22 hrs
Just about time.
Give it all. Go school to pray tomorrow.
Labels: dance
FOA dance
Today, I will say, witnessed a series of small steps in progress towards the final product. The props are almost complete, and it's a sweepingly misguiding understatement to merely describe that the banner is 'nice'. Well done Clarissa!
4 more days to end of dance, I ask myself again whether I would wanna perform for teachers' day. I really would want to, if my grades agree with me. Currently, I'm coaxing it to nod its head. Otherwise, Friday will mark the sorrowful disappearance of dance from my life, at least for now, not just my love of it, but too, my love for the CCAs and everyone in that CCA.
Had a great 13.5 months in dance so far, and I would ceaselessly wonder if I'd join dance last January instead of June, how much difference will it make?
Expectation and effort escalate with the nearing of August 1, emotions are indeed an amalgam of dreadful excitement.
Well, as a rare earlybird, let me wish myself a good future, and Dance Venia and every single member in it to march on from strength to strength.
Labels: dance
BANNER
It is finished.
And it looks really NICE.
Labels: :D:D, dance
what's with the coldness?
A walk down the corridor is enough for your senses to tell who's pretending to not see you. It's not for any particular reason that you're unwelcome, but it's the fear of being warm, being nice, or even taking the risk to say hi.
Last time I used to be like that, when I was still the more uptight, conserved person, till I thought that the behavior is very stupid. Whyfore pretend yourself not to know that person when you actually do? So I made a point to be nicer, to smile more, to loosen up more, to be more sincere, more warm to people around me. It's not the easiest to accomplish, as an inner voice will bug "why do it when no one is doing it?" But well I insisted on going on, remembering others' birthdays, smiling at them and looking at them in the eye as much as possible. Things did turn out for the better, things did change.
But really, on hindsight, what's with this coldness? What's with this uptightness and unwillingness to be welcome? Why so serious? (lol) Is it a Singaporean trait? I have an American friend who gave me very different accounts of life in America, where it's less staring and avoiding, a overall more relaxed and welcome atmosphere (and mind you he's an Asian immigrant). You walk up to someone here and greet "good morning", more likely than not, he will stare at you for 3 seconds, thinking "
WTF DO I NOE HIM?!" before giving a half-warmed, half-awkward smile. Well, it's true that some people are quiet and more cooped up, and that's their nature and its nothing wrong. But what I mean is the coldness, not the quietness, the uptightness, not the conservativeness. Warmth doesnt just originate from the more friendly and talkative person.
I believe it all starts with yourself. I realized the uptightness everywhere and decided to put out a conscious effort to stop myself from being uptight and make myself more welcome, less intimidating, look less intimidated and stuff. Not the easiest things, cos' I sometimes need to inform myself, but it really brings out results.
Labels: findings, school
1000 things
So many things in me right now, and I can't get them done.
1. FOA dance, taking up more than what my chinese A2 did.
2. FOA props, voluntary effort for my last performance in school, and as a member.
3. WORK THAT IM DAMN SCREWED.
4. My sick grandpa, who I'll never sacrifice a visit for anything.
5. Extreme need to get a rest. I've a feeling I may get overburned like the 40 days thing.
I remembered that God was there and did make things so much easier when I called for him.
Please God, harden my back that I could carry all these well. And I place my burden upon you. Thank You, and now I ask.
Labels: christian-bboy
nightmares
My family members are talking about nightmares now. Well, about suiciding, getting chased, getting killed.
Anyway, aside that, here is the graph of a successful resistance to a certain desire.
It's true for certain things here. T1 denotes the moment when you made your decision to avoid, to control your desire for something. Let's say, your desire to know this person. Then after which, your desire for that thing, or that person, goes negative, an escarpment to a deep, seemingly irreversible drop. This thing is quite true of crushes, or like a person who tries his best to abstain from falling for the other one.
If his will is strong, or if God is on his side, he can successfully turn the tables. However, this drop may be dangerous as it may be caused by persistence of one to find fault in the other, to see every undersirable thing in another person, or object. While this isn't too bad when the other object is not a human, but it's definitely detrimental to the friendship of 2 persons if one were not to control his own will to find everything undesirable in another person.
