Everything in between

I can't wait for this year to end. This exciting, treacherous, fulfilling year. 2011 has been a year of big and bold decisions, loads of travelling, self-realization, growing up emotionally and all kinds of changes.

Leapfrogged into Honours year

My make-or-break gamble paid off in the form of a huge 'culture shock' in Honours year, when sleep became a luxury and working our arses off in school on a Sunday was a norm. Every day was an excruciating battle with time, dense readings and slow email replies. But the camaraderie we forged during those long hours, I believe, will continue to bring us together even after graduation.

Watched an incredible number of movies

The current count is 19 for this year alone, not including those I watched on my plane flights and on DVDs. That's mad, my dear.

Deflowered my virgin hair

Ever since getting hooked on bubble hair dye, I've coloured my hair THRICE this year, with only the latest done in a salon at an exorbitant price (pfft). After shying away from the damaging qualities of colouring my hair, the great leap came during Chinese New Year - auspicious mah (ok bad excuse I know).

We're three. :)

Tasmania, Taipei and Desaru

Desaru has been the long awaited family trip; it's rare that we get to line up our schedules and manage to find just three common free days. The food was sedap, the locals were really friendly and we never regretted the trip, despite the hefty peak period price tag.

Tasmania, on the other hand, was a first for me in many ways - first free-and-easy trip, first oyster in a long,long time, first time driving overseas, first time scaling a mountain, first time running the fluffy texture of day-old snow between my fingers, first time running into wild animals and over dead ones, first time experiencing such low temperatures, first time having salmon almost everyday... Tasmania will be one of those few place I will look forward to visiting again in future, simply because it has given me so much. And I can't thank Gerlynn and Gordon enough for working on the coordination of the entire trip.

Taipei was a challenge to myself - I was juggling a crazy final semester and planning every single detail of the itinerary, while everyone sat with arms akimbo. But it was worth the sleepless nights and hours of research and route-planning with Google Maps.

Celebrated Christmas Eve at Marche - for the FOURTH YEAR running

Humans are nostalgic creatures. Jack and Julie are worse. Without Marche, there wouldn't be our first dinner meeting outside school.

I'll think of more.

aveugle

(credits: gardenofgloo)

Officially... graduated

I haven't told this to more than a handful but, a few nights ago, I awoke from a nightmare in which I found out that I had scored a mere 3.5 for my overall CAP. This foreboding feeling that my dream was a projection of a future continued for the past few days, up to the moment I opened the SMS containing my final results.

NM4202 Transnational Producers - B

NM4206 Communication & New Media Regulation - B+

NM4220 HEalth Communications - A

NM4218 Knowledge Management - A-

At least, for once, my premonition was totally off. NUS decided to end off the results report with my class or Honours. Schweet, though it would have been better if it had matched last Christmas'. But I'm as contented as pie.

The weekend has been eventful, with a movie marathon courtesy of the Boyfriend. :)

If you haven't watched Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, I hope it's because they've run out of tickets. The trailer which debuted in October totally caught us; who wouldn't want to watch good-looker Cruise scale the 125th floor of the Burj Khalifa Hotel, the tallest building in the world? Shall not ruin the movie with spoilers, but if you're interested in how future installments might veer towards, you can check out the movie's IMDB page here. If there's any reason to watch MI:4, it's to watch 49-year-old Cruise in his awesome sidekick - the BMW i8.

Hello, sexy.

Tom Cruise is 49 years old. 49.

(credits: celebritiesheight.com)

Nope, not convinced.

Anyway, our back-to-back movie marathon saw us do a mad rush from cinema to cinema for Alvin and the Chipmunks 3. Compared to M:I, this was far less entertaining, and even more so when you factor in those little tykes in the cinema squealing and yelling randomly during the show. Adults, please keep away from Alvin and the Chipmunks, regardless of what your girlfriend insists on.

L'Amour, Toujours, L'Amour

I don't even know where to start. It's like getting bath water into your ears; you have too much to get out, you're hopping around crazed, but the mind-boggling sensation remains. 

Mid-November rang alarms of all sorts; while I was working on the brink of exhaustion putting together a paper with another hardworking groupmate of mine, the others granted themselves leave from involvement on the account that they had papers to sit for and we didn't, popping over random emails of "how's it going?" and "what is there left for me to do?" occasionally. I hope Santa feeds you to his sleigh dogs - you're so much more useful that way. But I can't be greedy, for I was blessed with three other teams of tangible awesomeness. I can't thank them enough. In the midst of it all, my body was learning to fall apart more easier than before - time to go read The Brain that Changes Itself. Apparently the flu caught on more easily, I was feeling light-headed just by taking a crowded bus and I was sadistically suppressing bouts of fever with Panadol. Needless to say, a lot of other stuff start spinning out of control. On hindsight, I wonder what kept me sane the entire time. I never knew I could end my last days in NUS complaining like an old hag.

And not to mention I was single-handedly planning the family trip (a.k.a my second graduation trip) to Taipei. *FRUSTRATION MUCH*

But we made it there anyway.

Fisherman's Wharf @ Danshui, Taipei

Ever since I first set foot on Fisherman's Wharf, I have made myself a promise to return to the "lovers' bridge of Taiwan" to fully capture its glory. To many, it's simply a bridge dotted by bright lights and tourists. To me, it's a symbol of wanderlust and choice, of love strong enough to brave time and tide. Though it would have been complete if you had been there too.

The Taipei trip was a learning experience in every way. From booking the flights and accommodation to filling up the itinerary, I finally had a hand at conjuring a fulfilling trip out of thin air. And I finally put my language skills to use in Taipei and the Hong Kong airport, as well as attempting to baffle the Taiwanese Starbucks barista by ordering four drinks with an American accent. I pity my guinea pig.

Next on the wanderlust list: Hong Kong!

Of course, the movie junkies never go on strike, just out of free time. 

I wonder why people like to deconstruct stories and delve into a single character; The Hobbit (coming out in 2012) from LOTR, Wolverine from X-Men, and this time round it's Puss in Boots. Not that it doesn't garner a theater-full of swooning (I wonder if the men "aww"-ed too), but it seems to me that attempting to center a film around a kitty cat begets some huge boots (excuse the pun) to fill. Not to mention my critical analysis skills kicked in the moment Puss in Boots started serenading the other kitties - why in the world would you ever, ever sexualize a fairytale character?

And thank God this was still on when I came back from Taipei. What better way to support local productions than to catch it in the cinema for 7 bucks?

Michelle Chong made the right decision to step out of her acting shoes and into those of a director's. Already Famous might have been dismissed as another rags-to-riches story of a girl in a foreign land, but Michelle brought it closer to home by including cameos by local celebrities, localized jokes and hidden puns. Looking forward to her next film.

Okay I'm wrung dry of words.