Departure time: 2240H

19th August 2005, Friday

Today is the day I fly to Japan....

Yes after 5 hungry months of anticipation & astute planning (actually it spanned from end of last year), the day finally arrived for yet another swash-buckling Japanese trip which could meant so much to my happiness for the rest of my life...

Ok ok...don't make it sound so much at stake... After going to Tokyo alone last year for the Wonder Festival, I gained a bit of knowledge in venturing a land in which I had difficulty grasping the native language to begin with, and fully in faith I could expand it elsewhere within the country..
Despite the fact I have my lass with me in this trip, I basically single-handedly got everything in place like sourcing for tickets, liasing for accomodation, booking of train tickets, so on and so forth...

Anyway this day is the 15th of the Lunar 7th month and once again doused with Chinese residents burning offerings to their deceased ancestors...
Things didn't began as peaceful as I would like in my household when Mom accidentally spoiled the tap for the shower-head and resulted in jets of water bursting out from that point and Dad had a hard time fixing it in place and was on the verge of losing his temper over the whole incident..
It did hindered my preparations to work...

Me myself sure had the cough which can be a niggling ailments that could take the longest to recover..well I tried all I could to take medicine and hope for the best as back in 2003, I had a bad, phlegm-filled cough in Iwate and it miralcously recovered by itself without any medication or fasting of certain food that could aggravate the coughing itself..I tell you it's the fresh air there, man...

Back at work I passed down the last few instructions for Bobby who nervously take on the solo run of the service...
Meanwhile BY was halfway through doing her chores when her mother buzzed her to inform her that one of her beloved cat went missing which prompted her to frantically finish up her chore, applied an emergency leave and vamoosed home to hunt for her precioussss....
Last heard she did managed to find her, thank goodness....

YM who was supposed to be on leave as she had to stayed home to make sure that her flat is in order as it is undergoing upgrading renovations, came back to work as I happened to see her on my way to work..meaning in the end Bobby need not be all alone which sure can be daunting for him...

The Swiss researcher I mentioned a couple of days back who somehow found solace to be able to click with me in terms of sharing our knowledge about Japan, gave me a list of famous places of nature splendour today as he even brought with him a map of Northeast Japan to clearly highlight the locations of the places he recommended...However in the end I had forgotten to bring back the list he had written..sorry man...

Last night in "Rock Star: INXS", 3 long-haired blondes as I have predicted was the final bottom three as Ty would never be put into that situation he had 2 weeks back...

It was a close fight between the trio as INXS themselves felt and in the end the veteran of 4 consecutive "Bottom 3" dogfights, Jessica's luck is running away from her and she was duly eliminated but I can forsee both Deanna and Suzie to follow suit in coming weeks (which I might have a chance to watch...)



So back at home now, had to do a proper checking of the items I am packing (espcially the ring) and waiting anxiously for depature at Changi Airport later in the evening..

This would be my last blog till I come back on 2nd of September but I would be really busy those few days back to edit my travel video and photo gallery ....またね、みんな

Japanese word of the day:飛行~hi-kou~ (Flight) Hope I can sleep soundly on the plane for the very first time...

Counting down the seconds

18th August 2005, Thursday

1 day to go to my Japan trip...

Yes it is down to my final full day at work, and I was pretty upbeat despite I suspect I might be suffering from a bout of mild coughing...In fact my lass herself was down with sore throat days back, and the flu bug is such affecting any available victim possible...

Last evening, my buddy dropped me a couple of call using the internet telephony software, Skype. Despite been very soft and filled with morse code liek sound on the background, we can actually engage in our silly conversations , a situation not be found months back when he was seeking in vain for a telephone over his residence that can make cheap overseas call...
He informed me he could actually asks for a day off to show me around Osaka, but preferably on Monday or Friday which totally clash with my schedule there as I would be arriving the Kansai city by 3 pm on 29th August, Monday and be leaving on Friday morning on 2nd September, so both days are out..
Of course we can still meet in the evenings when he knocks off from work, which I am still looking pretty forward to...

Talking about flu bug not too long back, after Bobby had recovered from his flu since last week, and myself still struggling with a phlegm filled oesophagus, BY was next to suffer the wrath of the viral attack when she contracted a running nose which leave her sneezing and sniffling the entire morning.

The talk of the town is the unchallenged President Nathan retained his office for the next 5 years after the non-existent of eligible nominee on the election day, yesterday.
So as expected I have to kiss the off-in-lieu which might be created if there was a polling day on 27th, Saturday itself....

Meanwhile a trio of music pirates had been nabbed for sharing and distributing MP3s via mIRC which had been well tracked by RIAS for their activities...
Well since the turn of the year the local authorities had been trying to stamp their authorities on piracy on copyrights on the internet such as music and movie...
So one way or the other, these 3 had it coming for themselves for continue sharing up to 200, 000 mp3 files in such precarious manner...now the whole nation will witness what punishment they are in for and for the rest of us, better stay off mp3s and movie files...

Back on the work front, the mysterious phenomenon with our purification kit re-surfaced and I clean up whole sale the inidividual essence of the process and manage to stem out the unsatisfactory results...
The 800k white elephant-robot as well as one of the machines also started to show frailties and started to reveal errors which I hope would not disrupt Bobby's solo run starting from tomorrow's afternoon, well at least the work load is significantly decreased today as compared to yesterday.

A much positive news is that I was awarded an official name in my regularly patronised toy forum, Katoots.
There had been a contest to guess the official date when the 100th member of the forum would reach their 1000th post. It began in June with everyon e guessing from July to somewhere in 2006 for that benchmark to be reached..
I just feel the middle of August would be right to see the remaining few members who are at the brink of reaching their 1000th post, and little did I realise I am lucky enough to hit the jackpot and
I manage to gain my official name in the forum as "Toot's Straw Hat Pirate", something I can only achieve previously if I hit 4000 posts myself but my lack of activity there seem to make that aim a long and tedious one to achieve...

On "Rock Star: INXS" last evening, the remaining 8 were to sing songs chosen for them by the band unlike the case in which they will choose themselves in earlier rounds

The entire performance was sandwiched by a couple of out of this world performance with Jordis' take of "Knocking on Heaven's Door" and Mig doing a nice, romantic tine of "Baby, I Love your Way" with his vocals and piano playing the highlight of last night's show...

Next in line would be Marty's morbid rendition of Britney Spears' "Baby, One More Time" which was a big surprise for Marty and audience worldwide when J.D. told him about his selected song to be performed, and it was as Dave Navarro mentioned "not just outside his box but outside his entire venue"...And boy he nailed it perfectly...so I think it would Christina Aguilera next week..heehee

So who would be the bottom 3 this week?
Early figures show Jessica, Deanna and Ty but I doubt the popular Ty would be there tonight, so my guess is Suzie to join her 2 female mates and one lady would go home tonight...

Japanese word of the day: 秒~byou~ (Seconds) It's a matter of seconds to my escapade ...yoohoo

Sore Jaws...

