In a blur

Ok tons of things happened. I can't really remember cuz i'm soooo tired right now but can't go to bed anytime soon cuz there's just way too much stuff to be done and sleeping's not really my first priority as of yesterday.
To summarize last week - freakin' awesome. and also... interesting creepy experiences. let's just leave it at that.
Went to watch the Taylor play 'The Crucible', and promptly fell asleep again. i always fall asleep watching plays! and yet i still go to them! no idea why.

So anyway, we didn't get into the new university apartments. sadness. sigh!!!!! we were number 20 and there are only 15 spots. sigh. but.. i guess it's all part of God's plan. when i found out, i immediately went to apply to study off-campus. hahaha. cuz i told God that if we didn't get the apartments, it means He wants me to go study abroad.

SO I APPLIED! the deadline's monday, so i'm cutting it kinda close. but who cares. my interview's monday, and all my application forms and references have to be in by then. so this weekend.. no sleep!! so hopefully (please pray hard for me) i can go study in LA next semester!!!! AAAHHHH!!!! and do an internship in freaking HOLLYWOOD!!!! i really hope i get it. please please please.

also been doing a ton of interviews this week. our writer for our lead story on the student body president elections decided to bail on us last minute, so we have to write the whole article ourselves. sigh. plus i'm already writing another article for the newspaper. oh well. it's the life of a journalist. also pray i can get an internship this summer!!!!!

ok. can't really think anymore. need to go back to studying/writing articles.

Out of bad comes the good

Reading 'The Culturally Savvy Christian' certainly has been quite an experience. you get so upset/frustrated/depressed at the first two chapters, with quotes like 'entertainment has become a replacement for religion; in the same way people used to quote scripture, they're now quoting Seinfield.' And just talking about how popular culture has really influenced Christianity, instead of Christianity influencing pop culture. And God often being displayed as a mere entity or 'the man upstairs' in movies instead of the divine, loving, merciful, personal and graceful God He really is.
One really interesting thing: most Christians are in the extremes of their consumption of culture.

here's 3 categories we fall into:
-cultural anorexics. people who stay away from popular culture at all costs cuz they're trying to avoid being corrupted by it
-cultural gluttons. people who consume all and any kind of popular culture cuz they're just so into it
-cultural bulimics. people who consume lots of popular culture and then turn around and condemn whoever created it.

So i'm totally a cultural bulimic. haha. i love popular culture, as can be seen by the 10 trashy american tv shows i keep up with on a weekly basis. i know they're not really edifying, they don't really glorify God, but at the same time, they don't make me lose my faith either. they're just pure entertainment to me. something to watch in the background as i do hw. so anw i gorge on pop culture and then turn around and condemn the creators of those same tv shows i watch for being unspiritual and without morals. and i think most people fall into this category, unless you're a monk and refuse to indulge in any kind of pop culture. guess we're all hypocrites here. but hey, we were never created to be perfect.

this week has been, without a doubt, one of the craziest ever. i've never had so much reading, so many quizzes, presentations, project proposals, articles to write, assignments due. Ever. i've seriously been stuck in my room all day and night (when i don't have classes) studying my face off. and i hate it when the stupid Echo makes us do last minute articles on thursday when the newspaper comes out on friday. it's craziness! trying to get a hold of people to interview and write the entire article while juggling classes and other articles to edit and page 1 and 2 to layout and design. omg. Am so awfully glad the weekend is ALMOST here. just two more classes away from a long, restful sleep of at least 12 hours. oh that sounds so good.
also, last night was seriously one of the most fun/awesome/crazy nights ever. too bad i'm not at liberty to spill. you never know who reads your blog :)

so to end off, here's a verse from one of my favorite hymns.

Oh to grace how great a debtor, daily I'm constrained to be
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to Thee
Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart Lord, take and seal it, seal it for Thy courts above

i love it cuz it's so true. my heart always wanders, but Lord You have permission to take it and seal it forever! don't ever let me fall.