Over time, however, the person begins to forget about the other thing, and begins to see his folly through his self-made efforts to find faults in the object. Thereby, casting the object out of his most conscious mind. He begins to walk away, instead of flee, begins to look at that object like any other object in the world. If it's a person, so it be a person that meant no meaning to him anymore.
Labels: findings, human behavior
the dark knight in a few words
When I knew of the title a year ago, I was trying to predict the central themes, purpose and setpiece in the story and in the director.
Well, that aside,
It's completely ownage. Definitely worth multiple trips to the theater.
Labels: reviews
Things in my head right now right then
It's extremely hard for me to keep the 1900 calorie diet. I overshot to 2100 today.
I had just finished editing my econs IAs, what thought will take me an hour actually took three. Well, it's all worth the effort.
What's going on the next few weeks is: testimonial self-write, world lit, ioc preparation, STUDY (NOW).
I am extremely pressed for time. I have to resort to extreme measures to FORCE myself to study more now. Rather do an extra 2 hours per day now than suffer in the dreadlocks of last-minute work, as if this is not last minute enough, I cannot rest on the laurels of "4 more months". M'balls man, as if this is enough time.
Dance! coming up too! this is something i really want to press 100% for. And there's like props undone? And I'll be glad to help, for this' the only thing, besides the sharpness of the moves, that I can contribute to the club.
I must come up with a detailed plan (detailed planning is not something I ever followed strictly before but now i haven't choice.) to split time between work, reading and dancing. This constitutes waking up 2 hours earlier and compromising myself to tight situations where i can't do anything but study.
NEVER be like me, year 5s.
Labels: dance, exams, exercise, school
To Dance: 14 days
To dance: 14 days!
And these 14 days I should try something, a crash diet. Full of fiber, retaining protein, cutting back on carbs by 20%, cutting down on fat percentage as far as possible.
From my calculations, the average number of calories i take in per day is about 2550/2600 calories, rising to about 28oo nowadays, but to successfully make this diet successful, I must cut about 900 calories off, that's if I'm disciplined enough to retain a 700 calorie deficit per day for 5 days a week. So by then, with calculations, since 1 pound of fat = 3500 calories, i can lose 2 pounds of fat.
However, there is a great cost. Muscle may be lost. The only thing I can do to prevent this is to go gym once a week (the most I can accommodate man). I will see how this works out, though success rate is quite low because:
- It's the first time I'm trying this out, inexperienced dude.
- It's very taxing cos of dance and studies, and its really time to start get serious.
- It's still hard to keep track of the food I'm taking in.
My BMR is about 1600 cal a day, with a high metabolism rate. An additional 900 calories must be burned through exercise and heavy activity, which shouldnt be a problem, and i must cut my food intake to a 1800 calorie diet, no cutting lower than that amount, for it will result to lack in nutrients and stuff.
A very hard thing to do. Goodness. Never done it before.
Labels: exercise
common tests
If one were to look at the mistakes of the math paper, he would die laughing.
Im thinking of posting them up.
Labels: exams
Out of Touch
I had been out of touch for a time so long i can't remember it started. I can't remember how it started to become this way. Firefight, self-rescue?
It didn't too much to me any further. The use of existing here to fulfill the 41 points, to be any sort of social analyst, this eccentric guy, cannot understand himself, cannot really live without a self-made purpose. So long, so long we've been out of touch.
What can I do to break away from influences within myself? I had everyone around me, but what had happened?
Labels: God
spiderman 3
Just finished watching spiderman 3. Despite rave reviews from friends who've watched it, I don't really stand with them on this one. But this' not to say spiderman 3 is not worthy of the $890 million US$ it brought in.
It has an intended drive to the story, very apparent and obvious, great ideas in this story. Spiderman meets the next 2 nemeses, Harry and Sandman. From this, S3 is one of the most intense action films I've watched.
Aside the webs and surfboards, the blackie and the beach, this episode lets us further explore the character of S3, and the main theme of: choice, put forth clearly and successfully in this movie. There are constant efforts by the director to create emotional upheavals, and to some extent, successful, to some extent, with doubt. The fights are, again, terrifically fantastic, unrivaled, and extremely engaging, just as S1 and S2 are. But a little bit more.
