The long overdue update

At last, it's here, right? It's been a month since my last post, and there's good reason for it (or bad excuses depending on how you see it).

School holidays started on the 8th of June, and lasted all the way until the 10th of July, which means it was 5 weeks long. Some of you may know, some of you may not, but I went to London for 3 weeks during the holidays. Stayed in our apartment and met up with my elder brother, who currently lives and studies there. Having most of your meals at the same restaurant everyday can get pretty sickening.

Also went to Amsterdam for 5 days, basically just running around the place and visited some family friends. The smell of cannabis around was pretty much the most horrible thing about that place, and the people's lifestyle and living conditions didn't really appeal to me. No, I don't mean that the place was horrible, just bad for people like me.

Found out about Michael Jackson's death the night after I came back from Amsterdam. Everyone went to sleep and I found out from Kotaku. Rest in peace.


One of the ways they advertise in Amsterdam. Horses were huge.


Thames Square, Amsterdam


Cheese factory~ Holland cheese is good~ Smoked cheese nyoron~


I prefer old cheese though, nice strong taste to it. My dad liked the herb and garlic one.


From left to right: Xui Ting, Jian Xun (elder brother), Me, Jian Kun (younger brother), Tiffany, Cecilia, my mom.


Holland pancakes are excellent, especially the traditional cheese one. This one's banana with whipped cream IIRC, what my elder brother ordered.


This cat here only appears at restaurant when it dark, and only eats beef, nothing else. Oh man, how I'd love to take her home~


Michael Jackson's memorial "shrine" located at the O2 Arena.


Another "shrine" we found while walking around in London.


The O2 Arena, where Michael Jackson was supposed to perform in a few months. We watched Transformers 2 there. Only criticism I had was the typical bad plot, and the slight slack on the CG parts, definitely less attention to detail compared to the previous one.

That pretty much concludes the trip (and my holidays, the non-stop gaming parts omitted). Got back and stayed one night in Singapore, then left again for M'sia. I believe I only stayed in Singapore for a total of 5 days throughout the holidays. The rest was spent in Europe and Malaysia.

Well hey, can't forget the books now can we?
Light novels:
-Toradora! - Volume 8 GET!
-Spice and Wolf - Volume 8 GET!

Got Knights in the Nightmare as well, bloody weird game (not surprising from Sting), but very enjoyable.

IGCSSE mocks started today. And I didn't know about it until last night, when Robert said complained about English Literature being the first paper. My reaction was "English paper? OHSHI MOCKS!"

Updates MIGHT be limited over the next few weeks, but don't count on my word. It could go both ways.

Just made it in time~!

It's been a long while since my last post. Updates are getting less and less frequent nowadays yeah?

First of all, would like to give my gratitude to Brother Michael, who left on a sabbatical and will be absent from 9 months to 3 years. He has, no doubt made school a much better place for many students, and his absence will be greatly missed.

Chinese IGCSE on the 14th and the 19th, I suppose it went fairly well for me, although having to stay in the hall and wait for the exams to end was a slight bit irritating, because there were quite a lot of people who finished the paper ahead of time.

New books are a given!
Light Novels:
- Bungaku Shoujo - Volumes 1,2 and 6 GET!
- To Aru Majutsu no Index - Volume 8 GET!

Manga:
- Bakuman - Volume 2 GET!
- To Aru Kagaku no Choudenjibou - Volume 1 GET!
- Lucky Star - Volume 6 GET!

Went out with Greggy, Patrick, Robert and the lot to watch Angels and Demons, although my original intention was to play Melty Blood Actress Again at the arcade with Greggy before the movie start, but eventually decided to watch the movie when Patrick and the rest wanted to watch it earlier.