17th August 2005, Wednesday

2 days to go to my Japan trip...

Woke up from a pretty dubious dream in which I was to carry out matrimonial ceremony with my lass in this shabby little place my parents had indicated with great emphasis..However I completely lost direction sense in my realm and was mis-guided by passer-bys and eventually got there hours late and had to face that typical black face of my old man...as black as charcoal..

I was woken up by then with saliva dripping from the corner of my mouth (just want to point out I seldom do salivate in my sleep, just need to smell my pillows to justify my point!)

Called the Mori household to check on their status at Iwate after the earthquake yesterday and glad to know everyone's fine and not much damage was inficted, my confidence of my much-anticipated is been rejuvenated...

This very day at work is filled with many visitors who I have to hold much conversation or explaination with..

Firstly the pirate-lookalike, Swiss researcher Pascual came to deposit his samples and while asking how was his trip, I got to realise that his wife is a Japanese and he just came back from a nature trip at Northern Honshu and had plenty of reccomendations of places of stunning nature splendour...Normally I would not look eye to eye with his assertive style to get the work done, but when come to the topic of Japan, the blatant interest shared by both of us is well evident..

Then in the late morning, some guy from the main headquarters came down to better understand our web portal which people had been harping about. Been someone who had no good impression with the main share facilties I have been assigned with, I serve my enquirer with a note of impatience and wanted to just expedite the entire explaination process. But this guy who was pretty new to the company isn't such a snobbish high level pompus no good SOB, so had a good time explaining about everything in the end...

Before lunch Ron from the Teaching Lab came by for a chat..From his wretched experience with a unruly driver to his lost in interest in his former vibrant bittorrent activities to the office politics existing in our current workplace and when Bobby is back from lunch with the girls, we had some army talks which is a much rarity from someone like yours truly...

Finally in the afternoon, the director of the company which help tailored our web portal and server came with a Norwegian lady whom he said would be expanding their service over the the Scandanavian market so we have to show her how well the portal the company has created and in the process of rumbling every bit of information, my motor mouth got off the rythum, my throat got dry and ticklish that I kept coughing away and my tongue got twisted, and you can see I'm really trying to rush through...

All these talkings made my jaws well sore by the end of the day and it got worse when the workload increased ten fold as knock off time grew closer..With Bobby off to do a specific task, I still got million and one things to settle over our side, which was why I had to enlist the help of BY and YM to settle everything fast before we can do our daily knock off routine of "Go-Go-Go" also known as jay-walking...

Ok gotta go pack my luggage now...

Japanese word of the day:　話す ~ha-na-su~(Talking) Did a lot of that this very day

Things are not looking Good...

16th August 2005, Tuesday

3 days to go to my Japan Trip

Wanted to talk about the dipping Japanese yen for this past week with Prime Minister's reform of the Postal Bank is definitely shaking up the market, resulting the yen to drop as low as S$1.48 for 100 JPY...which left me and my girlfriend in fit for we had exchange our yen months ago when the rate was pretty good as well at 1.543, thinking it might bonuce back to maybe 1.56 by this time...

However as I am typing this, people of Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture is licking their wounds after an off-shore earth quake of 7.2 Ritcher scale hit them full force at around 11.39 am Japan time.

Fortunuately the locality of the epicenter is not focus on land so the damage was kept low and the casualty is around 30+ people injured in Sendai...
However this news definitely doesn't go well with me as our trip is just days away and we would be travelling up to Iwate, which is nearby Miyagi..

In fact southern Iwate had an earthquake of 5.0 Ritcher of their own, so I would try to contact the Mori family to see if they are alright and how bad was the devastation..

I think Tay-chan would be stay in contact with Vincent and Miyano who are now somewhere in Kansai area for their "Obon" trip to check on their status as well

As reported all north-bound shinkansen (bullet trains) had been halted but resumed once it checked to be ok; as well as Narita and Haneda Airport...

Just hope everything would be ok, as it seems as of now; unlike when I first heard the news my heart dropped in down all the way to my stomach..
For some moment my anticipation nearly evaporated in front of my eyes...

Will keep peel to the status of the quake for now on....

Japanese word of the day: 地震 ~ji-shin~ (Earthquake) One of our worst fear comes true, luckily we are still here and insured for the trip.

No More Monkey-Head Mushrooms

15th August 2005, Monday

4 days to go to my Japan trip...

So it's down to the final few days of work before my flight of exhileration on Friday...

As I am typing this, I am thoroughly full and feeling kinda drowsy after the sumptous and over-the-top dining, more on that later...

This week also marks the profound absence of both JxMMy and my supervisor who should be on the long flight to San Francisco and somewhere in San Fransico respectively.
So I'm on my own to run the show and at the same time do a full force coaching of Bobby; with the appraisal over the weekend, I had extra stride in my footsteps.

I am letting Bobby doing most of the service as he is running show on his own for the 1st couple of days next week before JxMMy returns, so it's only fitting if he gets as much exposure while I am around as possible..
And the lad is learning the rope pretty fast, despite can be still a bit slow with some of the processes...

The girls had been buzzing about an ala carte buffet at Ling Zi Vegetarian restraunt for a while now and it was set on this very day to satisfy the long-suppressed hunger, literally

However I conjure a web of deceit this morning when I lied through my teeth that I had forgotten about the affair entirely and even brought lunch from home.
Since they need at least 4 persons to qualify for the buffet, the girls became flabbergasted, kept asking me to deal with my home-made "bento" and wondered if they should just call off the whole thing till I revealed my "treachery" which infuriate them...

Bobby was adamant not to join us, feeling that the long lunch expedition does not go down well with him...

So we left by 11 and took a direct bus down to Liat Tower in Orchard Road, with BY making her hunger known for umpteen times along the way...
Like the last time, we came to the retaurant slightly earlier than the usual operation time and the staff was briefed for a long while, with compound more misery to BY who was waiting desperately for the Tim Sum to be served...

And it finally came, we couldn't stop stuffing ourselves with the tasty vegetarian Tim Sums and we promptly followed up with the noodles and "Monkey-Head" mushrooms which we came solely for as well...

My lass joined us shortly after her work out session as her fitness center was located in Paragon, a stone throw away...and she had always been advocating for great tasting vegetarian food...

Somehow we felt amiss for the stark drop in quality as compared to the last time we had buffet lunch in Feburary, but still was good enough to fill our tummy...

But the girls got full with the 1st round of food and not well justified the price we had to pay for the buffet, so we decided to take a breather before adjourning to our next round and BY seems pretty interested for another serving of the sauteed Monkey-Head Mushrooms which she felt would go well with noodles as well.. She had been beckoning us to join the cause and YM kept insisting she would not touch some of the repeated orders...

I then went for some more Tim Sum with an exotic one known as "the 8-Treasure Sack", and eventually our table is filled with food again which at a point we are very sure we are close to 100% full...

So for the next half hour or so we kind of on a mission to coerce each other to stuff down the remaining food especially BY who had ordered each servings each of spring roll & carrot cake as well as noodles which was remotely interested by the rest of us...

