Have a Happy One!

"I should never have run
I should never have gone
I would give up the sun
if only we could be one
But now it's done
and I'm good as dead
I'm lying in bed
as good as I'm dead
Cos' I can't take your smile
out of my head"


Thirty minutes to the eve of the new year... wow!

I have recapped the year on this blog, my new year resolutions have been set, Christmas has come and gone and my Macbook is here! I've done quite some writing in the last week leading up to 2011 and this has got to be a good sign that 2011 is going to me my year of writing! It's going to be fantastic, it has been whispered into my ears!

I have had people asking my if I have a website or a name card, both of which I didn't, but now I have set up another blog by which I am professionally known as The Writer Samantha Liew and I'm waiting to get my card printed. So yes! I'm doing this for real! For the past five months, I've earned less than what I used to earn in a month, although I don't think I worked much less but what the heck, it's happening!!! I relish not going into the office and taking in the damp recycled cubicle air. I love to take breakfast at my pace, I love it!

Feel free to visit the other blog, leave comments etc. It is largely for work and I will write (or hint) about the work I am doing, but my being cannot be just work, I have never been that sort, so I will put in whatever inspires me. It will be just like this blog, but updated more often with much shorter posts and less personal stuff. (Which doesn't make it just like this blog, does it?!!) I will sound very friendly there.

Twenty minutes to the eve of the new year and I am reluctant to get off blogger.

I have been reading Salman Rushdie's Ground Beneath Her Feet for the longest time and I'm having difficulty finishing the last bit of it. Very crudely put, it is about the tormented relationship, the eternal love between two pop musicians. It is funny to read lyrics off a page as opposed to listening to them in a song. Rushdie does it often when his main character Ormus Cama composes.

For example, Ormus wrote this song during the period which his love Vina had disappeared from his life without a trace:
It's not supposed to be this way
it's not supposed to be this day
it's not supposed to be this night
but you're not here to put it right
and you're not here to hold me tight
it shouldn't be this way

I was brewing a foul mood for a while before unleashing the temper into a piece of flash fiction last night, and I came up with some lyrics of my own, which is the "poem" at the beginning of this entry. I don't think I favour it, this technique of weaving poetry into prose, but it was fun experimenting.

Before I end off, some pictures from Christmas! We had dinner at a quaint little Italian restaurant called Trattoria Milano at the secluded Hillview area.

 

Happy New Year's Eve!

have a wabi christmas

Love you Wabi.

Merry Christmas everyone!

all things big and small...

A New Year resolution is something that you are firmly determined to do or achieve in the coming year. With that in mind, here are my…

2011 New Year Resolutions

1) Get closer to God

2) Do some form of exercise three days a week

3) Have vegetarian breakfast and lunch at least six days a week

4) Manage people cleverly as opposed to losing my cool or peeing in my pants

5) Complete at least three short stories and one longer piece of written work that I’m proud enough to market

6) Write at least three songs

Keeping these constantly on my mind

1) Lose 2 kg (thin = me)

2) Communicate more, and more patiently with parents

3) See more of grandma

4) Keep room (and kitchen after my mom moves out) neat and clean with better space management

5) Look out for singing/performing opportunities

6) Not dress like a slob (in other words, be onz form!)

I intend to travel to

1) Korea – September/October

2) Japan – April/May/December?!?!??!

3) Taiwan – April/May??!??!!!

4) Hong kong – February??!??!!!

5) Malaysia – Penang   in May for my cousin’s wedding

(It’s time I get out of Asia) A miracle would see me traveling to

1) Majorca in Spain

2) Maldives

For work opportunities, for fewer idle Friday and Saturday nights and for Jane

1) Widen my social network

I hope to reward myself with

1) A Stella McCartney bag

My mom used to say this phrase often when I was young: In all things big or small, do them well or not at all.

I need a calendar. I need to map out an action plan. Firmly determined I am!

Recap 2010... stay blissful like a star

And again the year has passed us by (almost).

On hindsight, it has been a year of simple and sometimes unexpected pleasures. Bonding with some of the girls in Australia, working bloody hard for the museum and SIPF, then leaving the museum, the few girlie outings with Wei, writing songs for JY (then seeing the I'm-not-dreaming-this-is-real CD), puking after shochu, learning the ukulele, re-reading the Alchemist, going to church... nothing back-breaking or intellectually stimulating there. As always, it’s the little things that seem precious. It’s the difficult things, the things we struggle with, that seem worthwhile.