Being a culturally savvy Christian

so i've been reading TONS for all my classes. every class is just like, here's 100pages of awfully boring information that no one will ever require you to know, READ IT! sigh. oh the dreariness of education. but my media books have been vaguely interesting. talking about how faith influences the media, vice versa.
and i found some quotes that i think are really interesting.

"In Fight Club, writer Chuck Palahniuk gives voice to a lost generation - we are the middle children of history - no purpose or place. There is no great war for us to fight, no great depression. Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'll be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. We're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."

"For we are called to be culturally savvy Christians, who are serious about faith, savvy about faith and culture, and skilled at fulfilling our calling to be a loving, transforming presence in the world. Such radically fully human people, aglow with God's presence, will create culture, counter culture, and communicate a better way of life in culture."


So omg..kinda beginning to be more than a little overwhelmed by projects and stuff ALREADY. and it's only the 3rd week of class. sigh. really don't really like my classes this semester. they're just... boring, in a way. oh well. hopefully they'll get better.

anyway. i'm learning to really dislike Valentine's Day. not cuz of all the mushy couples. oddly enough, i don't feel envious of them at all. really enjoying my independence! so here are 3 reasons why i don't like v-day: cake, cookies and chocolate. i guess people just feel the need to give others TONS of junk food on this particular day. and when i'm presented with junk food, obviously i stuff myself with it. so yeah. feeling really gross now. ate way too much chocolate, candy, cookies, cupcakes and what not. all the deadly Cs.

and i've been waking up at the BREAK OF DAWN like these few days! friday cuz my friends made me get up at 8am to go to breakfast, sat cuz i went with girls from my wing to go Walk-a-Mile for the homeless. we walked in the frigid cold for a mile.. i have no idea how that helped the homeless. and today went to korean church with a bunch of people. which was awesome as usual cuz of the awesome korean food. and the company :)

i don't know why but feeling quite sian nowadays. even though working out makes me more energetic. also feeling a tad far from God.

Place personal ad here, please

Yesterday we worked our butts off to get the Echo published on time. today, i read it and hannah and andrew wrote a personal ad for me in it! it was kinda funny. at least they didn't put my name down.
if you can't see the picture, here's what it says:
Asian female, 21, seeking Disney prince. Will settle for Zac Efron-esque individual, but musical ability is a must. Prefers a man with pretty eyes and a heart of gold to match. Call Taylor's Lucy Liu at ....

they obviously made fun of my love for disney princesses and high school musical! haha. and there is nothing wrong with that! as for the musical ability... who doesn't like a guy who can play an instrument? (piano/guitar)
the pretty eyes part... well, i really like (angmoh) guys who have really really really pretty eyes of pretty color. and my friends all know that. haha.
'heart of gold' comes from an essay i wrote. that hannah saw. and never let me forget.
and i have no idea where the lucy liu part came from. just cause we're asian! haha


this is my personal ad. placed in our school newspaper for everyone to see.

our newspaper. the Life & Times page filled with personal ads! true love awaits you... haha. in honor of Valentine's Day!

All you need is love. couples whose relationships have lasted the test of time. awww.

The Echo, our newspaper. front page!!! yes, hannah and i did this entire page plus page two. my story's at the bottom! kinda blurry though. and it continues onto the second page :)

you know what, i'm really learning to appreciate the fact that i'm at a christian school, surrounded (mostly) by fellow like-minded Christians who really do have a heart for God and want to reach the world for Him. I mean, where else would i get the opportunity to ever be in this environment, to be continually encouraged by men and women of God, to learn more and more everyday about God, to be challenged in my faith and learn to stand strong... it's just pretty awesome.

and my professor was saying in class the other day about how we ought not to give the appearance of being godly, but that we should truly have a real, genuine relationship with Christ, because in the end, that's all that matters. it's no use being godly on the outside if you're not really living out what you believe in. and then she shared about some of her friends.. who always seemed like such loving Christians, but now they're all like divorced and their relationships are all messed up. and it's kinda sad, really. the one thing that really ticks me off is unfaithfulness. it's rather intimidating to see so many relationships break up, even Christian ones. i just wish people would try harder to save what they have instead of giving up so easily.