You can virtually everyone's face turning green with been over-stuffing ourselves and the sight of the mushrooms (and even mere mention of it) makes me shudder and we are all bewildered on how a supposedly enjoyable lunch session had turned out to be a "over stuffing nightmare"...

After a trip to Kinokunya where I got some manga with my lass' members card, we bid her farewell and dragged our over-worked digestive system and a sleepy mood back to work...

Japanese word of the day: きのこ ~ki-no-ko~ (Mushroom) Had too much for lunch today...

Full Appraisal

14th August 2005, Sunday

5 days to go to my Japan trip...

Slept at 4 this morning and with only 6 full hours of sleep on this Sunday, I still feel pretty fresh...

As stated in my previous blog a Russian P.I. in our institute with a tendency of wearing the same shirt over and over again as well as boasting a nice American accent is pretty assertive to get us to come back on Saturday to help his staff processed a batch of samples with the fact that they are at the brink of publishing an important scientific paper which would propel their lab to new limelight...

I think he was in desperation and our supervisor who insisted not to bend the rule to accomodate one request which would have tongues wagging and resulted in more unwelcome requests from some other labs; eventually condescended and I who originally volunteered my service was the one assigned to come back on a nice, sunny Saturday afternoon to do what they wanted us to do...

I was pretty surprised to notice the hustle and bustle in my workplace even it is mid afternoon of Saturday which you can see in the scientific research line, there's no definitive office hours as if you required to, you just have to come back

I was able to do the task within a couple of hours as well as updating my webpage which had been well delayed for a couple of weeks or so...
Then I got an e-mail from my supervisor who wrote it just before she flies to San Francisco for the diplomatic visit with Se Ban, JxMMy etc.

In the email, she praised me on my recent positive working attitude regarding assimilating Bobby to our work and practises (of course she had no slight idea of my ploy)

This is coupled with the prompt, unrestrained way I had volunteered for the task on Saturday really bark up her alley...

This was all too good as with the undeterred favoritism towards JxMMy and the introduction to an equally stoic Bobby, I had been afraid my role in the lab would be displaced in no time especially with my close association with the girls, this email really inject a stench of confidence and enthusiaism to better myself and prove my value would be still valid in a slightly cramped up environment...

Of course at the end of the e-mail was a promised personal day off which at first I thought of use on coming Friday but feel it wasn't right to leave Bibby on the lerch to fend the storm alone as well as not informing my supervisor in the first place...so I guess would be better if I use it when I'm back

After my brief dropby at work, I made my way to La Tendo and was a quiet time there without the omni-present Vincent already in Japan and Chan and Ferris were visibly and vocally absent as well.

But things are building up about the upcoming Japan trip and one would wonder what kind of treasure we can unearth especially I found out that the highly-anticipated Tokyo Toy Festival would not be bundled together with Wonder Festival this time round...damn...'cos I was expecting to find some cheap, hard to find stuffs there as I did the year before...

Japanese word of the day:　ほめる ~ho-me-ru~ (Praise) Always feel good to be praised by your superior.

Strepsils Please...

12th August 2005, Friday

7 days to go to my Japan Trip..

Something I fear most so close to my trip actually seemed to in the stage of propogating itself...
I want to leave for Japan with a clean slate of health..
But not sure what apparent reason, I started feeling a bit of pain in my soft palete and my uvula when I woke up this morning, sort of like inflammed, making swallowing pretty difficult..
It all seems to point to the symptoms of sore throat which could lead to something worse like flu and cough *TOUCH WOOD!*
Well my new colleague Bobby himself was on his healing route from a very serious flu, thus he could be the source of virus that I might have contracted...
Better stock up on Strepsils and lonzenges to help alleviate the sore...
As I am typing this, I had sucked a pack of 6 Strepsils (which cost absurdly at $1.20) and downed a few gallons of water, I feel my throat is definitely clearing up...

Beside that I feel that my right ankle is a little sprained but should heal up real soon...

Got one of those dizzy, nasceous spell as I had experienced a couple of weeks back, perhaps all the hustle and bustle had once again taken a toll on me..But I was lucky to reach my destination stop before I really barfed my breakfast on a fellow passenger..a few deep breath of fresh air did help...

Talking about fresh air, we at Singapore are much more fortunate from our neighbours across the border at Kuala Lumpur who took the full blow of the haze which comes annually from Indonesia from the relentless forest burning.. It reached the critical PSI level in certain parts of KL yesterday afternoon (think around 500) and forced the government to shut down the usual functioning of schools and even a seaport which visibility was dwindled so much that normal sailing in and out of the port.. well the Indonesian government did offer an meek apology but after all the asthma and other health ailments the KLeans are suffering I really doubt an apology is suffice...

Now just pray our island could continue to be shielded from the haze unless the wind blows in the other direction...

There would be a high chance that I may need to dropby the lab tomorrow with a Russian researcher in dire needs to get a batch of results for his scientific paper to be published..once again all for the sake of an off-day...

According to the girls, Bobby seemed to be more vocal and conversative than JxMMy after our brand new colleague went lunching with them...Then again not many can successfully emulate a JxMMy...

So the result for "Rock Star:INXS" is in last evening and one the most positive contestant, 31 year-old Brandon was eliminated after his disastrous rendition of INXS' "Don't Lose Your Head' which he obviously had when he missed up alot of the lyrics and he took defeat with so much grace, in front of 2 ladies whom had been in the bottom 3 for 3 times, Jessica and Suzie (whom really stunned the band and Dave Navarro since they find her "Losing My Religion' one of the highlights fo the previous night's show)...The thing is Jessica escape axing for the 3rd time, but can she repeats her feat for the 4th time? we'll see...

Japanese word of the day: のど~no-do~ (Throat) Getting better by the moment...

Not Enough Time...

11th Aug 2005, Thursday

8 days to go to my Japan trip...

Quoting a 1992 hit from the most talked about band now, INXS...
~Not enough time to do what I want...~

Which is all true with the trip about a week away, I still got some loose ends to tie up before I leave on next Friday and the arrival of Bobby kinda robbed away some of my private time at work..

So now basically had to confirm the list of gifts we are getting for the Moris and I stroke off "Bak Gua" (BBQ Pork) as I got an intense intuiton that it would be considered a sensitive item which I would have to go through the hassle of declaring before it would be allowed to bring into Japan. Well since we are getting them mooncakes as well as cashew & pistachio, I think should be well enough to make up for the absence of the tasty delicacy...

Bobby came in to work pretty early at around 8, as he thought he would be helping the girls with loading the agarose gel, only to be disappointed by the fact that they had just "cooked" the gel...

My lass called to inform me that the situation at her company was a bit jittery and they seemed to be suffering a grief loss in profit, which may prompt them to carry out measures like axeing of staff or pay cut up to 30%...In the first place the company wasn't such a wonderful place to work in and with such implementations I rather my girl slave at the new company start-up by her former Korean mentor during her attachment which would pay her for what she deserved at least...