Naturally, I’ve faced all sorts of emotions this year, there were times when I was contented, times when I was dejected and times when I was in-between the two, trying to make sense of and steer well this on-going project called my life. Fear is a constant emotion that needs managing and passion is an agent that assuages it. Faith, hope and love come and go, they ebb and flow. I can only move to the rhythm of my pulse, and choose to smile and not cry, and choose to cry and not smile when the right moment strikes. For life it is! How should I put it, 人生だよね～

Small lessons I’ve learnt – I do not like to eat the gamey tulang (bone marrow) and that it’s smarter not to lend stuff to people in hope that they will take care of my stuff the way I would! The bigger lessons are harder to pinpoint because they are lessons I learn and revise every year – to carpe diem, to be kind, to be contented – and for sure these have surfaced as they should in the course of 2010.

Now, let me take a look at the resolutions I made last year before I make new ones for 2011. Achieved or not, I'm blissed out for 2010!!!

2010 New Year Resolutions

reach work place before 9:30am - I kept this up for like, 2 months! Then got myself braces and eating and brushing took precedence over making it to work on time. Then I quit. Heh.

keep work place and home neat and clean - sorry, not done! I’m trying!!!

be organised and focused with baking - I did sell some cupcakes to my ex-colleagues!!!

bring my own container for take-aways - Made a half-baked effort. Not good enough. Have to buy a new takeaway container that won't rust.

have more vegetarian meals - YES! But could do with more.

lose weight - I did I did!!!! Cho Ureshii~!!! Keep it up, thin = me!!!

In the New Year, I am contemplating to

get braces - done!

change jobs - done! In a way...

get an iphone - done!

get a macbook - no... still clinging on to Miffy

get a dslr - done!

I would like to travel to

Australia - done! Alright the kids did stress me (all of us!) out but I had a great time, I’m glad WH spontaneously came along (we’ve never done this together before!), I love the long talks with Jane and I miss Phoebe lots after I came back!

Hong Kong - done! I can never get enough of HK!

And if I can still afford, also to

Taiwan - no money, no time

Japan - no money, no time *sob*

Prague - no money, no time

Majorca - no money, no time

Movies I have to watch in 2010

Secret - done!

Up - done!

G-Force - little gerbils wait for me...

Sherlock Holmes - done!

Alice in Wonderland - done!

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus - done!

Books I want to read in 2010

The two memoirs by Lee Kuan Yew - sorry only read a quarter of the first book cos I'm only interested in the lovey dovey romantic and family parts.

And now for the most unforgettable… putting together My Best of 2010…

Best meal: We went to Oso Ristorante on my Dad's birthday and the food was yum yum yum (heavenly everything from starters to desserts), the service was so good, I like what I wore and I had a lot of fun that night which makes this, best meal!

Best cake: Mont Blanc from Flor Patisserie. A seasonal autumn flavour from October to December.

Best song: In My Life by the Beatles. Not a new song, written by John Lennon so obviously not written in 2010... but it has caught my attention only recently and I pronounce it the best song to have come In(to) My Life in 2010.

Best show: International Ballet Gala, part of dan:s festival 2010. I'm glad I managed to catch this although it was pretty last minute (what with the Australia trip and my work for SIPF in my calendar) because I was blown away by the beauty and grace and strength of ballet dancers and of course, the ballet. It doesn’t matter that I knew nuts about the techinicalities, Daniil Simkim still took my breath away. I love accessible art.

Best movie: Fish Story. Again, not made in 2010 but I caught it at the Japanese Film Festival and it was so clever and funny and moving and poignant and motivating! I love a good story.

Best read: Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Froer

Best new dress: So hard to decide but I think it’s the wearable pop art skirt from alldressedup’s 2010 spring/summer collection, in collaboration with Ketna Patel. So quirky, so Asian. Love it.

Best buy: iPhone. 

At Oso Ristorante for my Dad's Birthday. Me with the so good pasta and you can see a sliver of my alldressedup skirt.

Mont Blanc for Ming's birthday cake!

Vegan Burg! The first vegan fast food joint in Singapore opened in 2010! Cool place, not so sinful fast food!

Cha Ban Sheng's press con! JY sorry you have no make-up here but this is the only photo that has just the two of us! Hehhehheh...

At Byron Bay. Jane, you were having cramps and entertaining Isaac somewhere up there so not having that great a time (I think), but the four of us were having fun! See how interested P looks!

The shoreline's a crescent at Byron Bay.



My Dad loves to brunch! Father's Day...

Another family brunch at Hediard Cafe. You are looking at Singapore's best croissant.



Where?



Where?

I have not shared the Kluang pics!!!!!! ARGHSSS!!!!!!!

Wedding Planning - Photography

After much consideration (on my part), we have decided not to go ahead with the Cambodia pre-wedding photography. Instead, we will stick to the usual outdoor shoot.

