Chalet

I'm not gonna blog about the process of planning the chalet, as that would have to take 2000 words or more.

Monday:
Woke up with more runny nose and cough after having a bad night's sleep of continuous runny nose. Today was the day that class 6/2 booked a chalet at Goldkist Resort located in East Coast Park area 'D'. Took my medicine and proceeded to say visit 'Mr Computer'.
Woo Hian called me at 2+ to ask for directions from his house to the chalet. I gave him the directions he wanted andhe was shocked to hear that he needed to walk over 1km from the Marine Terrace bus stop to reach the chalet.
I heard that we were supposed to reach the chalet past 2.30pm, so I decided that I would reach a little later. I left the house and walked to the bus stop later discovering that I had left my wallet at home. LOL. Rushed back at breakneck speed before discovering that I had left the wallet on the couch, which was downright stupid.
Bus 14 came not long after. I had actually wanted to take that bus to East Coast Rd and hike all the way from there to the chalet. Bu that may take even longer and tiring. So I got of a stop and crossed the road to another bus stop where I waited for Bus 31. Lucky me. A minute after I sat down on the burnished seat, it came.
I passed the VJC and thought that the bus would stop at the next one. But at the nexxt stop, it just kept on rumbling. Only until another stop, it finally allowed me to go out. It was raining by then as I took my umbrella out. I walked to Siglap Park Connector and found that the canal was almost overflowing.
Walking along the Connector, I saw that the overhead bridge wasn't far away. BUt it required walking away from the direction of the chalet. I tried to take a peek whether there was another overhead bridge across the ECP in the direction of the chalet; sadly, there was none in sight. So I just had to take the one nearest to me.
After crossing the overhead bridge, I walked and reached the chalet after a few minutes.Saw some of my classmates comin outta the resort when I walked into it. Our chalet was D01 and it was facing a playground. Inside was reral crowded due to the confined spaces. The bedroom was upstairs and there were only 2 beds situated in it. THe boys were plyin PSP upstairs while some downstairs were renting their bikes from a man who had booked the chalet next to ours. He charged $4 an hour and $6 for 2 hours. I had actuallywanted to rent a bike for 2 hours but the man asked me to rent it for 1hr and then come back. What a cheapo!
We went cycling in groups. I went with Zi Jie, Jun Lei, Yi Sien, Darren and Zhi Hang. We cycled to Fort Road. Zi Jie and I were the first to reach there. I offered him to go to the Katong side under the flyover but he resisted. Then we all cycled back to the chalet. After pedaling for a while, the rest were nowhere in sight. So I just made my way back. Along the way, I saw some other groups goin towards and away from the chalet.
Some people had reached already and were upstairs playing (and watching) PSPs. What's the point of coming here when you're just going to play? At least they were somehow, socialising...
Zhi Hang came back half an hour later saying that Zi Jie had crashed into Amanda at Mac and ha to walk back from there. Darren had gone off towards Fort Rd to ask everyone to come back to the chalet.
In the meanwhile, with nothing to do, Mathilda offered me to go to the beach with her. Bryan came along too, and we were there splashing water and sand at each other. Mathilda got herself wet and I told her to blame it on gravity instead of me.
George came along soon after and sat on the sand, looking at the far horizon. He said he wanted his privacy and told us not to go into the chalet as they were throwing water bombs at him.
We were curious and went back to the chalet, only to find the floor coated with puddles of water. Around the 'kitchen' sink was a crowd of people filling diminutive balloons with water that made them expand a few times their original size. Clara threw ice at me and threatened to bombard me with 'delicious cupcakes'. She even put ice down my back and I did the same, jus with bigger ice pieces.
Most of us went to the beach to bombard each other with the plastic bags of water balloons. Smaller ones didn't burst that easily beacuse the tension between the rubber wasn't enought so these normally rolled into the sea. People somehow rushed over to get the 'rolled away' ones as if those were their lives. When we ran outta water balloons, we used the plastic bags to scoop water from the sea and splashed it at others. Jun Lei kept spitting out 'cos he complained that the sea water was too salty. Megan screamed in a VERY VERY VERY high pitched voice when I poured water on her.
Shawn and I decided to return to the chalet to showere before everyone comes, then we will have to queue up. I remembered that we had put our slippers somewhere near the top of the beach we were playing at. But then, to my horror, no familiar slippers were there. We then scoured the shore towards the west and found our slippers-50m away from where we were playing! We had actually moved over such a distance to a sand barrier which seperates one beach from another.
WE went back to the chalet and Shawn ask me to lend him my 2nd pair of extra clothes, I lent him the one that I was going to use for sleeping at night, which was long sleeved (but in the end I was not).
Crowds of people started coming in soon after and I was glad we came back early. Dominic's father was clearing up the masses of water and it was then I thought that we can't run a chalet.
Dinner was served and it was a spread of chicken wing, bee hoon, curry and 'junk food'. When I heard that there was gonna be pizza, I waited until the pizza man came. It was Hawaiian pizza and it was better than good. I had 2 huge slices and a few cans of soft drinks.
After the sumptious meal, I told the-people-downstairs that I had sparklers and ask them if they wanted to enjoy the fun of...burning their worksheets (I was the one who told Dominic to tell the rest to bring their worksheets yet I didn't). In the end, no one brought theirs.
We made a small fire over a pile of sand that had been shaped by someone to look like a birthday cake. Using tissue paper as fuel, Megan said that it was a waste so we had to switch to using other stuff. Using flowers, Megan said it was cruel, anyway the flowers were moist so they didn't work. 'Dried leaves' a soaked up lots of moisture that they wouldn't work either. George spoilt the fun by pouring his 100plus on the fire to douse it. Then suddenly the rest started throwing the sand grains on the fire...
Dominic's father left the chalet to us after a while and then I went up to the bedroom and found a whole lotta people crowded in there. I asked George to throw a tissue box through the window that had a view of the bottom floor and he I it up again to him. Then this process repeated until more people wanted to try it.
They started throwing potato chip tubes and sumore random objects up and down. Then they changed throwing chicken wings, prawn cracker bags etc. Jun Lei tore open the tissue box and threw ALL th tissue paper out and it was snowing. Someone brought another giant prawn cracker bag up to the bedroom and accidentally spillt some of it onto the floor. Dominic offered me a prawn cracker served on a plate and I took on, later discovering that it was from the floor...
Th floor was a mess downstairs and Dominic ordered everyone to clear up the mess, well, except for Darren though =( In 20mins, the floor was as good as new (original).
Went home LOL