However, the script was, in my opinion, unqualified, and I'm really quite surprised that it's the same scriptwriter in S1 and S2, in some places, was unconvincing. The direction was sufficient, but not fantastic, artistic elements are few, most told to you in the face. Maybe this is what's expected of action movies. Although I found the script loose, it's nothing compare with the likes of DOA (you should watch that and get a laugh).
Well, the acting was fine, not so much of acting is required in an action movie. What's fine is I mean, just enough. Tobey, Kirsten, James doing good jobs on normal sequences. But one thing to note is that when it's time for tears, all were great, Tobey, definitely was the best at doing tearful scenes. His double-portrayal as the black Pete and normal Pete was, good. Yea, good to be convincing enough. Come on, it's an action movie, acting is not as important as they are in dramas, biographies, thrillers, love stories, but having good ones are definitely better.
Efforts for character development is fine, but could have been better. The sound was OK. But not fantastic and stuff. Well in general this movie is OK, or a little more than OK. So, here it is:
Cinematography: the choice of camera angles, lighting, is unrivaled. Unarguable, period.
Portrayal: As I've said, acting was OK, but script is not, acting was like a 7/10, script is like a 6/10
Directing: Artistic aspects (fights and stuff) are great, but storytelling through artistic creative aspects are abit of a letdown. I mean, more could be done. Like, the setting of mood and atmosphere isn't very good. They are very important in storytelling. The story was sadly unengaging to me noticeably in some parts. The sequence of events is not really there.
Story: Simple theme of choice told in a bombastic manner. Well there's bit of digression, the ok-but-not-excellent development of central character obviates the full potential of story's development.
Cinematography: 10/10Portrayal: 9/15Directing: 12/20Story: 10.5/15All in all: 69.2%.Now let's see what rotten tomatoes, and imdb say:Rotten: 61%Imdb: 66%The next movie I'll be reviewing is
the dark knight, oh and it's a time to check out my favorite actor Christian Bale! I heard that there's not one single negative review yet.. I'll shun myself from other reviews, but grab a copy of new paper to see it's ratings. Cos I've realized this about new paper: they seldom get adventurous and give 5 star, or 4 star reviews, just like the typical Singaporean. Sometimes I find the ratings too conservative, around the 2.5-3.5 star range. It's always easier to be skeptical and find faults than to appraise something in front of the masses, as it would review your professional skeptical eye, instead of the (even more professional ability to praise) dangerous thing about accepting and appraising everything you see. To some extent, it's true about skeptics and pessimists who find fault in others. Well, true isn't it. Oh I'm not saying that new paper reviewers are like that, that's nothing of my intention to find fault and attack them (though I don't like the lack of variety), but in general, I theorize this about skeptics and true believers.
Labels: reviews
respect
though they did go through bad things
i look at them and scorn at pity
i look at their lives and scorn at what they call "suffering"
for they look at life negatively, making unrealistic expectations of themselves, and thinking that they've came to the greatest epiphanies.
what ive come to further learn is that one's hunger can be another's fracture, one's poverty can be another man's life.
that i myself am nothing to sufferings around me and must learn to do something about bad things in life instead of loathe over them, complain, get despaired, pissed, disgusted, contempted
well im freaking sure that your learning abilitites are far refined
that which i greatly respect.
Labels: life
critical
Do things take place so fast? You were fine 1 month ago when I came to study for my chinese exam, now, you're so ill, so immobile.
I don't know what to do cos' I can do nothing. I can't procrastinate, I can't help, I can't do anything, I CAN DO NOTHING. IM SO DAMN HELPLESSLY HELPLESS.
It's about time for me to face this, but I won't let this hope go, I'll visit you as far as I can, I'll do my best to make it fine. I'm starting to see this realization slowly diffuse into myself. I have no idea how to react, or how to combat, or how to deal with it, simple indescribable helplessness. Someone be there for me.