Our photography contract.

Wedding Planning - The Dress

The inevitable wedding posts have started.

Let me write something before September ends.

Life works in strange ways. It is the same theory they call Murphy’s Law or the Magical Lists. Just when you’ve changed your plans, change aim, things happened the way you wanted them to. But you’re not sure you want them anymore. And that is the undependable nature of life and of the human kind. Call it fickle, call it capricious or call it the Why Not?

Up until six months ago I was looking for a reason to leave my job and that would rightfully be a new job. A job I liked better, and could earn more and learn more from. I sent out resumes to magazines and ad agencies because writing, I thought, should work out in either of these industries, and I wanted to write. Resume after resume, follow-up email after follow-up email, nothing transpired. One day while discussing careers with WH she said that perhaps I was the sort who had to close a door before another would open. No, I replied instantly, I am not that sort. But as days and weeks set in, that seed of a passing remark so casually plucked from the top of her head, the tip of her tongue, had germinated in my thoughts and I saw the ambiguity of the matter. It took a dash of courage and impulse but I decided I’m quitting. Heck, I’ll close this door and hack the next one open if I have to.

Between that decision and possibly lunch, like an image coming into focus, the vagueness I had about what’s-next congealed and peeled off to reveal a desire. I didn’t want to be jumping from institution to institution, cubicle to cubicle. I wanted something else, I wanted to live differently, not radically, just different… then the clarity was gone.

In the days, weeks and months that follow, this sense of sureness would come and go depending on the literature I was reading, the person I was talking to, and most crucially, the opportunities that came my way. And since I left my job two months ago, I have been propositioned to go back into the work force many times! If I had experienced a drought earlier when my resumes had evaporated into cyberspace, then now I have tripped upon a spring. This sure plays with my mind a lot. I want to carpe diem, not to justify running the hamster wheel, yet every time I am asked to put on those sneakers again, I have to struggle to refuse. This might be part of the journey, I sometimes think. Then I think, no. A decision that flickers like that of a tungsten lamp is most undependable! What might be dependable is what keeps coming back, the recurring dream.

In this process of consideration and filtering, I’ve deconstructed some of my values and priorities, my wants and desires. Sometimes they lay in a neat grid before me and all I have to do is to sweep my eyes across to come to a decision. Other times they are a mound of flea market wares, toppling over one another or hidden under the carpet. Those days I feel doubtful and afraid. But I remind myself that there is nothing to be afraid of. It is only life. And life is transient so I should do the good things I am meant to do.

I am still in the process of reconstruction and I cannot tell how long it will take or how futile it might be, but I keep faith that I am already on the path that lets me live out my life meaningfully, purposefully and happily. It is so damn tough. But woohoo I cannot be more thankful.

I love breakfast. Water is my favourite drink
and coffee comes a close second.

天啊！

天啊！我的天~~~啊！杨佳盈，你终于发片了！你当歌手了！你做到了！

今天忙了一天，记者会的时候还不觉得怎样（可能我坐得太近又容易累，到最后只是觉得：耶！完了！耶！累累累！）后来在Facebook看到Huimin说专辑HMV卖完了才顿时觉得你做到了一件很不可思议的事情！你变成了歌手，专辑摆在HMV里面的歌手！我的天啊，我在做梦吧？

你虽然是乐天派但不是傻傻的那种，你虽然蛮走运但步上这条路挫折也不少，但你竟然可以坚持到现在！面对未知的everything！而你不是没有别的选择。哪来的勇气那么大？！？

我很骄傲我的朋友不是说说而已的那种，而是不压抑梦想放胆去追的杨佳盈！

café • gallery

It is a game trying to locate Room With A View café and gallery.

I walk down Carpenter Street on a dishwater damp morning, and there’s nary a hint of the existence of a café; but just when I am about to get intimidated by the prospect of ending up no where, I see their standee before a dark and dank little building. “Café now open...” And there they are!

I walk up the little lift lobby which brings to mind uncommon businesses that make unlikely patrons out of students from China with remnants of winter on their fair, fleshy skins, or middle-aged men with streaks of limp hair across their dome-shaped heads, scalp red from one beer too many. I can imagine the yawning brute walking into the ground floor massage parlour, last night’s tabloid paper loosely tucked under an arm, a long string of ash hanging off a cigarette hanging off his sweat framed lips. Or maybe it’s just me grossing myself out.

I enter the old silver-grey lift which is a labyrinth in itself, with doors that slide close on one side then creep open on the adjacent side into the clean, air-conditioned brightness of the topmost floor. A wooden square frame with “Come in for a cuppa” hangs on the knob of an open door.

