Breaking point

Introducing the worlds smallest toilet.









Yes the pictures that you have been waiting for, our new home. Ok now that you have it, feast on it, feel it, because it feels great.





Well the examinations are soon over so I decided to take a break and actually post on this. Examinations are fun, cause everyone else is panicking except you, makes you feel like the oddball of the century.





Nevertheless here are the breaking points -


Asher and his carefree sleep (which no longer bothers me because I have my own room now.)


My dad's brand new hairstyle.

I gave in...

Twice this week.. To two different things..

How has life been? Its an interesting question. I will attempt to explain it as bittersweet and sour. Monday, I watched as the rest of the combo band played in front of Mr Lim Swee Say and 104 other tables worth of SCDF, ICA, Prisons and Hometeam Academy Senior Officers. I would have loved to be up there. I can't say I didn't mind the 6 course dinner. But seriously, I would have loved to be up there. I bought myself two surf-styled tees from Cotton On while during my two hour break in Suntec after set-up, that was the highlight of the day. Either that or it was the shark's fin they served at dinner. I gave in to buying those shirts (:

Tuesday, camp. I learned about a CA suit. Its disgusting. For army guys, its a Hazmat suit. For non-army guys, its a suit that looks like someone is about to drop an anthrax bomb or some other chemical weapon. Basically, its my long four uniform (which already makes you sweat) coupled with another suit on top and a gas mask with a canister. The suit is to make sure you have no gaps to be exposed. I did guard duty that night. Turns out SCDF guard duty is much nicer than army guard duty, we don't have turn outs or wake ups, and I picked a detail with four hours continued rest. Prowling was a bit freaky given that BRTC is beside a graveyard.

Wednesday, camp. Book out day. Also one of my most trying days in BRTC. After lunch, we had weight training. Pushed myself hard. Then falling in, platoon stuffed up again so we got punished hard. I think we hit 300 jumping jacks, 100 power legs and 100 push-ups, in succession. Given that the half of the platoon that actually worked during weight training was dead tired, it was more than tiring. Immediately following that, without any break, we had another PT lesson. Interval changed to Endurance. OC wasn't happy about the fact that a lot of people can't do 1 pull-up, so we had more punishment. What is pain? Pain is love. Sigh, book out after dinner. Almost gave up during the PT lesson. Was close to breaking point emotionally.

So whats the good news? I'm a proud new owner of a PSP (:
Kind of a contrast. But I am loving it right now.

Hokkaido Madness!

Took me 4 days to find internet access in hokkaido. the hotels we've stayed at have had none. The temperature ranges from 20deg to 3deg. There is fish everywhere. There are flowers everywhere. There is milk, melons and hot baths. There is no english translator anywhere. The indigenous Ainu people eat bears and sell smoked salmon. The size of the unagi sushi is amazing. The blossoms are amazing. Eat your heart out, literally.

Anago (eel) Sushi













Salmon Belly Sushi













Lake Toya













Sakura(s) in the backdrop


































Mutant Strawberrys all you can eat

Yang

MEET THE COUSINS

The guy cousins had a nice overnight at Josh's place on sunday night, the next morning being vesak day. Bohnanza was the warm-up game, while we played power grid and lincoln watches prison break.

The next morning, woken up by kor's mutterings about the sleeping blue elephants, we played modern art, a art-museum style card game. As in the last round of the game, lincoln suggested why don't we up the stakes to push-ups, loser does 30, 3rd placed does 20, and 2nd does 10. To cut the long story short, Lincoln was last. =)

Enjoy the pictures. Meet the cousin photo shots.

Yang

EMO COUSIN




















SLEEPY COUSIN















FIT COUSIN

Round of applause for Xiong

For losing so much weight! See with determination you can do it!

Spelling P-O-P-C-O-R-N..

Usually, we get up to the P-O-P, and then we get stopped at this point. Realizing the foolishness of taking the first step towards falling into a trap set forth by a batch of recruits about to become privates, the reply that comes back is often, "P-O-P oh!"

Disgusting.

For those of you who haven't understood the situation by now, I'm in a BP platoon. It means, we pass out 6 weeks later than the PTP platoons. BP means Pes B pending, it means we're slightly overweight and they're trying to get us to lose more weight to get to Pes B status. PTP means Physical Training Phase, for those who are Pes A or B, but failed their IPPT.

Back to disgusting. The PTP's passed out today, leaving two envious platoons and a lot of cookhouse fatigues. Stuff you PTP.

All honestly, a lot of love goes to them for teaching us nonsense, improper footdrills, cooking maggi-mee with irons and mess mugs and a lot of other weird things.

And thank you for giving us a long weekend too. I love Fridays even more this week.