Oh internships

So been trying to find internships that i can do over the summer here in the States..and it's been so unbelievably impossible to find the perfect one. i'm not even that choosy, but i do need to find one that provides housing, cuz obviously i have no family here..and if transportation were provided that'll be cool too. and to be paid would be very nice. so that narrows it down to like 0.001% of all the internships available. argh. i've found a few...hopeful ones.. for magazines..national geographic..disney..abc.. world gospel mission..all that stuff. gonna get my resume together tomorrow and meet up with my advisor. really wanna apply and get this over with! doesn't help that alot of the deadlines are over already and i'm kinda late in applying for the summer!

in other news, my NEW YEAR resolution is... to be happy, healthy and hardworking! the 3Hs. haha. happy as in not stressed about classes or projects or the Echo or relationships, healthy as in working out 4 times a week (which i've been doing so far!) and eating healthily (because there are wayy too many things i wanna do in this world before going back to be with the Lord), and hardworking as in... not slacking too much. like i am right now :)

ooh in other other news, i saw the Grammys on sunday night!! awesomeness. and i saw, on TLC channel after that, THE PREGNANT MAN. and of course i was totally taken aback when i saw it. they were filming him giving birth somemore!! totally traumatized cuz how can a man give birth omg. but then as they story went on, i realized 'he' was a WOMAN. who did a sex change but still has female reproductive organs. ew ew ew. how can they even call 'her' a MAN when obviously she was born and still is a WOMAN??? she just looks like a guy and is married (ew) to another woman, but still... a woman!

so i was disappointed. i thought they made like some scientific breakthrough where guys can now get pregnant. because, as those who know me will know, i have no plans to have children. that's what adoption is for. i mean, why bring another child into this world when there are so many poor, lonely, starving children who don't even have anyone to provide for them??? plus being pregnant is painful and traumatizing. and i've paid my dues for suffering every month (or even twice a month).
enough said.

What is going on in this world

So. there's been a lot of discussion lately around campus about the emergent church. i personally don't even get what it is exactly, but i think it's kind of got to do with postmodernism, where people think everything is relative, and they don't wanna be subjected to the norm, and they're trying to break out of society's expectations...whatever. so from what i understand, the result of this 'emergent church' thing is many Christians leaving the church because they don't like preachiness and they think everyone's equal and that they can find God themselves. and so people are setting up 'churches' (church has become a rather broad term) in cafes, golf courses, parking lots, etc. it's really weird. they even have drive-in churches, which people claim to like because they can leave straightaway after service.

but hello?? what kind of church is that if you're only thinking about leaving throughout the entire service?? where's the fellowship and community and all that? sure you can grow in your walk with Christ alone, but how much can you really grow, and how can you keep growing without being accountable to anyone? no one's that perfect to go seek Christ alone. sure, the emergent church has its positive points like social justice and helping people and stuff, but really, we're made to be a part of a community. i personally would have probably drifted away from God like years ago if not for the support and love i found in church.
so yeah. this has been a topic of heated discussion. and although people have been voicing their disagreement with the emergent church, some do actually kind of agree with it. it's really weird. i don't know what this world is coming to.

And then reading in Historic Christian Belief (a bible class i have to re-take cuz the stupid prof failed the entire class last spring), learning about how scholars dispute the authority of the BIble, how some people think the Bible is made out of 'myths' and allegories instead of spiritual and historical truths... is just really disturbing but interesting at the same time. especially learning about general revelation, which states that everyone, even non-believers, have reason to believe in a Creator because God reveals HImself and His divine power through nature and all creation, etc, etc. so i'm pretty excited to learn more.

So thursday we put out our first issue of the Echo for the spring. things went pretty well..we have an earlier deadline, which i prefer, so we can get outta there quicker. and it was nice to see everyone so excited about the Echo on fri :) sense of accomplishment. and i turned in my form for off-campus housing!!!! hope hope HOPE we get it. Sungah, dorothy, capri and i wanna get an apartment off campus..in the awesomely new apartments. but there are only 15 spots and tons of competitions, so hope we have enough credits to get it!! otherwise, i'll apply for study abroad programs. leaving it up to you, God! haha.

