Happy New Year!

Happy new year!! 2009 is here yo! (And also happy bday to Fawwaz!)

Got book-out from today (31/12/08) 2pm to Saturday (3/1/09) 8pm. Siao la, my ex-buddy, before our company was re-arranged and buddies re-paired up according to our 2.4km run timing (apparently only Cougar does it, or at least thats what they told us), Goon CP kanna confine la! Right after first book-in, someone straight away tio confined - because he left his rifle on the ground when he walked 2 steps forward to report his temperature to the Temperature I/C.... Omg.. So scary.

First Book-out.. Then all hell breaks loose.

Yay first book-out, after the 2-week adjustment period (more like 2-week confinement period). BMT (Basic Military Training) so far has been pretty slack, unlike what I have expected. Then again, its our "honeymoon" period, so our seargents and officers were trying their best to be nice.

Oh btw, I'm in Company C (C for Cougar). My 4D number (yes, NS gives you some lucky number to buy 4D with) is 3208, meaning Platoon 3, Section 2 (i.e. 2nd bunk), Bed 08. My buddy's called Justin, some guy who went to Xiamen to study and just recently came back to SG.

Too bad I'm not supposed to blog about NS (the officers warned us about it, they said its smth about military secrets etc). So I'll just briefly cover lor.. Wasted sia.. I wrote diary everyday leh.. zzz

Okay, here goes...

10 interesting things I've noticed so far:

1) Though vulgarities are not supposed to be used, they ARE always used. According to my seargent, he said "CH** B**" is an organ, and "F**K" is an action. They're not swear words. Here you go. They're not swearing, they're just using nouns and verbs =\

2) The SAR21 (Singapore Assault Rifle) is actually very easy to aim, no prerequisite skill, like air rifle experience, needed. Unlike M16, SAR21 has a very good 1.5x optical scope. Marksmanship is no longer that hard to get now, comparatively.

3) You'll only get to throw a live grenade once in your entire life. Unless you sign on NS that is. Haha

4) Almost all the females (besides guest speakers or lecturers) in Tekong look like males. But yet, people still whistle and clap and make a racket when one walks by. What the heck?

5) Upon enlistment, you will get a heck lot of things. All for FREE.

6) Officers and seargents with nothing to do stay inside this nice room called the "Platoon _ Room" (Insert platoon number) or the "Coy Room" (Company Room), with radio,  air-conditioner etc.

7) Lights off is at 2230 and reveille at 0530 almost everyday.

8) You'll find yourself spending hours doing exercises (warm-up, cooling-down, 5BX, etc).

[Btw, 5BX = 5 Basic Exercises. Smth you'll do every morning before breakfast]

9) Heard of the N Coy (Ninja Company)? Heard of its crazy reputation? Well thats for BMTC School 2. For BMTC School 1, its Cougar apparently. My company. Good for me =/

10) Commanders (officers and seargents) get to decide their day-offs and leaves, and are compensated for their "confinements" during weekends by day-offs. Meanwhile, trainees/men like ourselves currently, do not get to decide when to use our leaves and do not get day-offs for being confined. The trainees/men early leaves are decided by the commanders (btw, men refers to soldiers who are under command of commanders =/).

10 Tips to make your BMT life easier:

1) ALWAYS go for every single toilet break you can get or are given. You never know when's the next one, and you get to take a break from whatever shit you're currently doing. SO GO FOR IT.

2) Right after RO (Routine Order) every night, choing to the bathroom to bath first before doing anything else. Because the queue will form in around 10minutes, and its 50 people sharing 7~8 cubicles.

3) During mealtimes, don't bother asking for "less" just because you don't think you're hungry. Just take the given portion (if not ask for more, if you think it'll taste good). Leftovers just throw away. The food is free anyway.

4) While eating, refrain from talking and always start off with the good parts first (unlike normally where you eat the crappier-tasting parts of your meal, saving the best for the last). This is because you're only given 20minutes per mealtime, including queuing up for food.