Oh, and 79.5kg down from the initial 91.55kg - take that.

lol.

boys i wonder if it is you are not reading my previous posts or you are conveniently ignoring them ;)

anyway, just like yang said, madness is coming! Japan - Singapore - Malaysia - Singapore - Philippines. woot woot!

WAH

WAH..I tell u ah,my muscles are aching from over exhausting it...by moving furniture...well,same old me(well what can u say,im still YOUR fat annoying lil bugga.)hahaha.BUT studying harder lol(liars go to hell is now alden's favourit phrase...*though it used to be mine*)[mine is still...Chang Qi-Yang will DEFINATELY know it...can comfirm it...hahaha*proves how much i use it when he around...*]Raggae music and RnB are still likable to me...well all types cept for classic,blues and metal(any kind)is ok...hehe.well thats that from your lil brat*former lil brat*=)hehe gd nite every1.


Lil Burnt Rooster wus here
Ash=)


SPECIALLY FOR CHANG QI-YANG

Trademarked sentence...
BUT I'M INNOCENT!!!I DID NO CRIME!!!

Happy Mother's Day

'Happy Mother's Day' just passed us by over the weekend. The cousins left in SG, courtesy of Nicky, organized a lunch for all the mothers, ah-ma included. This special event was held at the 'Big Fish' Grill Restaurant located along Siglap Road, its specialties being fish & chips as well as taking advantage to charge you $28 for a lunch set meal that usually costs $14. But not to be denied, it was a joyous occasion and everyone enjoyed the fisherman wharf-like ambience during the prolonged wait for lunch's arrival. The twist to this whole occasion was that the cousins will pay instead, breaking the usual norm we're all accustomed to: 'aunties and uncles pay for our meals all the time'.









































Update

The Nicky-Yang-Joshua madness Itinerary ahead:
End-May: 15 deg. Hokkaido beckons while Joshua loses weight in the 36 deg. sunshine.
Early-June: Singapore Airlines flight to Food-haven Penang. Joshua still under the light.
Mid-June: Nicky goes to Philippines, Cebu. Joshua is still under the sunlight.
End-June: Yang goes to Vietnam, Hanoi & Ho Chi Min. Joshua is light(er).


Yang

As a final bonus to all you out there, attached is xiong's best impression of a donkey as i wrap things up. Enjoy!

God never shortchanges anyone.

That's what my dad believes and he faithfully gives his tithes every month/week, go dad for believing that. Simple things that God does, really shows you how merciful He is. A few days ago he made my 1 dollar become a 2 dollar. Don't know how He does that really, no idea why either until today. I guess He knew what was going to happen, but nevertheless I have to thank Him for it.

Malachi 3 : 10 : "Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in My house. Test me in this," says the Lord Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room for it."

Still I can't help but wonder, how much is too much? But, soon I will know, because there will be two obese people under 1 roof....and in 1 small car. I wonder which way will it tilt? ô.o'....

Alden was here, and he needs prayer for the examinations that are to come.

Exams?! When!

Haha i was kinda under the impression that freezing temperatures were supposed to keep your mind sharp (like that "child-prodigy-turned-prostitute" story).

And who is this strange person that our dear Asher is becoming? An alien?

On another note - on the bright side, i'm getting more sleep, but it seems lack of activity is always filled with more activities. i think i need to have like a month of doing absolutely NOTHING. Haha! Oh i went for a scholarship interview at NUS on Friday too. Will have to see how that goes - SMU hasn't even gotten back to me so i guess that's probably a lost cause by now.

Btw, what are you guys planning to do when Mr. K comes over?

Learning the ropes

Alright, examinations are coming (all of you go YAY) and maybe getting a haircut (shout YAY even louder now). Almost done moving house, and its getting harder to study because of the weather.

Its cold, its wet and it makes me shiver, too bad I can't say the same for Asher, because he's A-Okay. Lately, progress is 15% slower and 200% colder. Amazingly, I didn't know that studying hard was part of the 'work smart' idea. I thought it was in direct contrast with it. Ahh well, thanks Yang for telling.

And things are pretty bleak at the moment, exams around the corner, Asher trying to be someone he's not and the idea of wearing thermals. Well, thats probably how you people do it around here, being penguins was perhaps part of the idea.

Anyway, back to mugging.

Alden was here, and he's even more square.

it's... over!

Haha yes boys and girls. Tunnel has ended its run!

Really thank God for seeing us through, and i hope that He was glorified! It was really quite nerve-wracking considering rehearsals the past few weeks weren't looking particularly promising... But God saw us through! For some reason, the Monday rehearsal (in my opinion) went promisingly, though there were still a lot of boo boos.

And quite a number of my friends came! Army friends, and some old buddies, plus some new guys i met trying to form a band. Hope that the seed was planted!

Hope that this frees up some time, but seeing as Cebu fundraising is only gonna be heating up...