Friday was Capri's bday celebration!! totally surprised her when 15 people turned up at Flattop grille unexpectedly for dinner. food was awesome, as usual. Asian stir fry!! plus cocktails and margaritas. cuz u only turn 21 once :)
and then watched 'He's just not that into you'


It was... rather lacking in morals and values, i must say. despite the all-star cast and the plot's resemblance to 'Love actually', it was kinda disappointing. there were funny parts, of course, but there were also disturbing parts and 'omg-he-did-not-just-do-that' parts. mostly disagreed with it cuz it condoned sleeping around, divorce, adultery, unfaithfulness, etc. one scene stuck out in my mind. this girl was like, so if you meet the man of your dreams, and he's married, does that mean he's off limits? and her friend was like, no, he might be your soulmate! you can't give up on love just cuz he's married! --- what kind of messed up logic is that. i don't care if you think he is your soulmate. he's married and therefore off limits completely. no questions asked. and i don't care if she's your soulmate either. your marriage might not be perfect, but you made a vow, a commitment, so please stick to it! gosh.


our group at the theater

with sungah, mimi and britni at Flattop

with sungah, barbie and carly in the theater

ok so this is a really long post, but i have something else to say!
today, sung ah and i drove to muncie, which is half an hour away, to go to Target for grocery shopping. and it was kinda weird/scary cuz we both didn't know the way, it was at night and dark, and she isn't that experienced in driving.

so we got there fine, but coming back...omg. almost got into an accident. we realized we were going the wrong way, so she made a u-turn, but it was SO dark that we didn't see the lines between the lanes, and she TURNED ONTO THE WRONG LANE. and we didn't realize it until we saw tons of bright lights coming toward us, and we realized we were on the OPPOSITE LANE! omg. total panic attack. the cars were like THIS CLOSE! and she swerved onto a huge patch of grass, we heard a loud thump, and finally we got back onto the right lane. omg. my heart almost jumped out of my chest. but she was freaking out more, and she was the driver, so i had to calm her down. but really, THANK GOD SO MUCH that 1. we saw the cars in time, 2. there was only a patch of grass separating the lanes and not some huge pavement, 3. we got back safe and sound.
no more going out at night for a while.

but yeah, thank God :)

Pics of my room

As requested cuz i was bored and it's the beginning of the semester and i have nothing to do. well, actually not nothing, but i don't feel like doing anything else :) and LM it is snowing SO bad outside right now. piles of snow everywhere!! u don't wanna experience this. i have like 5 layers on. plus boots and scarf and hat and gloves. although it is kinda nice to see the whole campus blanketed in a beautiful layer of pure snow.


my desk. disney princess calendar, my schedule, and oooh look what's on the right! :)

my scarf and shoe collection. i have discovered a new love for scarfs. they keep me so warm! most of these are gifts from others though. i only bought like 3 of them.

our closets. all the stuff on top of the closets are mine. heh. overflowing suitcase of more clothes. i really don't know how i have so much when i don't buy that much. i guess i just can't bear to throw away old stuff. i like keeping them. memories sake

my boot collection! i love my brown ones. so cute. i know the two black ones on each side look the same. i only realized that after i bought the second one (on the right). but it has a zip and the other one doesn't! (excuses) and the one next to my brown ones are my rainboots! for rainy/snowy days (which are often) in Upland. bought them from Greece :)

our couch! we totally put the black one together ourselves. and by that i mean my roomie and my friend did it while i watched helplessly. haha. our fridge..hidden away in the corner..as u can see i brought back pineapple tarts :) not for me! for those who missed out on CNY at home. aren't i nice :)

a blurry pic of our beds. mine's the lower one. but it's still tiring to climb up onto it every night and down every morning. there's a glimpse of my overflowing drawer below my bed.

our desks! mine's the more...cluttered one on the right. i refused to take the desk by the window cuz windows are scary. u never know what kind of insect might come through there. plus we have our great big hole there.

our poster collection!!! u can see our differences in taste :)
hannah picked out the office, pirates of the caribbean and the dark knight.
i picked out high school musical 3, gossip girl and xmen.