5) Go bath daily. Seriously. It takes only 5~10minutes (and DON'T look and comment at other people's private parts -.-"). If not you'll stink and get sick or whatever. And your bunkmates might hate you (like this RJ dude in my bunk.. He bathed only 5 times out of the 2wks)

6) Whenever possible, plan your trips to the toilet (and best if you can plan for everything) once you're given the RO for the next day. This will help you save trips to the toilet, which is usually crowded during peak hours like after RO or in the morning.

Personally for me, after RO,

- 1st trip: bath and brush teeth (brush first if there's already a queue)

- 2nd trip: shit, then wash clothes

- 3rd trip: refill bottles/waterbags etc (if there's road march or smth the next day)

7) Don't overpack your bag when you're enlisting. Just bring exactly what they say, excluding those "You may bring..." just pack those "Bring along...". Like I said, upon enlistment, they'll give you a heck load of items.

Just bring along:

- Toiletries (toothbrush, toothpaste, soap and washing powder, they'll give you 2 toilet rolls)

- 3 sets of undergarments (unless you don't intend to wash daily, then bring more)

- hangers and pegs

That's all if I remember correctly. Everything else is provided.

8) When hanging your laundry, you can hang at 2 areas - Outside the bunk windows, or at the bamboo poles at the staircases. It's better to hang outside the bunks (but you'll need pegs or your stuff will get blown off by wind). You get sunlight and wind, and the poles always fall down due to wind, causing ur laundry to drop to the floor, which is almost always dirty.

9) In NS, forms that you fill in are very important documents. If you screw up, you'll be screwed.

Some things to take note:

- Always write in CAPITAL LETTERS

- Dates are in this 6-digit format DDMMYY (without - or / etc)

- Do not write/sign across any line. Or make any extra markings on the paper

- Avoid creasing the paper/document

10) Avoid drinking too much water. Because there's god damn water parades where you force yourself to gulp down 500ml worth of water in seconds. Just drink during water parades and mealtimes, and maybe a little after RO, will suffice for your daily water requirements.

Tip: How to gulp down so much water? Don't take small sips, just keep gulping before your brain sends a signal saying "Oi, stop drinking, i'm bloated!"

So long... Goodbye.

Went to Changi T3 at 7.15am to have breakfast and send Ying Xiao off back to China.

Saw this at the Outram Park MRT. Rofl.. Didn't know the CPF board uses ":D" in their advertisements! XD

Mm.. then after reaching and having breakfast, we went to send Ying Xiao off... Guess how many people send him off? Lets see:

- Our class people

- TJ Climbing Club people

- DHS St John's Brigade people

- Ying Xiao's DHS Classmates

Total around 40 odd people.. Sia la.. Big shot sia =P

Look at the crowd, and its only a fraction of it.

Sigh.. Known him for 6 years (sort of), nice chap. Funny and blunt guy. Gonna miss him eh. Thank Mr Tim Berners-Lee for the Internet and MSN, we can still keep in touch... During weekends I suppose =\

Besides saying goodbye to YX, there's one other thing to say goodbye to..

So long civilian life, for tomorrow embarks my NS enlistment life.

Here's some pics of me, before I enter NS (and get my haircut):

Let's see what I transform into.. soon =P

New Specs!

Yea, collected my new black specs today. My cousin told me to buy, even though its not on the list =\

so i did.. and apparently my ears are uneven.. the uncle tweaked the specs forever before he gave it back to me, saying "your ears are.. seriously.. too uneven liao" (in chinese of cos)

Alt asked me to take a pic so I did, though I never liked zi pai-ing =.=

Looks retarded eh?

Let's poke fun at maple.

Spot the typo:

Dragonica Outing!

Went to Ben & Jerry's Chunk Fest at Fort Canning Green with a few Dragonica peeps - (all IGNs) Altessa, Cake, Pie, Eilrahc21, Ginz, Nogami, Sakamoto.