In last evening's "Rock Star: INXS", the remaining 9 contestants slugged it out to prevent themselves from been eliminated this week...
The most desperate one to impress was Jessica who had we all know been in the bottom 3 for 2 straight weeks prior to last week's fortunate escape...
Seriously to me she should be the one next on the chopping board as the band felt her rendition of Nirvana's "Come as You are" lacks the passion that should be instilled for that particular song while Jess kept insisting it's passionate enough for her and that really irks the band as it seems like she was a wee bit too snobbish and resistant to suggestions by the judges themselves...

Meanwhile the elite group of Ty, Jordis, Marty and Mig once again could do no wrong..
In fact from loggerheads, Mig and J.D. made up like men usually do when the former was willing to give up his No. 1 choice of Seal's "Crazy" to the latter when J.D.'s No. 1 selection was snatched under his nose by Jessica.
J.D. also wanted to had a much kinder approach towards his fellow contestants and offered Susie suggestions to re-arrange R.E.M's "Losing My Religion" which was very well recieved by the judges and audience alike...

So it would be formality that Jessica to be featured in the bottom 3 tonight..Joining her would most probably be Brandon who's style was not well conceived by the band and perhaps Deanna and not surprisingly those 3 were the previewed bottom 3 once the line was opened for voting last evening...

Japanese word of the day: 一週間~i-sshuu-kan~(1 Week's Time) That's all I had left to settle whatever outstanding issues...

Feeling Patriotic?!

10th August 2005, Wednesday

9 days to go to my Japan trip...

Back to work after National Day, and still reeling from the effects of the day out which I would narrate in a while time.

Today's main thing is the Drug Target and Design Symposium which once again translate to gobbling down free food the entire day..man we are such hungry vultures...
However the topic been featured today is abit too "cheem" for me to keep my concentration that I nearly snoozed for a few times...

It's Bobby's 2nd day at work but you could feel he was still abit tense about the new environment and new responsibilities...
JxMMy is back and I was jittery about the fact that he might grew too attached to the guy somewhere in some aspects resemble him in terms of been "pretty dead"
However I feel quite satisfied to act as a bridge between Bob and the girls which would only be good to my cause; however the strigent, to-the-book lad wasn't too impressed with our time off from work such as going for the tea at 3pm or planning to dine at LingZhi next week...

So on National Day, the weather was excruciating and the humidity and the still air comes well-coordinated with the unforgiving sun making manoveuring around our Lion City pretty uncomfortable..But that did not hinder a huge crowd to flood Yishun as of other locations on the island to be busking in the granduer celebration of our nation's 40th birthday...

While walking towards my lass' place, one would notice the military vehicles that got plenty of "mountain-based turtles" skipping for a joyride in full enthusiaism...

We made our way down to Queensway Shopping Center where our usual fashion haunt residing with a retailer-uncle knew what style of jeans we favored..
It seems like he seemed to hit the jackpot with the jeans my girl woul cast her eyes on and without 2nd warning she grabbed 2 into her shopping cart as her successful training routine has seen her losing a few inches of her waist to garner enough attention to get new jeans to prep for the pending trip next week...
Me..I got a pair myself after try on one pair of god-bestowed piece which just simply assimilate onto my thighs without any need for alteration and love it on first sight..
Our shopping took quite a while which ran a bit late in schedule to get down Vincent's place in Jln Membina despite the availability of a direct bus there with a journey less than 15 minutes away...

Taking the high ascending elevator to Vince's "penthouse" on the 30th floor sure have pressure gathered in the ears and once the door was opened, we can see some of Vincent's boisterious acquintances having some friendly card game..The clique are stuck by the buffet table as Miyano had threatened us to eat first before admission into the apartment..Actually time is ticking down as the caterers would be coming down by 6 to clear it up but there was plenty of food left...
Vincent wasn't around the entire time we were there as he was summoned to proceed to the the Padang to help out in some of the fireworks display brought together by Unusual Productions...

5 plus, the NDP is starting and the comperes are psyching up the crowd at the various locations while over at our side, Vincent's place has a great view of the landscape and Padang isn't too far away, so we could easily spot the planes and parachuteers from the sky which was exhilarating to watch live...




Meanwhile we had an opportunity to see the display cabinet Vincent had been waxing lyricals about and sure look nice with cool lighting and all..
The One Piece's "Portrait of Pirates" figurines are nicely posed in a complete set and Miyano's Disney figurines and miniatures are displayed assertively as well...
But the damaged Transformers Binaltechs sure do not go well with Reset Vignette series...


Could have done better with the display...


The parade got pretty hot up as Vince called his wife to keep tab of the time of the fireworks...
Somehow there was plenty of false alarms with Chan kept insisting he smelt "gunpowder" (which might not be used in fireworks)
Ferris who had attended the preview show a couple of weeks back also tried to guide us through the programs but just could not give the exact moment the fireworks would be coming on...


Ferris sitting comfortably in the apartment alone while the rest of us camp outside hoping to see fireworks


Someone mentioned that the helicopter should hold this flag over Padang instead.

My girl was in a frenzy and camped outside the apartment to be able to capture the actual sky illumination..By this point, Matthew and his girlfriend, Carol were around to watch the procession with us.. Jackson was the last Kagoshima member to stay behind to watch with us as well...and Miyano was a superb host as a true blue Japanese housewife is all well capable of dishing...sabisu, sabisu...

By around 8, the parade was near the climax and by now the usually quiet neighborhood suddenly had neighbors gathering by the corridor to have a good look of the fireworks, so are the entire gang and we were not disappointed with the beautiful display which always managed to steal the show in all NDPs past and present...


Please don't mind the lousy shot....this is the best I can conjure in the nick of time.

Vincent mentioned they would be one firework display scheduled at 9pm which we simply laughed it off and seriously it did not happen..We conclude the cosy and eventful housewarming with a slideshow of the photos taken by Eng Kiong from the last Hong Kong vacation Chan, Ferris, Ziwei etc. had went as well... Miyano also had a hilarious ribbing of past Singapore Idol contestants who had a series debutting later on the night which was doomed to crash and burn, she ponders on how come Singaporeans could go ga-ga over the biggest loser, named Sly and gave Olinda the nickname, "Fatty Girl"...

Got home by 11 plus after a long bus journey in 851 which most probably had coverd 3/4 of the island, and shagged us out to the core... and still felt the goverment should just award us another day of rest after a tireless celebration given by most citizens...

Japanese word of the day: 花火~ha-na-bi~ (Fireworks) Everyone sure will go ga-ga over the beautifully designed display...me included...

New Kid on the Block

8th August 2005, Monday

11 days to go to my Japan trip...

My chirpy morning was well shattered by the fact that my beloved audio-technica headphone's chassis was tore apart at the right ear-piece....my heart was well sore with devastation as it had only lasted me for less than a year (since I bought it in my Japan trip exactly a year before)..
Now I need to search for the strongest adhesive available to heal the wound my precioussss...has suffered...