Went for a Shakespeare play, called Much Ado About Nothing. Played MBAA again before we headed to the play. Ended up playing through Story Mode and beating the final boss all on one playthrough. Was a pretty fun night, especially on the way to Gothic Gate where the play was. Whole group of us gathered at Plaza Sing, next to Dhoby Ghaut MRT, and started walking there, but it soon turns out that we were lost, and pretty much spent about 10 minutes walking around in circle, trying to find our way, going up and down the hill.

The play itself was pretty understandable, given that none of us haven't actually studied it yet. Rather amusing, I must say. After it ended, me and Gerard decided to share a cab back home, stopping by 7-11 near Cathay for a drink first. Talked with the taxi driver, who ranted endlessly about people driving in Malaysia, pretty amusing too.

Went to Funan Digital Mall today to get a new camera, point and shoot, nothing fancy like a DSLR. Got the Canon IXUS 990 IS, which has automatic mode that camera idiots like me and my family can use to take pictures properly. Definite improvement over the last camera we had, with pictures to prove.


Another picture of my room, compare it with the one I posted before, and you'll notice the significant difference in picture quality.


Bought a new bookshelf on the 23rd, a MUCH larger one compared to the my old one.


!!!

Tada! I got a PS3! A white, shiny, new PS3! Although now my wallet is flat. Got an arcade joystick that works with the PS3, PS2 and the PC, so that I could play Melty Blood with it. Whee~

Hopefully I'll update soon yeah? >_>

The Promised Update~

You know, looking back, this blog really was active wasn't it? 8 updates per month...what the hell prompted me to write so much?

Well, it's probably because my life's been rather uneventful lately, though I can't say I don't like it. In fact, I prefer it this way.

The whole time I was in Segamat was pretty boring except when I met up with some friends. You could say it was mostly due to the crappy net there. Seriously, the cables outside are so badly maintained that one rain is enough to kill the net and phone lines.

New desktop finished and functional when we got back to Singapore, so I installed a few things to try it out, definitely works excellently, unlike my current laptop. So, I was thinking to getting a desktop next instead of another laptop seeing as I won't be going anywhere soon.

Man, time really does fly when you're having fun (was I?) and tomorrow, school's starting again.

New books~
Light novels:
-Bungaku Shoujo - Volumes 1 and 2 GET!

Manga:
-Bartender - Volume 9 GET!
-Bakuman - Volume 1 GET!

And then, BAM!

It's been more then a month now yeah?


Huge arse box there is my cousin's Hayate figure.


Pictures of my small, old room.

I moved out of that rented apartment on the 28th of February, and moved into a new one. Much bigger place, and I now get to have my own room.

Regardless of how I much complain about it's size, or how dusty it gets the moment the windows are open (the reason why I almost never open them), or how noisy some of my (former) neighbours can be, I have to admit that I'm gonna miss the place.


New desk and whatnot. Having that slide-out side table is great for doing work on. I now have a proper desk to study~


Same old bookshelf. Since I have more space now, I'm trying to see if I can get a larger one. After all, the amount of books I have will only increase.

The view from above is great, especially at night. Only thing I don't like about living 11 floors above is that the elevator kinda takes it's own sweet time.

New books corner~
Light novels:
-Toradora! - Volume 7 GET!
-To Aru Majutsu no Index - Volume 7 GET!
-Bungaku Shoujo - Volumes 1 and 2 on order, 3-5 GET!

Illustration books:
-Kozue Amano Illustration Works - Alpha, Stella and Cielo GET!
-Aria the Illustration Avvenire - GET!

Now my Okami Art Book has companions.

I'll be going to the PC Show at Suntec City next Saturday (14th of March). There's a few things that I need to buy there. Things have been rather hectic as of late, with our teachers now starting to push us to work and the approaching IGCSE. While some may whine about it, I just wanna get over and be done with it.

Have semi-solid plans for the future already. After much thinking, I figured it'd be better if I just finish my IBs here and then go to a University here in Singapore.

Money money money~

SPARE ME A DIME?!

Nah, just kidding.