Group Pics:

[From http://forum.iahgames.com/dragonica/showpost.php?p=67903&postcount=530]

Don't ask why. Saka wanted his face to be blurred out XD

If you really wanna know how he looks like, he looks somewhat like JS

(if you're from DHS, you'll know.)

CHUNK FEST!! RAWRRR

There wasn't much there - Less than 10 booths selling stuff in such a huge area. The band setup was also quite wasteful, it was empty the whole time we were there. And their time scheduling for events wins. They allocated 1hr for a eating competition which ended in 18 minutes (where the prize giving lasted longer than the eating part itself haha).

So what did we do at Chunk Fest? Well, it IS an ice-cream carnival. It'll be dumb not to eat any ice-cream right? Wrong. We spent 1hr 20min before we got into the front of the queue !@#$%^&* But at least the ice-cream was good =D

No it doesnt.

Look at the queue...

Oh great. Rain + outdoor ice-cream.. Luckily it stopped before we got ours XD

The ice-cream booth. Yum yum ^^

After that we roamed around Plaza Singapura for the rest of the day o.O

No movies, top floor arcade too small and boring, waited for Ginz to come before we go dinner, spent nearly 1hr deciding where to eat before going to Kopitiam. And Ginz brought home-made Mousse!! Though its a tad sweet, it ended up being a good ingredient for "Cream of Kimchi".

Cream of Kimchi

Ingredients:

- Ginz's White Choc Mousse

- Altessa's Spicy Kimchi

Instructions:
- Pour and mix well.

- Add rice/noodles or whatever you deem edible if you wish to.

It actually tastes like my DHS home econs curry with too much coconut milk.. Quite tasty actually, though Altessa refuses to try it =P

And Cake always seems like he's going to eat the final product of tissue + aluminium foil + rice + noodles + cream of kimchi + apple tea.. but he never.. aww man.

"Don't play with your food, Cake!"

"Don't play with your food, Cake!" Returns

Other stuff at:

http://forum.iahgames.com/dragonica/showpost.php?p=67903&postcount=530

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

7th Dec 2008

Guess where can-pickers leveled up to? Recycling bins.

Words on bin: Drink Cans.

Stayover at Nigel's

Went Nigel's house to stayover and play. Met Wen Quan (WQ) at Tiong Bahru. Watched "Bolt" before we went to Nigel's house.

Reached around 12am. Mahjonged 16rounds. Won $7.30. Then switched to Poker. Till 8am. At around 5am, I had lost about $20. Maybe I was just too tired or something (I hardly lost at Poker. My total net winnings from all the Poker games I played is positive, and quite high also). It was as if something was playing/toying with me. Everytime I get a very good hand, the wanted card doesn't come out until I fold (due to crazy raises) or when I think I got a crappy hand (and I fold), I could have won. Anyway, after I washed my face and freshened up at around 7am, I recouped some of my losses. We ended at 8am when we all felt too tired, with me losing $8.30 in Poker (i.e. total night loss = $1) Lol. Super worth it. 8hours of fun for $1. Haha..

Then the 4 of us slept on a double decked bed with a pull-out mattress. Joaee and Nigel shared the bottom deck while WQ took the upper deck. I took the mattress.

Took some videos haha.. My phone sucks so I added subtitles if you can't hear properly.

Halfway through, Joaee picked up Nigel's sakkat, wore it and started dancing...

Subtitles:
Joaee: "Hola..."

When the iTunes hit the Digimon theme song, WQ went into a dancing frenzy..

Subtitles:

WQ: "I hate you."
Davin: "Say again?"

*WQ punches*

What happens when retro music like "Staying Alive" comes on while Mahjong-ing..

Subtitles:

Joaee: "You are born in the wrong eh-ra, era"

WQ: "Sorry."

Joaee: "Are you hungry now?"

Nigel: "I also."
Joaee: "Are you going to play?"
*random noises I can't decipher"

Time for bed (at 8am+).. WQ asks for a bedtime story, and Joaee gave it to him.

Subtitles:

*The story started a few seconds back..*

(Ignore spellings of wierd names, just trying to make them sound like the same when pronounced)

WQ: "Gooey what?"