The trip to work would be really monotonous without music but glad to find some solace in a junior of mine from NUS, Tiong How who has shifted to Sembawang and on his way to NIE where he is in the midst of his one year course on his quest to be a teacher...always good to meet someone I haven't talked to for a long while...

The main feature for the day is the arrival of the new colleague, Bobby...
We kept teasing BY to prepare a huge can of cat food as in her brood of street cats there was one sharing the namesake of our new co-worker...
However the morning was filled with thousand & one scheduled tasks to accomplish and not had the opportunity to talk to this quiet giant (he stands at 1.82m!!) who was hogged by conversation with my supervisor and a series of routine paperwork and briefing.

I did bring him to the sole foodcourt within our vicinity to purchase his lunch and had an adequate chat with him at the lounge while we dined.
He seemed to have thought about further his studies in life science and hope his stint here could propel him towards his dream...
However he seemed well accustomed to do any job openings available to him including a well-paid prison ward post..

How could I ever thought I could manipulate him to go against JxMMy when he was feeling daze and groggy the entire afternoon as I gave him an insight of our job,,,
Perhaps been his first day he was still tense of the new environment or perhaps he is still trapped in a bout of flu and the medicine is making him drowsy...
I myself had a dry throat after all the briefings and explainations to him as well as the girls who wanted to learn the ropes during the period when me and JxMMy would be both overseas,,

But I feel I seemed to have equipped him well with some basic idea of how our service was run as well as giving him opportunities to hands on, much contrary to my very first day 3 years back when the "Shit" did not fill with much details except more his useless trivias and lame jokes...

The girls find him kind of like a piece of emotionless "dead plank" but it could really be because of the reasons given above..Think the first impression wasn't too propitious...

However Bobby seemed to be a bit slow to pick things up which might be good meaning my position could yet been displaced... man I hate that schemeing side of me...

This eve of the National Day ended pretty fast with all the briefings and surprisingly compunded with much workload on a Monday which most would take leave to enjoy an extra long weekend...

And I had to go through a single day at work..without doing some routine internet surfing (:_:)

Back to mending my broken heart and my wounded headphone.....

Japanese word of the day: 同僚 (Colleague) A brand new one delivered on our doorsteps

The Tikam Effect

7th August 2005, Sunday

12 days to go to my Japan trip...

A nice Sunday to just relax at home, watching recent episodes of "SMAPXSMAP" which never fails to make me ponder the amount of efforts and budget the Fuji Television Production team has pumped in to keep viewers entertained and constantly refreshed with humour and entertainment not repeated in subsequent episodes...
From the lavish set up for guests to savour great cuisine cooked up by the SMAP members in "Bistro Smap" to big in-studio games which includes high quality stage props that would never graced local TV to well-choreographed skits..and ultimately lies in the X-Factor the lads exude as well as the talent they possess. Seriously they may not be the bext looking male artistes in Japan nor are they the best in singing or dancing, but it's poignant why they can be so popular for a decade or so...

Ok...beside waxing lyricals about SMAP and their program, I have also watched a sleeper hit in Japan, "Azumi", a high quality DVD lent to me by Ferris..
This 2003 blockbuster hit adapted from the manga series by Koyama Yuu, is about the lives of a bunch of young assasins reared to help the cause of the Tokugawa family to assisnate any oppositions...
A youthful and beautiful cast led by one of the hottest idol in Japan now, Ueto Aya, nice cinematography, and plenty of actions and blood (and more death toll than the Rambo series I think) sure make up for a pretty weak storyline and stiff acting..
The only bright spot in this movie is the appearance of one of my fave Japanese actor now, Odagiri Jo..who starred as a skilful yet remotely sane swordsman known as Bijomaru Mogami..
Man this guy's filmography is full of out of this world characters like Kamen Rider Kuuga, to the tragic Takeshi in "Tentai Kanzoku", to the violent cop with a dark background in "Kao" and then as Saitou Hajime in my fave "Shinsengumi"..I simply adore his performance every single time...

Guess where I went to yesterday...
Oh ok...no point for guess La Tendo, it's a dead-panner...heehee

Which leads me to the main topic about "tikam"...
Ok from reliable sources "tikam" in Malay means "poking" or "stabbing" which I assume in the past there's a local game in which kids can random poke grids covered with a piece of paper which contained a toy or other novelty items within, so it is down to luck whether you can get a good prize or not...

For a person who doesn't like to gamble because I am a big sore loser, I love such "tikam" stuffs since young...
My love for gashapons traced back as young as toddler days and was rekindled in recent years much atoned to the high quality figurines the toy companies in Japan can conjured up...
However "tikaming" for both gashapons and related toys as in candy toys or trading figures which come in blind boxes which buyers would have the slightest idea what is within that random box they choose can be an endless pit for your wallet...
Whereas some smart collectors have managed to use color theme and powerful torch light to shine the dark interior of the capsule machines to figure out what would come out next to avoid too many repeats..
However in the art of picking blind boxes, in the past people can use the weight of the specific figurines to choose the ones they desire...
But manufacturers became smart and added weights to the lighter ones to further confuse buyers, leading in fustrated and unscruplous collectors to tear up part of the boxes behind the shelves in supermarket or toy outlets to get that specific piece they want

For me I usually will foot a bit more just to get a complete set with the guarantee of the pieces I want instead of sprawling into the endless pit which might resulted in more cost incurred

Yesterday there were 2 such cases witnessed in La Tendo:

1) A regular customer known as Jeff came to innocently to collect his stuff till was cajoled by Eng Kiong to try his luck on a "Gundam Seed Chara Fortune"



The anime series was a big hit which was a big selling point for fans globally, thus companies like Bandai and Megahouse would reap fortunes by releasing endless line of products to woo the buyers and in this case Jeff who was resistant to purchase a complete set to get the 4 characters he just wanted, and instead tried his luck on the random ones which cost $5 each. He did managed to get first 3 the ones he wanted till he got stuck with the one called "Kira (the one on the far left)"...
After a couple of unsuccessful attempts (which cost $10), he then decided to go for a twist of his luck to ask Ferris, Karen, Chan and myself who are by his side to choose some pieces..
Been someone without the nest of luck, I chose a piece called "Frei (the red hair girl in pink uniform" which he least wanted...Meanwhile Ferris instructed us how to feel for the hair sculpt of Kira to get the piece Jeff desperately wanted to get
So after a grand total of $35 spent, Jeff still did not get Kira..bummer man...