yes, look at that big gaping hole in my wall. it's totally freezing in here.

the snowy view from my room

Coldest of the cold

It's official - this winter is the coldest EVER at Taylor. even the president of our college said that. it's snowing like CRAZY right now. there's snow like up to my knee! of course it's all shovelled off the sidewalk, but still. the ice is really scary. i feel like i'm gonna trip and fall anytime and break a bone or something. hope not. and so my room is insanely cold cuz we have a huge hole in our wall that was supposed to be fixed since last year, but guess what? it's STILL THERE. they better do something fast.

and i heard on the radio they've even CLOSED OFF the highways because it's simply too dangerous to drive. that's quite scary. there've been tons of accidents. so... i'll be staying in Upland for a while. no shopping trips anytime soon. not that i should spend any more money. i think i need to manage my finances better. money just keeps disappearing from my bank account!
NO MORE SPENDING. except on necessities. and books, which are SO expensive. sigh. good thing there's something called Amazon.com :)

classes have been good. i get tuesdays OFF! no class at all. and only one class on thursday! but then classes all the way from 11am to 9pm on wed.

gonna go clean up my room now. there's hardly space to walk.

Back safe and sound

yes, i am back. at school. feels kinda weird to be back, actually. like i'm on vacation 24/7. cuz when i'm home, i'm obviously on break, and when i'm here, i'm not home so it feels like i'm on holiday too. haha.

anyway, the travelling this time was good. smooth flight, hardly any turbulence at all, thank God. cuz whenever there's turbulence on the plane, especially bad turbulence, visions of my life flash before my eyes. it's kinda terrifying, but i'm getting more used to turbulence now that i've to travel at least twice a year.

sat next to this big sized german guy from singapore to frankfurt, and omg. totally had no space. he was in between me and another girl, and he took up his size plus half of ours. totally no leg space. but oh well, at least he got off at frankfurt, so i had a nice empty seat next to me from frankfurt to new york. surprisingly i slept a lot on the plane this time. although i still managed to squeeze in 5 movies :) so here are my reviews.

- Nights in Rodanthe (not really worth watching. really draggy and slow. would have been a normal romance story if not for the sad ending. but i guess, like all other nicholas sparks books, someone has to die at the end. his other movie adaptions like The Notebook and A walk to remember are much better. this was rather disappointing.)

- High School Musical 3 (although i saw this on its opening day, who doesn't like a good old feel-good movie once in a while?? plus i knew all the songs by heart since i heard them everyday in my hallway. haha. so i got to sing along! not out loud of course. there's just something about Disney movies that can 'stand the test of time'. people of all ages love them! it's just refreshing to see a movie that's not all about sex and violence for once.)

- The Duchess (i'm so glad i didn't waste money watching this in the theatres. it was kinda disappointing. although i love period films where the people dress up in such beautiful costumes and get to go to balls and all, this was just rather bland. keira knightley did a pretty good job portraying the long-suffering Duchess of Devonshire, but the other characters were one-dimensional and just unconvincing. and the ending was another sad one. as u can tell, i don't like sad endings! movies are supposed to take you into a world where unrealistic things happen so we can live vicariously through the happy endings that characters have! so depressing endings are just unacceptable. unless it's like a war movie or something)

- Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist (i'd heard bad reviews for this one, so i wasn't expecting much. but it was actually not that bad. the awkward yet likeable pair of Michael Cera and Kat Dennings as Nick and Norah made for good chemistry. there wasn't much happening in the film, it was kinda slow-moving, but still interesting to see the relationship develop between them. although i only got to see the ending and not hear it, cuz the plane was landing and they took away our headphones.)