Staring into the starless night sky...

'Beep beep beep!' the shrill alarm of my handphone sounded, as if having a life of its own. It lit up the room and I woke up, startled. I checked the time: 1am. Wee hours of Tuesday morning. Good sign, I had woken up. Woken up for Mother Nature's great night performance. Rare as you can think but how often do you see a 'meteor shower' in Singapore?
The Leonid Meteor Shower has produced some of the most spectacular meteor displays in history,but it is unfortunately periodic in nature. They generally begin from 13 November and end at 21 November with maximum occuring on the nights of 17 and 18 November.
Ok enough of infomation, back to my story.
As I shuffled out from the bedroom, I walked towards the window and took a peek outside. There were indeed lights, but they seem to be...moving...at a very slow speed. Later I realised that the sky was filled with clouds and stars were nowhere in sight. So, the lghts couldn't be stars, they were AIRPLANES.
1.30am and I still haven't seen a star as the clouds didn't clear. I ran out of patience and set the alarm to 4am, with high hopes of waking up seeing meteors. But, I overslept. LOL.
THen just now I heard that the meteors passed by during 4.30-5.00. *Sighs* What a waste it was.
Another failure...

Skipping 'Rope'

School after PSLE is like a rope, a silent killer.
Why am I coming to school? Is there anything to do there except attend talks by schools I don't even dare to think about going and board games the whole day? Think...Maybe you disagree with me saying that its the last week of seeing your classmates. Last week?! How can that be? You can always find them to meet them after Graduation right?
Since I do not agree with the latter, I had decided not to come and be honest about it in my post. On that particular Thursday, I heard there was art crap and talks by those schools. But doing(or listening) wasn't going to help in anyway...Unless you wanna take art for O levels, but I totally detest art.