2) Next is Ferris' turn to indulge in his random picking adventure..
This time round something much more harder to pick than the Chara Fortune...
It's CARDS!!!
Cards are difficult to collect yet an expensive indulgence in which young teenage girls seem to willing surrender their pocket money to get some high quality 2D cards which for a while was part of the trunk of a tree...
The one Ferris was picking is once again a Gundam Seed product that Megahouse has created to suck the wallets dry of fans and collectors:



I'm not sure what madness was driven into Ferris for him to even contemplate of getting one card like this..despite the nice cell effect and quality, I don't feel justify to cost $10 a piece...
Matthew urged him to get a full unopen box at a discounted price (which still adds up to around $120) to ensure the pieces he wants..
But he was not moved by the offer and decided to try his luck..
Opening the one he picked from the stack he got a blond guy playing piano which he berated for a while, claiming this was one of the 3 he least wanted to get...
Undeterred, he bought another card, and guess what, he got the 2nd piece of the trio he loathed..this time it really irked him as he cursed and swore for a goods 15 minutes about his bad luck and the card ironically came with wordings emblazed as "I'm the special one for you" which further enraged him but really floored us...
However he felt the need to get at least one nice card which he deemed would be the formula to made him sleep soundly last night, so he picked another piece with much thoughts and consideration and did finally got one of the 13 he deemed ok to get..but he forgotten that he had already wasted a good $20 on 2 useless cards...

Well for me I would try not to fall into such trap of folly to be robbed of my hard earned cash..so I would always buy something which I know what I would get in the end...

Japanese word of the day: 運~un~ (Luck)You need alot of it for "tikam" if not you need a lot of money.

Constant Craving

5th August 2005, Friday

14 days to go to my Japan Trip

The skies of Singapore had been engulfed by the smothering haze and smell of the column of smoke from the burning of offerings to the deceased by the Chinese as we mark the beginning of the creepy 7th Lunar month, more well known as the month of Hungry Ghost Festival when our suprnatural "good brothers" were allowed for a month's grace to roam the human world to feast on the food offered by their descendants as well as having other sources of entertainment such as scaring the hell out of innocent people or watching "ge tai" etc...

Well for this month just had to watch the time to go back home, praying not to had some unprecedented and unwelcomed encounter of the "other" kind...Also gonna stay away from some taboos like swimming at the beach, holding auspicious events like giving births, wedding ceremong, house moving etc.

Back to work, more attached to the girls once more as I just wanna take it easy on the final day of a long work week (as of all Fridays)

Then got a thought about cravings... everyone even saints has cravings of their own, be it selfish or magnanimous, simple or require meticulous connivings...

Just like today I had a craving to have some snack beside my lunch box so I went to get a prata from the absurdly priced prata shop at the food court formerly known as "Soul Food"

My lass had a certain craving for my attention & affection when she called in the morning...

The girls in my workplace had cravings of their own...
A self-owned place to form santuary for cats for BY; a lavish and romantic wedding ceremong for YM; a blue-eyed, blond, 6 feet tall beau who can sing Jay Chou's song for LF to sweep her off her feet...

For my supervisor, she would crave for many more clones of JxMMy to be working under her (try not to read too much with the word "under)

For JxMMy, he craves to have kids soon to fulfill the stoic life story of his as well as more working hours so as to let his passion for the job goes ballistic...

For my family..My parents would crave for me to settle down and bore them a grandchild to fiddle with... My sis would crave for a well-paid job to support her lavish lifestyle

For my buddy in Osaka, he craves for a name in the gaming world and be able to turn heads from crtics and fellow professionals with his artistic achievements and recognition as well as a wife , an amalgam of Mizuho of "Onegai Teacher", Aoi from "Ai yori Aoshi" & Chidori from "Full Metal Panic" who would constantly made bentos for him

For CS, he constantly craves for a less slave-driving job and more Quality Time with his lass...

For the folks at La Tendo, they crave for more business as usual
For Chan, he definitely craves for a brand new house to have ample space to display his collections as all collectors would crave as well...
For Ferris, he would want more money to support his random expenditure...
For Karen, perhaps a job in which she has more liberty to take leave unlike been tied down by her teaching career now...

For Foo of my Japanese clique, a name in the local film making scene I guess and settle down with his long timie beau, Michelle after his crave/desire been resolve
Selina would crave for more overseas trip (not like she has got much now)
Jackson would crave for more colourfully tinted hair while Cheryl would crave for more time to enjoy things that she likes now that she had gotten her job

Everyone has his/her little cravings..like the terrorists/ fundamentalists in the middle would crave for the crumble of the US and their allies while Chelsea would crave for a Cameroonian player known as Essien...
Tom Cruise would crave for less paparazzi for his plan to marry Katie Holmes while Brad Pitt too hope the limelight could be off him and Angelina Jolie
President Nathan may or may not crave for a second stint as the President of Singapore while the LTA craves for more revenue with the implementation of the ERP gantry on weekday nights on the CTE...
Taxi drivers would crave for more income with the price hike
While a craving of a former air stewardess went awfully wrong as she accidentally dropped and killed the young daughter of her illicit karang guni man lover a year ago with the trial proceedings taking the headlines now...
A 53 year old Muslim man craves for a younger, more nubile wife, and was doused with acid by his wife...

So be careful of what you crave for....

One person who might be craving for repentance or a 2nd chance will be Tara from "Rock Star: INXS" when she became the latest to be eliminated from the competition...


Pitted against 2 hot faves like Ty and Brandon in the bottom 3, even her rendition of "Beautiful Girl" could not save her from been axed by the band who seemingly adore Ty and Brandon too much to let them go so early in the competitions...I'm actually surprised Jessica wasn't one of the bottom 3...

Now with Jordis, Marty & Mig left not yet faced the brink of elimination, the contest is definitely peaking to its climax in coming weeks with now even the genuinely good could be eliminated anytime for one off day performance....

Japanese word of the day:~yo-ku-bou~ (Craving) Now I just crave for a good weekend to spend for my own leisure and ample rest....

Eclectic Musical Taste

4th August 2005, Thursday

15 days to go to my Japan Trip

Feeling pretty chirpy this morning... Physically I have been on tip top condition for recent times despite the niggling effect of lack of sleep, mentally I'm feeling upbeat with the weekend just a stone throw away...
The fact that I came in to work in my usual time for the first time this week sure is a morale booster as well....

The date for the Presidential Poll has been set on the 27th of this month as the people of Singapore would come together for the first time after the NKF fracas to vote for our 3rd public-elected president...
Hey wait...27th I would most probably stuffing myself silly with "wanko soba" in an authentic restaurant somewhere within the city of Morioka, Iwate; meaning I couldn't be physically around to witness local history in the making (which I have been pondering hard on whether do i really care...)
Actually there be a high possibility that our current president, S.R. Nathan would retain his seat in Istana for yet another 5 years if the other 2 candidates are deemed ineligible to run for presidency on the Nomination Day on the 17th..which pales in comparison to the hitly-contested, teeth-gnashing tussle we have watched in presidential elections in other countries like the States for example.
Nonetheless our PM has announced 27th August, a Saturday a public holiday which I think would remain; and according to our company policy that a public holiday to be fallen on a Saturday with be granted an extra day of "off-in-lieu" in our records...woohoo!!