- Lakeview Terrace (omg this was horrid. not so much the plot or the acting, which was average, but mostly the characters. especially the main character, played by Samuel L. Jackson. he was just so.... difficult to understand! like, i didn't get what motivated his actions. he seemed racist, but there were times where he just seemed like a corrupted cop, and times where he was just psycho. it was really weird. i spend the entire movie trying to figure him out and i still don't understand him. so no. not worth watching at all.)

time to catch up on all 10 of my TV shows online!!! and also unpack and all. i'm trying to be a minimalist in terms of material possessions, but i think for me it's just impossible. i don't know why! but i just have SO much stuff! 3/4 of the stuff in the room belongs to me. heh.

so yeah. glad to see friends again, especially sungah, whom i haven't seen since 9 months ago. but mostly everyone's not back yet. but also kinda miss family and friends back home. i actually was tearing up in the plane, and it was kinda mortifying cuz people were looking at me all full of pity and i was like, this is my like 5th time leaving already i don't know why i'm still sad.
but i guess HOME is always where the HEART is :)

a picture speaks a thousand words

What kept me busy during christmas/j-term break...
(not in any order)


trying to do a paparazzi shot..but i look too happy to be running from the paparazzi

Nene!! openly chewing on a fishball. haha

prawning - the first time where i caught only 1 prawn in 4 whole hours. those prawns were really quite sad. i watched them wriggle and struggle as their last ounce of strength drained away on the bbq pit and death consumed them. and them ming, joce and clar ate them. such sad lives prawn lead!

bottle tree park! ulu place. clar insisted on taking a pic with the sign.

i sure hung out with these 3 a lot this time round :) good times.

happy times right before joce threw her whole cup of some sort of tea onto clar's lap, whereupon clar just sat there stunned and unable to move as the drink soaked her entire outfit. haha.

family christmas party. we made ryan wear jedi's present (shirt) and mine (scarf) and he looks so cute! like a mini model :)

visit to the peranakan museum after service. kinda inspired by watching the little nyonya i guess. i only saw one episode though. one really boring episode where some guy spoke really bad english.

nyonya poses. trying to be demure :)

squashed in the mrt :)

last youth service :( but actually it doesn't feel so different.

eve + e8 (mostly)

even in the toilet also must take pictures. haha. shopping dayyy

fake eyelashes. what an experience.

oh aud. u make me laugh. :) christmas, christmas time is hereeeee. love our mini christmas hats! even though it was daylight robbery at $5 a piece.

happily pushing the huge cart at ikea. why? because i have humbly and obediently accepted my fate as someone's PA forever. need someone to hold your clothes and stand in line at Topshop while you browse through more stuff? sure. :)

more pics in the toilet. this time at some hotel toilet, which was swarmed with kiasu singaporeans unwilling to use the 'more dirty' ones in the shopping centre.

haji lane shopping! (meaning joce and clar spend lots of $$ while lm and me take random pics)

at some restaurant i forgot the name. oh Ivins!! i think.

cousins! although those cousins on the right i never met before but i guess we're related since we're at a wedding dinner sitting on the bride's side.

DE retreat. good times, good times :)

ignez is seriously the cutest baby EVER!

i love this pic. everyone looks so sian/sad, except for some CMI people who are secretly smiling on the right.

happy pic!

karaoke wed night. 'lord i lift your name on high!' :)

DE run. i got a medal for being road marshall. even though kevin and i didn't see the 10k runners and let them run 20k instead :)

Dawgz waraku ladies' night outing. omg never ate so much jap food before

our visit to Play! first gay club experience ever. and a pretty interesting one at that. haha

countdown party '08 at tc!!

ben is so cute :)

awesome foursome :)

at lm's house getting ready for the countdown

liang ming - nyonya in the making; cook-er of awesome food.

The rocker and the safari ranger. who wouldn't go see a movie entitled that? :)

it's 2009... party like a rockstar!

clarke quay in the wee hours of the morning :)

cartoon's first clubbing experience. too bad zouk was playing boring music.

yello jello the retro bar. it was a little sad to admit we knew most of the songs. means we're OLD!

christmas cluster party

awwww...this pic is so... warm :)

DE24 at the christmas cluster lunch.

i kinda miss my nice long curly hair. now it's short and flat and straight. argh. nvm wait for it to grow out. again.

ice-skating escapades.

:)

so most of these are on facebook. ok all of them. but it's always good to have multiple backups :)
can't believe i'm leaving tomorrow already.