Oh well. Glad to know that everything went well - if you can send some photos of the new house! Unfortunately this time i didn't bring my camera to the play, so i don't really have any photos to show!

The Unlikely Miracle

I don't know how to put this, but yes seriously Thank God. We're moving house.

Finding a house and getting the lease in under like 2 weeks, a miracle if you ask me. Thanks for all the prayer, it helps so don't stop there.

Just like the story of Elijah on Mount Carmel. I believe you know the story, where God performed an absolutely jawdropping miracle. (see proverbs 12:1 for a nice, short description of what a loser King Ahab was) God told Elijah to challenge the 850 false prophets. It got comical so Elijah couldn't help but make a joke out of it. When Elijah's turn came, he raised the stakes by drenching his altar with water. And God, who might I say is real, and will prove it if you DARE to ask Him to, sent fire down from heaven and consumed the sacrifice,( for those who taught that Elijah may have become roast meat, he didn't, he was A-OKAY), to show them that God was greater than any god.

God also proved that he is greater than anything. Basically, I don't know why I am about to say this, but God is so real, that even if you deny it, you simply can't, cause he's there, patiently waiting to be let in.

And crap that I'm not in Singapore to watch Tunnel. Oh well, at least theres nice stuff to catch in the ocean. Oh, YAY MISTAKES, they let you learn!

Alden was here, and now he's square.

Dealing With The Spartan King..

So.. Spartans.. To be honest, I'm not terribly fond of slow people.. But I don't mind slow people.. What gets to me the most is if they're unwilling to learn.. Its perfectly fine if you suffer the consequences alone, but if you doom the rest of your platoon then its not as fine..

That being said, I have a lot to thank God for again. He's been blessing me with so much, in most cases just enough to get by and in some cases more and abundantly. All the trainings and everything I do in camp, I have to keep telling myself, do unto God, not unto man, to keep myself going and doing it. Daily, He provides the sustenance for me to endure my training.

A few verses have really been comfort. The verse about God always providing a way out if it gets too hard. The story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abendigo and the fire. The story about Daniel being healthier than the other guys despite eating just bread and water rather than the king's feasting food.

It makes sense if you understand what I go through. Tunnel's been going on super. First night over, plenty of my own mistakes, smoking at the wrong cues (smoke machine), being late, not knowing where the scenes are to guitar mistakes, unable to set my boost and stuff like that. Ugh. It gets me. But the play has been awesome, heard some fantastic things from people. So be sure you don't miss it! It makes more difference when you're there though, so too bad for the australian guys.

Till next time, take care!

BlaaaarGh.

Alright, latest news, examinations in 2 weeks (everyone go yay!) and we're moving house. No idea why, but the landlord finally decided it was time for us to move. So we have till 20th May to find a new house, which is hopefully bigger. Pray for us cause we really need to find a house ASAP.

And that music video was absolutely unprecedented if u ask me. To those who are trying to lose weight, go do PARKOUR*! Its the Ultimate Form of Attaining Instant-Kilos Loss . Plus I REALLY hate the graphic calculator, one small screen, one small graph, 1 heck of a time with it. Gotta love that. All the best to Tunnel, even though I won't get to watch it (perhaps till the end of the year).

* Search it on Youtube.

Alden was here.

For You Who Wander..

**Firstly, my bad about the cbox, my darling sister will have to put it up when she sees this hopefully not infuriated.

What is Stellar Memory? You might be asking. I think this is the easiest answer.


Excuse the bad sound quality and the unpreparedness of Ernie's solo, and also the bad video quality. And the fact that it was our third attempt. While we're at it, remember to forgive your enemies, and love them too. Also, don't forget to catch Iron Man, I'm watching it tomorrow.

Haha Josh soooo lucky/blessed.

Boys - UPDATE US!

Anyway really please keep the play in prayer! Today was our first dry run, and the play is already next week!

Lightning & Thunder..

There are a few things you learn while training, but one line you must know to survive your NS. The line is, "Move like lightning, echo like thunder." Another thing you have to know is don't strain your voice. Echoing doesn't mean screaming. It just means doing your part in saying it loud enough.

I think I've been running out of time lately. It just seems like with so many things, I have so little time. So I'll keep my updates to a bare minimum. I started off at 91.55kg, currently I'm 84.30kg. I recently made it into the SCDF Combo Band. As a keyboardist. And I didn't even get to touch a guitar at all the whole time. Ugh. My platoon has a new name. Spartans. Its pretty awesome. Ah-woo! I'm very VERY tired. I need to up my fitness a notch and do 6 pull-ups in 3 weeks. I need more money, money is never enough. I need to find an appropriate Mother's Day gift (wanna share?). I'm pretty hungry.

Oh, and what day is it? Pizza day.

It makes sense to me. But its also 1:06am. So it won't make sense to you. I'm surviving well.

~toodles!