Of yes I'm very sure fans of JxMMy D had been yearning for more of the juicy yet eccentric scoop about your idol which had been taking a hiatus in my blog for a while...
Ok ok..calm down..here I go:
A couple of days ago, I noticed a MS Prompt window of the PC of one of the machine has been activated for your usual "cmd" mode.
This is not a rare occurence to be harping over about since the self-proclaimed IT expert of our lab had always been experimenting with the PCs of the individual machines with all sorts of programs resulting in endless pop ups and high suspicion of virus attacks...
However on a closer observation, I noticed that some files transferred is in process and it seemed like the files are actually tons of mp3 files from an assortment of albums.
I was assuming he would be orchestrating his own DJ project once I'm away for my trip as I usually log on to the live radio for Class 95 which would blast music to fill the room whether the listeners are willing or not.
Been as curious as a cat, I went to investigate on what kind of music JxMMy had been listening to.

I was taken aback by the eclectic, mish-mash, "rojak" selection of tracks he had selected...
I had mentioned before he had a liking for new age music as well acid/lounge jazz therefore the likes of Secret Garden, Laura Fygi and Era are not uncommon
But I didn't know he is into Bossanova as well when I see Lisa Ono's albums in the list as well
He also been secretly supporting local talent in the form of Corrine May...
This is sandiwched between the new albums of U2, The Jet and Erasure...
Of course he had been into Mandarin pop as well but I didn't jot down the artists he had been raving about...most probably old school stuff like Jacky Cheung.
Finally I was pretty amazed to see even some J-pop music (just a compilation of the award winning hits without specific information like the title nor the artist performing the song) and even Korean music such as the OST of "Winter Sonata"...
I'm actually quite surprised he did not include Indian chants or maybe some Alps yodelling compilation with house/trance/techno, as well as gothic/industrial rock, and classical pieces...
As BY has mentioned before he has no specific taste in music and it's apparent he had "jump the bandwagon" tendency of listening to what the masses are listening....hell, he don't even hum a song since I knew him ever...

Perhaps the only thing that I would be alike to my corpse-like colleague (who is dire void of life) would be our constant need for music (regardless of good or bad)....

In last night's "Rock Star: INXS", the remaining contestants raised their bar to impress the band as well as the audience after the shock double whammy elimination of Daphna and Heather...

The contestants had a vocal clinics to work on their hidden vocal abilities which reaped rewards for many like Jessica and even Jordis who always churned out flawless performance and did a splendid rendition of David Bowie's "The Man who Sold the World"...

Cocky, pompous J.D. were a blatant target for verbal criticism for Dave Navarro and INXS after last week's abysmal performance of "We are the Champion" which sure caught the band surprised that he was not one of the bottom 3 which sure indicates how well he was recieved by the audience who had been smittened by his talent for musical arrangment and cocksure attitude....
When Mig (now my personal fave) did a fantastic "We will Rock You", Dave mentioned Queen would be relieved now after J.D.'s performance last week...

The girls whom I think would be likely to have another eliminated did well with Deanna climbing to the band's table to do an "intimate" performance for them, Susie did a Beatles' classic under her grasp with interactions with the supporting house band and Tarra did a nice Police's song...

Brandon, another of my fave sang one of my fave contemporary rock song, Tonic's "If you can only see" and succeeded in expanding his vocal powers after struggling during the build up...

So it's tough this week to pick the bottom 3 this week because everyone did so good (except Ty who struggled with Foo Fighters' "Everlong" which he had not heard before his selection but still did great)...
Anyway my take would be Jessica, Tara and perhaps Deanna or Brandon..but quite sure Jessica couldn't lucky for the 3rd time straight....

Japanese word of the day: 音楽~on-ga-ku~ (Music) Someone got some weird music affliations, I'm not surprised one fine day he would be listening to Andy Hui's 70s Cantopop after some Japanese enka

Gu Niang Whining

3rd August 2005, Wednesday

16 days to go to my Japan trip...

Midweek already and once again cannot get to work at my usual time...much attributed to a combinations of me boarding a later train as well as the make-shift bridge which really prolong the journey between the MRT station and the feeder bus pick up point.

Just not too inspired to do much this very day and the lack of quality sleep (been dreaming way too much these few nights) compounded by the chilly weather (well amplified with the strong air conditioning within my workplace) surely made me pretty drowsy at this very moment...

Last evening at just an hour shy of the midnight, one of my closest female comrade from my Uni days, HZ called me , which taken me slightly aback, and sure was a disruptive force for I am concentrating on my toys collection photography session.

It seemed like she had been urged by someone to attend the annual freshmen orientation program in NUS known as Rag Day this coming Saturday. On this day, the various faculties would pit against each other to exhibit their artistic talent with a well-garnished float made by recycable materials (which supposed to be the case but rarely so).. I had my share of joy and sorrow during my varsity days struggling to complete the floats by the eleventh hours... sure can be fun..but I doubt i would relive that again...

I was prompt to answer her enquiry about whether I would actually gracethe occasion which was not what she was expecting.
Sensing that she wanted to go but need company, she would persuade, cajole, coerce and beckon me to change my mind which I am adamant for sure I wouldn't wanna waste my Saturday morning as well as $3+++ of travelling fee down to NUS just to watch other faculties squashing my alma mater (what's new) with their display and creativity
In fact I wasn't even prepared to attend Bernard's baby boy, Hobbes' 1st birthday as well on the same day...yes welcome to my hermit-style world of solitude...

But as I mentioned before, HZ's relentless whining and repeating the same point over and over again sure has no meaning to me, so last night I guessed I did the right thing to just end the conversation short and sweet, urging her to hang up saying I'm busy with my things which I am..If not it would last into the wee hours talking about nothing I would not taken note of before, and painfully devouring my slumber-time...
Hell she's not even my girlfriend, though in a speck of my past years I had that desire but the thought would be instantaneously eradicated once she starts her "gu niang" whining again...

In fact HZ wasn't the only "Gu Niang" whiner I had heard this week, in fact this very morning my colleague,YM with her usual whining voice over the phone probed on why her samples did not turned out as well as she was expecting.
This was not exactly the sweetest rhapsody I wanted to tune to kick-start the morning with...

I mean guys do whine as well but not to an extent that can be as irritating as the girls with their "gu niang" style of whining which most of the time is repeated over and over in a short span of time, hoping to get a solution from the listener immediately...

JxMMy might be the "king of negativity" but he rarely whines, in fact he doesn't even bother talking much but pry on the problem himself if he has the capability to of course
Then there was that "I Don;t Know" shrug of his shoulders, but that was much more bearable to the "Gu Niang" whine...

But not the entire female gender is been bestowed such kind of disturbing behavior...THANK GOODNESS...
My lass for example would whine and constantly be in a worrisome mode, but she never once had that viscous, clinging "Gu Niang" whining...
She has some trait of a guy in such a more "down to earth, straight to the problem" way of viewing thing which I felt blessed not to have to solve every single thing for her...
Kudos to her independance!

Japanese word of the day: うるさい~u-ru-sa-i~ (Noisy) Japanese usually hurls this word on someone or something that is irritating them, I would love to use this on some of those Gu Niang Whiners of mine sometime...