Joaee: "Gooey Kebluey" (Goo-ee Ke-blue-eee)

Joaee: "One day, Hamster Heyui was walking around the forest. And then, he met the rabbit." (He-you-eee)

Joaee: "The rabbit said, (in high pitch) 'Hello Hamster Heyui..' "
*random noise from WQ*

WQ: "Er sorry."
Joaee: ".. Hello Hamster Heyui. So hello.. wait wait.. So Hamster Heyui said, 'Hello rabbit.' "

Joaee: "And then the Hamster Heyui started walking again..."

WQ: "And then?"
Nigel: "Eh, don't be disrespectful la.."

Joaee: "I dunno, its supposed to help him go to sleep."

WQ: "Go on."
Joaee: "Okay, and then he met Harry Potter."

Joaee: "Harry Potter said, (in high pitch) 'Hello Mister Heyui.' "

Joaee: "And Mister Heyui said, 'Hello Harry Potter.' and then he started walking along the forest again. He walked and he walked and he walked... Are you sleeping yet?"

WQ: "No."
Joaee: "I want to sleep."

*random noise*

Joaee: "And then he met the Gooey Kebluey. And they both... exploded. In the great space Kebluey (no idea what that means)"

Joaee: "Davin ain't you tired yet?"

WQ: *inaudible noise*

Nigel: "Joaee, we're getting screwed."
Joaee: "What?"

Nigel: "We're getting screwed.

Joaee: "I want to sleep."

Nigel: "We're getting filmed in bed by Davin."

Joaee: "WITH YOU!"

*Sorry, I laugh so hard the phone jerked like mad"

Nigel: "Yeah what the f**k"

WQ: *inaudible noise*
Davin: (to WQ) "And you're on top of them"

Nigel: (to WQ) "Do you like it on top?"

WQ: "Yeah quite."

Joaee: *random noise I can't decipher.. smth about "model tone"*

WQ: "Its a bit jiggly."

Nigel: "I know it that way."

WQ: "Everytime you move, the entire bed jiggles"

*Joaee jiggles*

WQ: "There you go."

*Nigel kicks upwards*
WQ: "Oh shit."

Joaee: "What if he falls on us?"
WQ: "I can pee."
Nigel: "F**k you!" *laughs*

Joaee: "Can we sleep?"

WQ: "You know my cousin once peed through the entire mattress?"

Joaee: "Through?"
WQ: "He was..." *WQ's voice is overshadowed by Joaee's*
Joaee: "Davin ain't you bored? Doesn't your camera run out of memory"

Joaee: *yawns*

Nigel: "Wa f**k your breath."
Joaee: "Really? I brush my teeth leh. Before coming out"

Davin: "Its been how many hours?"

Joaee: "That's true. Maybe this is why I brush again"

Davin: "We played for 8hours straight."

Nigel: "This is rude. This is not a _____ (didn't catch the word)"

WQ: *inaudible noise*

Joaee: "Ya ok, I'll blanket it."

Davin: "Ok, goodnight."

Anyone for gay parties?

After we woke up at around 12am, we met up with Bing Xu, Sin Chin and Wendy and watched "Cape 7 海角七号". Quite nice la. Though I didn't really see the point in the movie.. I mean I get the plot but, its a bit pointless. Well again, that might be just me. But the pianist is really talented. She's even more mature than all the other people in the movie.. And I think she's more mature than anyone I seen -.-"

Random sightings:

Attack of the litter bugs.

Location: Outram NEL MRT entrance.

No one even bothered to pick them up until I saw it -.-"

Sorry for blur pic.

The black text: Specially produced for domestic, restaurant, outdoor and other uses.

Specially produced for "other uses"? o.O

This baby just can't keep still..