The place is long and narrow but well spaced with a kitchenette at the far end and a row of blockish wooden tables and chairs down the middle. Photographs line the top and power sockets the bottom on both sides of the cream-washed walls. Honestly, I was sold quite immediately because of the power sockets. I am the sentimental sod who goes around loving cafés with abundant power sockets because the battery of my 5 year old Miffy has fizzled years ago.

The owners are welcoming ladies, prompt in their service. One of them sings occasionally to the pop music they've put on. I order flat white and a scone with clotted cream, and I can’t wait to be back, even before I leave.

onz form

I like Stella McCartney, I mean I love Stella McCartney, the person for the brand, and the brand for the person... so animal and green loving. I love the designs, so cutting, confident and stylishly feminine... I've told myself that if I am going to spend hundreds (thousands?!?!) of dollars on fashion, it has got to be only Stella McCartney.

But the fickle fancies of the female, like the roving eyes of the male, is a tease. I also so love 3.1 Phillip Lim.

The kind of clothes I wanna wear. I don't even know if his designs have ever been ground breaking or are even original. I don't know anything about the brand aside from its name... but I love it!

From www.31philliplim.com

I'm not going to spend hundreds (or thousands?!?!) of dollars on any clothes, bags or shoes... for now anyway.

When I do... ...

The summer collection is like... ...

拜奶奶

今天拜奶奶，整屋飘满了香火味，我打了好多个喷嚏。
老狐狸们每年都这样，一张麻将桌摆上香炉，一杯咖啡、一杯茶、筷子汤匙一碗白饭，猪脚、卤鸭、等等，姑妈们的拿手菜。还有还有，包子，粽子，特别重要，马票要包中。

很好玩。

妈用两个铜板测试奶奶可否到此一游，而她每年都到。入境应该没问题，因为有我们烧给她护照。这次又烧了两张。

今年我辞了工才有机会凑热闹。举起三炷香证明奶奶还在我们心中，拜拜奶奶，奶奶掰掰！

フルーティー！

My eyes are weary and I am ready to sleep. But it gets hard to fall asleep when I have spent the entire day working on the computer. Just thinking about it makes me a little moody. Lucky for me I keep cute little things on my desk and they boost my spirits in bits (because they are so little) so I love them to bits (because they are so little).

These fruit I got from my favourite game of 'turn turn then got toy come out' in Hong Kong. What do you call them? They are fun... I will play with them for a little bit then to bed.

The Castle - Laputa

I am excited! My parents just got the keys to their new place and I am tasked to do it up! Yes!!! It's going to be tough - lots of planning and hounding, walking and choosing, managing opinions but... I am excited!!! Spent two hours at Kinokuniya yesterday stealing ideas (pictures above)... Oh I am going to be so tired... and so annoyed... but still so excited for now!!!

I look forward to a new place to hang out. My baking headquarters. Look forward to a spot to permanently anchor my KitchenAid mixer. And less cluttered space to room in. Now, I gotta work for it!

Freedom…ka?

I'm shopping at Paragon's Marketplace and found these Barn Laid Eggs. Eggcited! I have to blog immediately. Layer Hens for Barn Laid eggs are kept indoors - in barns, hence the name - but not in cages per the usual practice. The hens are given free movement around the barn. Although I really don't know (and may never know) how much space they actually get and how ethical this form of egg farming is, I believe it's gotta be better than caging up the hens! They only cost a little bit more at S$2.90 for 6 eggs! They are by Singapore's Chew's Agriculture. So the local egg farms are finally doing something, or am I finally catching up?

my blog about my blog

So I revamped the blog and thought I should put in a new entry to mark it. I have not been blogging for so long I feel rust cracking and falling off my fingers as I type. At the same time, I am thinking of what to blog, what to share with y'all... and I can think of nothing. I could, if I wanted to, tell you about my last few months at the Job or first few days at Rest, but that is so boring to recount and account for today, although I had and am having a good time.

I dig deeper. It has become so hard to unlock that bit of inspiration at my will. It comes and goes at its will and all I can do is wait. I wait with my laptop and fervent fingers, ready to spring into action when the thought comes, over twenty-six alphabets, punctuations and numbers. I wait with ample hours ahead of me, to dedicate to one lightning spark of brilliance. I wait by reading and regurgitating, crafting and honing, so I have words best to dress and express an idea. I wait like a puppy by the dining table, relentless, even if it had been pointless many a dinnertime. I am ready to clamp my jaws on that stranded knob of chicken bone!