Plotting and Scheming

2nd August 2005, Tuesday

17 days to go to my Japan trip...

In the Middle East, the kingdom of Saudi Arabia lost a great king in King Fahd and his passing on could be a great loss especially with the peace within the Middle East which has been in turbulent with all the terrorism looming within....
Meanwhile I am down to the finale of my Shinsengumi series, and finally at the brink of seeing the death in the great Buera Chief, Kondo Isami... in the final episode, which I should be watching painfully later in the evening would see friends and subordinates from near and far to try to halt his execution by the Satsuma Clan who finally got him to admit his true identity.

The morning was been occupied by my last few pieces in the puzzle of my Japan trip planning, including reserving the train tickets for my final trip from Osaka to Tokyo and the Narita Express to the airport itself; printing details of Odaiba as well as for the Skybus and finally for the complete itinerary list which we had plotted....

Also had a tiff with my lass after I revealed my thoughts about her wayward spending which kind of spoiled her day..me bad...

Anyway it was confirmed from our supervisor yesterday that the new colleague whom she had mentioned about in the lab meeting would definitely be arriving next week...
As it seems highly probable that he will report to work on Monday instead of Wednesday (the day after National day) as Old Hag of the Admin had instructed and it would be a golden opportunity to know him before JxMMy does as he would be taking leave on Monday itself...
I relayed my thoughts to the girls yesterday to cajole him into our group, playing out extreme office politics, so as eventually he would see the traits and true nature of our so-called "Lab Manager" and eventually labeled him as "Public Enemy No. 1" as well..MUAHAHAHA...
(I can feel my horns and arrow-tipped tail are poliferating as I am typing this)

But to put it into a more realistic way, it's better for me to gain a new ally than a foe in times when I need someone to back me up in certain decision...
Especially I'm in no fantastic terms with JxMMy (we aren't even strange bedfellows since I would even shudder at the thought of sharing the same frigging bed with him)

Of course my plan could back fire on me if I did it in such discreet manner...the new guy would think I am coming too strong (no sexual context please) and he would feel something amiss and I am in the end the bad guy who try to insert with some evil ideologies or doctrines..
JxMMy on the other hand been that stoic, relentless worker as he is might become a true model to emulate...

Well office politics are hard to dictate, one wrong move and you could end up sprawling into a trap which you may not be able to creep out from..maybe should just let nature takes it's course...

Japanese word of the day: オフィスの政治 ~o-fi-su-no-seiji~ (Office Politics) Welcome to the real world, you just gotta play it to succeed..

Inconveniences...

1st August 2005, Monday

18 days to go to my Japan trip...

The start of August bestowed me with a string of inconveniences...

I began with the carparks along my journey to the MRT station been scheduled for upgrading, well this has been going on for a while but it seemed to taking toll on my tight timing to rush for that direct train to work...

At Bouna Vista, the next phase of the Circle Line involves the rejuvenation of the usual overhead bridge that links the station to the opposite bus stop in which we would usually crossed, either to reach our work place by foot or via the feeder bus service...
Actually there had been posters pasted on the grillings of the bridge last week, but I'm sure not many would remember such trivial matters after the weekends..
So like many I was ushered to a make-shift temporary overhead bridge on the other side which really made the entire journey seems much longer and if I was on the usual route I would be able to catch the bus on time but I had to witness the bus departing as I was seconds away from it..Bummer

The heat and humidity ain't not helping a single bit...

Back to work one of our 4 main machines encountered a recurring problem and seemed to be un-usable for a while...
Beside that the main server is down which led to plenty of enquiries to be answered and explanations to be done; which of course I left it for JxMMy to handle which he would be doing at his own rights...

Yesterday spent a full day with my lass ...
What intended to just go down JTB to make payment for our Studio Ghibli Museum tickets became a full-fledge shopping trip as she decided to not attend her Japanese class...
We shopped for shirts for her brother who would be starting work in a freight company as he has decided to leave their father's company as he had not been duly paid for months...
Then I felt it would be a great opportunity to proceed to Chinatown to do some gift acquisitions for those who would host us in Iwate.

I intended to get Hiroki the 2 highly-raved Corrine May's albums as seriously she seemed like a good PR to show our island's feeble music scene.
I was glad to get it at this congested, tiny CD shop near Outram Center for $15 each which was really a steal as elsewhere would cost me at least $18 each.
Beside that they also boast pretty impressive selection of Japanese Pop CD...
Top on my list has to be L'Arc~en~ciel's "Awake" album and the initial enquiry was replied with a usual "not available"..
But after intricate combing of the Japanese pop Cds been piled on top of one another, I actually found the silver-colored cover and at only $7 for a China-press..woohoo...
My lass and myself even did somemore indulging with some CDs we had been yearning to own but been put off my the high price at major CD stores elsewhere...

She then suggested going down toward's People Park's Center to check if there would be any unique novelty items to get for them...
After searching a while, we sort of thinking of just proceed back home till we came to this "3 items for $10" store which is part of a franchise to entice tourists in to buy some real affordable novelty items for friends back home...
We did found some nice oriental style decorative items such as wine holder and tissue box wrapper, which would be great as gifts though it may not represent much about our island nation...

An hour bus ride back sure made both of us drowsy all the way especially her would basically was in slumberland 80% of the journey.

In the evening we finally satdown to meticulously go through the complete itinery I had composed on Friday.
Then as we look through the attractions in Disneyland Resort, she became reallu upbeat about it and got very excited of the prospects of gracing some of the nice Disney-inspired attractions...
Our initial plan was to have an economical, concise "Night" Tour ticket which starts from 6pm which would end by 10 which was the closing time of the resort.
But after much consideration that the time was limiting for us to see the gist of the place, we both felt we should spend a bit more to be able to enjoy ourselves to some of the rides in which would not be hindered by the crowd if we are actually going there early that particular Wednesday morning.
However the high prospect of our budget been bludgeoned to submission when we are been constantly enticed by the wide array of Disney merchanises which on the webpage had already made my girl drooled profusely, made us very worrisome...

As I sent her home, her upbeat mood suddenly swung for the worst as the current situation back home was affecting her mood for weeks now...
It's apparent that her father's infidelity had been justified and breaking down her mom especially and slower causes cracks and fissures within her family...
She herself actually is accepting a divorce as long as her mom is happy but it seemed like she doesn't seems to want to let go...
My advice for her was to be strong and lead by example for her 2 younger brothers as they would eventually be the pillars of support for her mom if it does mean that their marriage was to come to such bitter ending...
Once again I think I would assume the role of the listening ear and perhaps the shoulder to cry on (yes Tommy Page's fans I am here as well)

How untimely our trip had become...but I really do wish it would be a nice retreat for both of us..as all Japan trips would do miracle to heal a broken heart and soul....

Japanese word of the day:旅行 ~ryo-kou~ (Trip) Our trip is shaping up well and hope we can go with a peace in our minds.