Skipped school on the 23rd, original plan was to go back to Malaysia that morning. My father came to Singapore by train, since he was the one who'd drive us back, since apparently, my mom can't keep her cool when there's a crazy ass traffic jam.

That plan just got shot to hell the moment my father heard that we won't be going to school the next day. He immediately said that we should go now (12:30 midnight, Thursday) because there wouldn't be any cars, thus no traffic jam.

So fucking glad we did that. Apparently, according to the radio, both the Causeway and the Second Link had heavy traffic jams since early morning on the 23rd. When we went that night, there was like, only five or six cars, excluding us, there.

Chinese New Year! Reunion dinner and whatnot. Recieved angpau money (always welcome) when we went to my grandmother's house on the 25th. 'twas pretty fun.

Came back to Singapore on the 27th, via Second Link and luckily, no traffic jams.

Of course, over the course of the past few weeks, there cannot be a lack of new books.

Light novels:
-Aria~Shiki no Kaze no Okurimono - GET!
-To Aru Majutsu no Index - Volume 6 GET!
-Toradora! - Volume 6 GET!
-Shinigami no Ballad - Volume 8 GET!

Manga:
-Tegami Bachi - Volume 5 GET!
-.hack//XXXX - Volume 2 (END) GET!
-Shinkyoku Soukai Polyphonica - Crimson series Volumes 1-2 GET!

There's probably a few who have heard me rant about Odin Sphere and about the Gwendolyn figure.



1/8 scale, S$118.

I got it >=D and it's totally worth the money.

And then it hit me

A few days into a new year, then it really starts sinking in. All that you've treasured so far, is now known as "last year". What I've done, enjoyed, felt, experienced, now nothing but memories that will slowly fade with time.

This year, my friends in Malaysia would be taking their SPM, and I my IGCSE. I've started thinking about it since two years ago, but I've yet to find an answer to it.

What the hell am I going to do?

Suffice to say, my foreseeable future is nothing more then a blurry mess, and frankly, that scares the crap out of me. That goes without saying, whatever that I will then choose to do will require more and more work on my part.

Therefore I have decided. This year, I will take my studies seriously.

From the impenetratable darkness, it appears!

An update, that is.

It's been more then a month since this place was presented with a new post. During that time, finals came and went away, and I went back to Malaysia for my holidays.

My cousin came back from Australia on the 23rd, and since then, I've been to his house as much as possible. Played endlessly, of course, no question about that. And yes, of course, we soon went to Kino and as expected, brought back bags of books.

My (elder) brother came back to Malaysia, and my mom went to Macau with a few of my aunts and cousins. Good thing for me, I didn't go. A place filled with nothing but casinos would most definitely drive me batshit insane, just from the sheer boredom and lack of things to do.

Met up with my (rather emotionally distressed) friend, who returned the books that I borrowed to her (Shinigami no Ballad, volumes 1 and 2), and sorted a few things out.

Then comes the bad things. Anticipating the horrible net connection in Malaysia, I brought home quite a few books, my PSP, and my PS2 to keep me entertained. I would've had my DS to had it not been for my cousin who borrowed it and told me that I'd see it again in a day or two, got confined and ended not coming back until I went back to Malaysia.

Although there was plenty of things to do, the most that I planned to do was play with my PS2. But as Murphy's Law would have it, it broke down, probably due to old age (4-5 years?). I managed (somehow) to keep myself entertained for the entire time I was in Malaysia, though.

Manga:
-Tegami Bachi - Volumes 3-4 GET!
-Toradora! - Volume 1 GET!
-.hack//XXXX - Volume 1 GET!
-Bartender - Volumes 7-8 GET!
-Ikoku Meiro no Croisee - Volume 1 GET! (Awesome stuff)

Also got another Ryogi Shiki figure.



1/7 scale, S$102.

I must say it was worth the money. Look closely, the details on the kimono are absolutely fantastic.

Or you can look at it here since my camera sucks.