Sometimes I wait for things that do not make me jubilant when they come. Work that has been held up. I don't like to wait for work that has been held up. I want things done right away, as fast as possible, and perfectly (for many, many reasons that will only be too tedious to discuss now). Oh, I am a monster like that, to myself, because I find it hard to be firm or mean, which is why I don't like to work. I like to sit at home waiting for inspiration to lap upon the shores of my consciousness. I like to drink copious amounts of coffee and still go to sleep. I like to bake and cook and be meticulous about them. I like to run my fingers over the warmth of Wabi's soft, plush coat. I like to write and re-read my writing and edit my writing and re-read my edits. I like to do things leisurely.

Wabi is sleeping sideways now, tucked between the curtains and windows. She is licking her paws and the floor and her paws in the middle of her sleep. The rain came early today diluting the world into a misty shade of gray; and people worry about floods at every rainfall now. News flood with flood news. I will hop along to the supermarket in a bit to get a jar of peanut butter for baking cupcakes tomorrow to bring to a potluck party (that has caused the host some grief).

my current squeeze

This is my favourite picture of the now. Ming and Mom in camaraderie, bonding over some laughable thing about Dad. Of course, he was across the table.

I heart Gula Melaka

Ice is good food for a sore throat.

My Stash

I was reading a novel about how a woman's life improved after she started clearing out her home of unwanted things.

The clothes one size too small 4 years ago but left in wardrobe as motivation to fit it again? Throw. The ornaments well meaning (or lazy gifters) people give as gifts? Throw. The magazines you have articles that are worth clipping? Throw.

As she started clearing her place, she started to realize how bogged down she was by THINGS.

The box of baby things she hid in the attic though she was never able to have a baby after the first miscarriage. The brochures of Italy which she will never visit as her husband hates going overseas.

Things aren't just things. They also represent unfulfilled dreams.

I was inspired to find out what my unfulfilled dreams were. (And a looming deadline as China relatives are coming to stay for two weeks.)

Pens, note books, paper, books, toiletries and make-up. What are my unfulfilled dreams anyone??

What Spectacle!

I was moused up in Dee's room yesterday, realising my childhood fantasy of wearing glasses - just like Ming! Of course I had outgrown that silly wish of mine soon enough, and am glad these little eyes can see good and well on their own. But boy, did I have fun with those frames last night!

The first accident and subsequent visits

Over the bottom two hollows of my mouth, hollowed because of the earlier tooth extractions, the braces' wire runs like a bridge across the gum valleys. On a Friday, the wire over the right hollow popped out from its brackets while I was having yu sheng at a work lunch. So the bridge was only secured at one end, with the other end a needle point resting on the side of my molar. After several failed attempts by me and my colleague to put the wire back in, I called the dental center for help. They asked if I was in pain, no. They asked if I would like to see the dentist, yes. They said the dentists were all out for lunch. They asked if I wanted to come immediately or wait three days until Monday. I asked if it was ok to wait three days, because honestly, it felt intimidating to have a sharp, thin metal poking around the inside my mouth. I sensed no urgency from the receptionist on the line, in fact she seemed rather peeved that I needed to make a last minute appointment. In any case I went down to the dental center right after lunch, and had to cancel an appointment for this. Because Dr Mah was not on duty, another dentist attended to me, and took all of two seconds to put the wire back in its place. Thank God the dentist was nice and so was Mabel, also Dr Mah's nurse. She warned me that the wire could poke through my finger so I should not try to manoeuvre it too much to get it back in.

Come Monday, Dr Mah called and brought forward my next appointment. He said the wire probably came out because my teeth had shifted and it was better to see him sooner as the wire would be prone to pop out again. So I saw Dr Mah three days later and this time, I got new and thicker wires. My last molars were also armoured with brackets to push them forward to fill up forty percent of the holes from the removed teeth (my front teeth will be pushed back to fill the other sixty percent). So having new brackets means new ulcers but only on my left inner cheek. Teeth and gums are hurting a little but it's all manageable now, I'm back to my eighty percent liquid diet which is going to help me lose weight further. Dr Mah also took moulds of my teeth again because he said they've moved considerably and he wanted to document them.

My teeth looks weird now. That they've moved is obvious and they probably need to get into many different positions to make way for one another somehow or other, before they can be straightened, but as of now, they look far from beautiful. The upper and lower sets of my teeth are not parallel, they part at an angle. On the right side, I see a space where my teeth should bite. I tell myself that this is all part and parcel of getting a better set of teeth - because that's the truth.

Now... I look forward to the next appointment! Of course! Every month I look forward to the next dental appointment! Superficial as it may sound, this beautifying the teeth process is rather exciting!

Spot the difference! I know the colour of the pictures can be distracting but be assured they are both me! See how strangely unimproved they look now.