Instead of killing precious time, Dominic and I had decided to do something productive: going to the library and read books before proceding to enjoy the scenery on a bus.
I was supposed to meet Dominic at 10am outside Bedok Community Library, but he came 10minutes late. We introduced each other books and proceeded to read.
Lunch was decided almost immediately after passing a coffee shop's Mixed Vegetable Rice stall. My share was $2.70 while Dominic's was $3.??. The stall had some kinda equation of the combinations of food types. Interesting that was but later we decided that the meal wasn't worth it as the food wasn't up to our expectations. It was just too diluted.
After lunch, Dominic and I decided to take Bus 168 to Woodlands Interchange before heading over to Bottle Tree Park for prawn fishing via Bus 854. Bus 168 was an Express Bus as, most of the time, it travelled on Expressways. But, if you want me to elaborate on the bus trip, I shall buy a book on 'The Meaning of Dreams' for you.
We took the ascending escalator to the platform and waited for the MRT to come and took it to Kahtib MRT Station. The Bottle Tree Park Entrance was 1 Bus stop away so we decided to hike there.
Bottle Tree Park had been in my 'bad books' since I had gone there. I had been dissatisfied with their faclities except for the fishing pond where prawns waited to be caught. We had decided to fish for prwans there at $10 an hour. Prawn catches had no limits so the more praws you catch, the more worth the money.
We decided to book only one fishing rod beacuse of money matters. I saw a green net hanging on the perimeter of the pond by a nail and thought that the net was to keep the prawns in. At that time, none of us knew whether prawns caught could be brought home, so, we just threw the prawns in without realising it that the net belongs to another person. Dominic wanteed to demand from that person another 2 lobsters but fortunately, I managed to talk him outta it.
It was like losing a penny and picking up a pound: After 'losing' 2 prawns, a man in long jeans came up to us and gave us his 6 prawns that were caught.
After using up our hour rent of the fishing rod, the owner gave us a plastic bag to put the prawns in. I had actually decided to rear them (thats impossible) so I wanted them alive. I asked the owner to let us add some water to it but he didn't allow it as the plastic bag might break. BUt we didn't adhere to his words and instead, sneakily took some water out from the super large pond outside. We also got another plastic bag from one of the restaurants.Along the way back, as I was the one carrying the plastic bag, my heart beat in trepidation everytime I felt vibrations coming from the plastic bag. We even had to resort to buying 2 bottles of drinks at a Shell Station just for 2 plastic bags. LOL.
Our 'hard work' didn't pay off in the end. A few of the lobsters were dead (maybe lack of oxygen), and some were drained of all their energy. So we decided to let them all go at the fish pond opposite my block.
So much for the 'hard work'...

Hook on Fonik (Phonics)

Kampong

I recently heard that there was still a kampong in Singapore, so I decide to personally go there to have an experience.
Kampong Lorong Buangkok is situated in a small area the size of 2 football fields. There are currently 28 dwelling units: 10 Malay and 18 Chinese. Paying about $13 in rent, the residents continue to enjoy a slower pace of life that the kampong setting offers.
The houses were not made of attap. The roof was made of corrugated zinc sheets and the foundations were made of wood. The road was made of dirt as it wasn't tared. Puddles of water appeared every now and then as it failed to seep through the waterlogged sand. Lush greenery surrounded the houses and the fresh air made me feel rejuvenated. The plants with larger leaves seemed to have been polished, somehow 'reflecting' sunlight of them. Mother Nature had enthralled me.
Cicadas were chirping in crescendo as I neared the thicker masses of vegetation. On the contrary, mosquitoes were irritating. I knew there were lots of mozzies there and I put on my mosquito patch before I left. But now, I found it on the floor (must have dropped it =D).
Dogs were a common sight there, guarding the other dirt paths branching out from the main one. I tried to go into one of the 'branching paths' but got chased by a dog instead. Fortunately, an old villager shouted at the dog and it stopped in its tracks. I heard a rooster crow as I passed a house but didn't get to see its appearance. And there was once where I walked into a 'branching path' (without a guarding dog of course) without knowing I'd just sneaked into someone's backyard! There was a flower bed consisting mainly of leaves and a black cat locked up in a cage, poor thing. It mewed continuously at me with pity, as if wanting me to get it out.
As this is the last kampong in Singapore, most likely the government would want to demolish it for urban development. But I think we should conserve them instead. See it before it disappears!

Boredom(s)

We were just about to play Game of Life when we saw Jing Yi cutting some leaves out of transparent plastic. The leaves had some wisdom Chinese words that I didn't understand
'Tock, tock, tock. Ok it's your turn,' was the 'noise' or sounds(It's nicer to those people) I heard while playing Monopoly and Game of Life. After 10mins, it all beacme boring since I already played yesterday. It's amazing how they actually played the whole day without getting bored. Godly. So I switch to Reversi. 'Flip Flip Flip,' was the 'nicer sounds' of entertainment as ebony flipped to reaveal an ivory side.
Amanda was teaching Ms Tan how to solved a Rubik's Cube and her teaching was too complex. I was surprised that Ms Tan didn't know how ot solve one since she had with her these past few months, 4 confisticated Rubik's Cubes from pupils (us, but not me. teehee)