Am I emotionless? I feel helpless, lost, and hear silent fear scream. I cannot let anything go. This thing is really taking a toll on me. The great escape in my working hours, ignorance found in books, but alone, one's left to fear.
Labels: friends n loved ones
HIT 5
Ok, here's HIT at work. Contrary to popular belief, training once in 9 days does NOT impede progress, at least at the beginner and intermediate level. The last time a friend of mine gymed with me was 9-10 days ago. We did the session high-intensity style.
Then his bench was 45kg x TWO,dumbell bench was 11kg(on each arm) x9/10ten days later, his weights are these:47.5kg x 713kg (on each arm) x 10Great improvement, and certainly advocates the effectiveness of high intensity training.
Whereas for me, the last time I trained chest was a full week ago:
last wk:
Bench: 80kg x 4
Dumbell bench: 24kg x 7
This wk:
Bench: 82.5kg x 2
Dumbell bench: 24kg x 11
I made several amendments to my training, including the emphasis on static contraction and negatives, so for example, last week i take 2 counts to lower the bar, two counts to push the weight up, and zero counts on fully stretched position (2020 movement). This week is a 2240 movement. It's very tempting to just push off without negatives in pushing movements, and well it's good that i've overcame the temptation.
Another thing: rest. I had been breaking the last 2 days. Exerting myself and stuff. Today I didn't feel good, and perhaps explaining the weights. The emphasis of rest must never be taken lightly. One cannot and must not underestimate the amount of stress pumping iron can induce upon the body. Let alone the much more intensive-than-normal high intensity training. Sleep is extremely important.
Slowly pieces are starting to fall together. Changing my training and diet, now i must change my rest hours accordingly. Meanwhile anyone thinking of embarking into HIT must first read about the pioneers of this: Mike Mentzer and Arthur Jones and their methods. Dorian Yates also trained with high intensity, so it will be good to check him out too.
Labels: exercise
past few days
Saturday had many things going on, first i went to the library to borrow a book I've been vying for: The Wisdom of Mike Mentzer. I was so super contented man! Went to hospital to visit grandpa for 2 hours, and seems that he's doing quite fine! He still looks as handsome as ever man. At about 1, I went to the Adidas store, then went out with the crew to shop and walk around for fun, with J. Wong. I was making fun of him with any instance possibly available. He was like "Why is he making fun of me all the time?" with that Australian-Chinese accent. At about 5, left for YMCA for an afterglow, which is a get-together of all volunteers who volunteered for the YMCA camp for the intellectually disabled. I remembered sitting at the tables outside the entrance filling up the CAS log. We're getting all sorts of requests and questions, like one woman asking us to make sure everyone dumped the rubbish in the right places, people asking us where to go, where to sit and stuff. They thought we were the ushers lol. Finally at night about 7, left for Serangoon Island Country Club for Charles' birthday. It was FUN man. Can see Charles having a great time! And thanks Charles for inviting us and booking SIX bowling alleys! Gosh it was damn fun to bowl. My lane was the craziest. We bowled in all sorts of fashion: bowling backwards, through the legs, the complete sideways approach, the slowest ball possible (i got 2.9 km/h with 5 pins down!), superman style (CNE lay on the floor and PUSHED the ball like superman, and yes, it went to the gutters, spin-the-top, football. We laughed and laughed till our throats got sore! I tried replicating my 2.9km/h rampage by pushing the ball even slower. Guess what, it stalled at the gutter and we're all like thinking we're screwed, cos when you row 2 balls, it will jam the machine. So we're like "cannot go to the right gutter". And so all our shots kept hitting the left on -.- Till JUNEN swayed one right in the path of the right gutter and hit the ball which was stalled there! We're thinking we're damn screwed cos 2 balls will go in. but it's not to be. one ball went in, and the machine cleared the pins. At this time, the second ball is approaching the end of the gutter slowly. Just as that sweeping mechanism sweeps the pin into the bank, the ball reaches the end. The best part is that the sweeping mechanism went the opposite way after clearing the pins, pushing the ball back down the gutter into our hands! We got the ball back where we rolled it, literally.