My Sis's BlogShop

Check it out....

http://breakthebottles.blogspot.com/

Her Advertisment:

"Mixed tee , NF short/skinnies , Slogan tee , smocked tube , etc .. all selling at cheap prices"

Also:
Any suppliers interested, contact her at:
babyy.queeniie-@hotmail.com

Prom! + UDHR

1st Dec (Mon)

Prom night. First one in my life. Sec school's prom was cancelled because DHS booked the swimming club opposite our school for $50 per person and no one wanted to go swimming for $50.

On the way

Jon: Hey! Buckle up. It'll be a bumpy ride. Nah just kidding, you can trust my driving =)

Hey hey, guys, look at the camera (my aunt's) I brought! Let's take a pic. I'll zi bai (self-take)!

Take #1:

Take #2:

Take #3:

Take #4:

Oh finally. I think I need to do something about my positioning. Oh btw zac, my aunt's cam likes you -.-

Grand Theft Auto VI: Let's go steal some cars

Ah ah ah ah.. Staying alive. staying alive. Oh wait, there's 4 ppl here.

Let's welcome the artist Jon with his 2 body guards Zac and Bay, together with Fawwaz the business man.

Before Dinner

Toilet shots.

Hey, blur's the "in" thing now, right? Right?

Say yes please... Ok fine, the camera just sucks.

During Dinner

Why are you... Biting a bird?

Nice pic. No further stupid comments.

Look pa, no legs! Oh wait, hakeym has no eyes either.

Post Dinner

DHS GEP reunited. Oh wait, Yuhui's missing.

Oh look, nice lighting effects from my camera..

It's as if a fraction of my face just dissolved in the light. Ouch.

Then again, we look like we're angels or something, the glowy effect =\

Also.. someone seems to like the top left corner of the screen..

Alright! Onwards to sleepover!

Random MRT pics

You know what's the funny thing? No one ever sleeps on sleepovers. Wonder why they call them "sleepovers" instead of "awakeovers" or "playovers".. Oh wait, it can be called "stayovers" too.. Hm.

Anyway, we went to Charlene's house, which was 2 blocks away from WenQuan's block. We meaning around 10+ people. We played cards games ("Pig", "German bridge", etc) then watched mime Norbit (i.e. super soft sound cos Charlene's family's sleeping) for a bit before we gave up, while others were checking out girls on Facebook/Friendster. I never knew girls like ogling at other girls and getting all excited. That's new. Haha..

After all those, someone suggested going KTV the next day (or should I say later today). And then me, being all money-worthiness-conscious said, why don't we just sing aloud here in the room for FREE. And we did. All the oldies first - Westlife (If I let you go, My love, Uptown girl, etc), Britney Spears (Lucky, Oops I did it again, etc) - then we randomly searched for songs on the Internet, and started singing together with the lyrics on the other window. Haha. It was fun, and funny =P

At around 5~6am we all split up, some went home while Bing Xu, Sin Chin and me went to Wen Quan's house to sleep.

Ah. You got me Bing Xu. What's the time? 7am? Ok.. zzz

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

2nd Dec (Tues)

Woke up at like 10am. Went home to do some work before heading out to NLB with WenQuan for the the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) 60th anniversary celebration. Quite boring actually. No idea how to write an article on it. But heck, Zheng Xi says just do it, I'll fill in the blanks and polish it. So, there we go.

http://theonlinecitizen.com/2008/12/u60-launches-human-rights-anniversary-celebrations/

Tired + Random sights

Tiring sia these few days. So many events and things to do...

Choinged finish a coding assignment (or should I call it "work" since I'm supposedly paid =\) before leaving the house for my uncle's/grandpa's house today to pray to ancestors. Have a look at my "grown-up" cousin. Psst... she plays maple =O

New way to recycle used/worn-out T-shirts:

It's never too old to bask:

Cool sia. Oldest person I seen that can play a guitar, an electric somemore!

Better start choinging the 2nd coding assignment ba.. Going into army soon =\

Oh btw, I'm no longer wearing the jacket I bought.. My dad insists I wear the jacket he wore during wedding >.<

First TOC Report.