Sunday was the competition at Ulu pandan CC. It was great man. But xinfu had too much fun before the com. He was breaking and cypering hardcore for like hours and stuff. He crashed quite bad, though the performance was really very good already. He was very disappointed with his performance, but needless to say, it's already a phenomenal improvement. Sunshine and Boy were EXTREMELY DOPE. Tosh was damn funny at the last battle, as usual, earning the respect he deservedly demanded. I seldom see this dopeness from them! Always never show in public, until underground (literally) competitions did they show their real guns! We had dinner after the com, sessioned, and went home.
Labels: bboy, birthdays, friends n loved ones
Sunday's com
Sunday's com for crew. All the best kyensai! We did good practising today, and yes they improved lots man.
Today was the last day of exams. But it seemed ages away. The best part is that I had nothing after exams, no1 to hang out with, NOTHING. It was superboring thank God weiyang accompanied me, played soccer, got allergic reaction with some plant poison, volleying from 20 yards out. Well, it always it happens to me, that I somehow have no plans after exams. Funny thing is, Song also had nothing, and I didn't ask him out to chill -.-
So just wait for the results and pray the sky don't collapse.
Labels: exams, friends n loved ones, solitary
h.i.t 4
I suppose this is my first back session done HIT style, though it wasnt completely HIT cos of the overcrowded gym, it was none other than intensive and painful. I can't really tell the results till my next back HIT which should be the next other session. But other than that, really satisfied to what close-to-HIT training did for me, and how much eating more could help :)
Today was middle and lower back thickening: barbell rows, lat row, one arm dumbell row,
deadlift, with barbell curl, ez bar curl, preacher curl. Shawn came halfway through our workout, disrupted abit, but well its great to have him here. Biceps are still weak, but are improving much. The killer of the day is unanimously voted by the nervous system and all fibers of the body to be: deadlift. The heaviest I've done with 112.5kg x THREE reps only, the third one took 10 seconds to complete, indeed the most demanding i've done so far. But somehow I keep thinking my form was wrong, but i checked the mirror again and again but nothing is wrong. So I ended up doing reps very slowly, about 3 seconds up, 4 seconds down. It's the only exercise I dreadfully love. And needs serious self-encouragement.
So I totally expect a wasted lower back and middle back tomorrow, coagulated with R or L lactic acid in
cis-trans isomerism. Next session is chest and triceps again and I will blog about improvements, recovery and intensity.
Labels: exercise
h.i.t session 3
IT WAS great! Marked by improvements made from the previous session vivifying me with sparkles of content and confidence.
A thought came to me yesterday. I was watching and advertisement on miss singapore universe. Then a thought hit me. If attractiveness is measured based on genetics and not effort, wouldn't it be a pure shot of luck that a pageant is born with such genes? And, as compared to Mr. Universe, the efforts taken to prepare is much less? Such is that of miss singapore and miss world, and I'm not implying that it doesn't take effort to keep the fats off, but you can compare it to the overwhelming load of shit the guys go through for mr. universe.
Compare this:
To this:
Not only do images act as photographic evidence, the process can also be used to back up:
Miss Universe: Step 1: Adding a little muscle to correct areas (if needed, most of the time, not). Step 2: shedding fat to about 15% bodyfat with a strict diet.
Mr. Universe: Step 1: Adding MUCH more muscle as fast as possible to different areas of the body, ensuring SYMMETRY and PROPORTION as well. Step 2: Shedding fat to about 5% bodyfat with a very strict diet.
So why is Miss Universe more popular, or more broadcasted? Well, first, sex satisfies all, second, i presume more people prefer to see beautiful women than musclemen (beautiful man, but what, really, is beauty?) And third, women are better icons of beauty and desire than men.
It seems as if many things in the world will never work in the ranks based on: effort shown and levels of difficulty. This is one great example :)
Labels: exercise
It's true for certain things here. T1 denotes the moment when you made your decision to avoid, to control your desire for something. Let's say, your desire to know this person. Then after which, your desire for that thing, or that person, goes negative, an escarpment to a deep, seemingly irreversible drop. This thing is quite true of crushes, or like a person who tries his best to abstain from falling for the other one.