Went with WQ to Hong Lim Park (Speaker's corner) yesterday to report for TOC on Mr. Tan Kin Lian's 6th speech. Get the full report + videos and pictures taken here:

http://theonlinecitizen.com/2008/11/“this-thing-cannot-just-die…”/

It was quite interesting actually.. I've never seen Singaporean's so vocal before. Not just the speakers, even the audience. There was around 200 odd people and we even met Wei Cheng's parents =\

After that we went shopping for my prom stuff lol.. Bought a pair of shoes for $35.90 and got some $5 voucher. Then went to OG and tried looking for a jacket. Holy crap, the normal formal jacket costs $229 or smth. Crazy... Then when we were about to turn and leave, we saw another jacket, a cross-breed between a formal jacket and a cold-weather jacket. From far it looks like a formal jacket, and it doubles up as a normal jacket as well. Since I lost my black IP Zone jacket a while back, months ago, I decided to check out the price. Woah nice.. $59.90 $29 . ROFL! Ok. Buy. Wanna know how it looks like? I'm not uploading. Can't be bothered. Just find me on Prom Night =)

The Top 5 Myths about H2 Computing

Went to Sitex at Expo today with my dad. After roaming around for a 2.5" HDD 250GB external hard drive and comparing prices etc, we decided to buy the Toshiba brand one. The close competitors were (excluding random brands selling way above $100):

- Maxtor: $79, no freebies (if i didnt remember wrongly cos we didn't really consider this partly due to poor service etc lol)

- WD: $99, free pouch, 3-yr warranty

- Toshiba: $109, free pouch, 3-yr warranty

My dad said Toshiba more reliable and he could try to bargain lol.. The Toshiba pouch was also better. The WD pouch can't even fit the hard drive properly and totally no space for the cable. Not to mention the WD hard drive has horrible design, if it had any lol.. Oh well, anyway, here's a pic of the one I bought.

After coming home, I realised over the 2 years, I was bombarded by random computer-related requests after people knew I studied H2 Computing in JC. Well, just to clarify stuff and provide info for people deciding whether to take it as a subject in JC1... I've come up with a list of "The Top 5 Myths about H2 Computing". Enjoy!

The Top 5 Myths about H2 Computing

Myth #5:

FAQ: "Hey hey, can you tell me about the new ___ and how it works?"

Truth: New stuff are NOT taught. We are taught old stuff. Those years ago. Want to learn up-to-date stuff? Wait till Uni.

Myth #4:

FAQ: "Can teach me how to fix my computer?" or "Can tell me how to upgrade my RAM?"

Truth: Assembling your own PC is NOT taught. Not to mention other hardware stuff, like how RAMs works (in detail), which type of processor is good for what, etc.

Myth #3:

FAQ: "Are you going to make a program/game?"

Truth: Well, all you ever gonna learn if you take H2 Computing is how to make SIMPLISTIC programs that run in MS DOS. Everything else you have to learn yourself. You won't learn how to make any user interface programs.

Myth #2:

FAQ: "Do you know Flash, Dreamweaver, CSS, Video editing, Graphic design, etc etc?"

Truth: Although I know some, they are not taught in school but self-learnt. After taking the subject, you WILL NOT know every single thing related to computers and the Internet, contrary to popular belief.

Myth #1:

FAQ: "OMG!! Teach me how to hackzors!! I want to hack ___, blah blah blah"

Truth: Hacking is NOT taught. If you think you can take H2 Computing and turn into a hacking genius overnight (or over 2yrs), you can forget it.

Nice.

Went to my grandma's yesterday night to stayover because I got to go pray with my grandma at a nearby temple the next morning (today). After that I went to school to collect testimonial. Oh man, its always "Davin WAS an intelligent student... Davin WAS hardworking.. blah blah". So I guess I'm no longer all those haha. Quite a routine day today bah.. Nth much interesting, except a few sights through the day...

Just when you think the record for "The most number of people you can fit in a lorry" has been decided by the Cambodians.. Here comes Singapore's entry.

Nice. I'm sure this gantry will make car drivers smile.

Free parking anyone?