Thinking of you

One of the few songs I can play and sing along with, 天天想你 (Thinking of you everyday) is almost a classic chinese pop song by 张雨生 (Zhang Yu Sheng).

Here is a cover of the song sung by Cheer Chen. Very nice! ^_^

January going-ons

After the one week drama (or lack of drama!) in Los Angeles, I’m back to an uneventful January. Well, there’s still the lost luggage saga when I touched down Ronald Reagan National Airport followed by a week of cold/flu which was one morale downer. Otherwise, it’s been pretty uneventful.

With less than five months to my hot little island of Singapore, I guess for the next two months I’ll be hanging around Maryland before going for a big two-week trip of San Francisco-Yosemite National Park-Las Vegas-Grand Canyon (and maybe Death Valley) with Weizhen and Elaine.

Despite the lack of drama, January has been pretty inspiring to me. I’ve been working out at a gym for a bit. I joined an indoor soccer league with Alan that plays Sundays. Then we got our biweekly music night going in Andrew’s condo with Jonathan and some of Andrew’s pals (some of them are pretty good musicians!). Interestingly, one night, we jammed to my rendition of 天天想你 (Thinking of you everyday) and it was pretty much only me who knows the song! That’s the power of music!

And finally, I stumbled onto a treasure trove of Cheer Chen’s tablatures on youtube! That got me playing hours and hours of guitar every week! I’m making it my personal target of learning two cheer’s songs every week! Anyway I realized youtube is actually very fun to use and you could make your own playlists and make them play one after another! This could potentially make youtube much better than watching the Chinese MTV channel! I’m definitely going to be messing with it for a while!

Here’s one playlist I made which is a six-song concert by Cheer Chen. Sweet!

Kim's Haircut

Finally got a decent haircut in a Korean haircut place in Silver Spring. Showed her a picture of Nicholas Tse and got this! This is so funny!


My Nicholas Tse haircut!

My Humble Abode

This is the how my basement apartment look like. I'm renting the basement of a townhouse. The interior is like some sort of a studio apartment which I furnished myself (bare minimum!)


This is the entrance.


My 'bedroom' portion with a fireplace (too lazy to use) and my guitar!


My mess of a 'living room'!


My cooking area.


The bathroom. The stairs to the upper portion of the house which I don't go to. My landlord's family occupies the upper two floors.


This my very own bathroom (very important to me, I realised!).

Snow@Fence Post Court (19th Jan)

This is the place where I'm at for the past six months. I guess you must have wondered where all your presents and letters went to? On January 19th, we had our first snow of the year and it was also the first snow of this unusally warm winter.


Fence Post Court


The community


My snowy Mustang!


First snow of 2007!


Messing around with snow!


The townhouse I'm at. I walk past the sidewalk by the side of the house to my private entrance from the backyard.


The walkway towards the backyard.


Messing with snow again!


Paul in snow!


That's how the townhouses look like from the back.


My entrance.


The back of the community is a downslope to the main road.

Los Angeles, California (25th Dec - 1st Jan)

Mimi's Cafe... breakfast before the first day of Disneyland


Breakfast at Mimi's... really good!


Everyone lining up for a shot with Goofy on Main Street U.S.A. Disneyland


Disney's famous castle!


Adventureland where we sat on Indiana Jones Adventure, my No.3 favourite ride!


Mark Twain's Riverboat, Frontierland


Tom Sawyer's Island, Frontierland


Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Frontierland


Mad Tea Party, Fantasyland


California Adventure Entrance


California Screamin'! We took it 3 times; 2 times in the day and 1 at night! My No.1 fav ride!


The Twilight Zone Tower of Horror! It was thrilling and funny at the same time. My No.2 fav ride!


Disney's Castle gates... the castle is way tinier than imagined actually.


Waiting for the fireworks at dusk! It was really pretty!


Finally got a chance to sleep on Westin's Heavenly Bed! Westin, Las Vegas. We also caught a Cirque Du Soliel show "Mystere", definitely one nice show!


Back to Los Angeles, a skaterboi at Venice Beach


Breakfast at Venice beach. My Eggs Florentine with a glass of Mimosa!


The coast off Venice beach... I finally got to both ends of USA, meeting the Atlantic Ocean and Pacific Ocean.


Downtown Santa Monica... where we had our slightly happier moments


A mad drive uphill just to catch a glismp of a quite tiny Hollywood sign


I reached the top of the city of LA!


Kodak theatre where the Oscars were held... it was amazingly normal. Just like a normal movie cineplex.


I walked on the Hollywood Walk of Fame


Tom Hank's Star


The Chinese Theatre beside the Kodak theatre. Interesting architecture.


A friendly Michael Jackson!


A rather fat Spiderman!

Truth is hard to bear

Some truth you already know beforehand and yet choose to see it happen. Some, you only know it after it happens.

Just happen that I learnt the two ugly truths in a single day. Makes me wonder about the principles where I based my life and relationships on… am I wrong? Why do I keep tangling into the lives of the wrong people?

But… I just couldn’t change myself… I’m the way I am because I chose to lead my life this way. All my friends… I will always treasure.

Random thoughts on 2nd Jan

I realized how much I missed home when I was at the airport… I wished I were on the flight back to Singapore rather than back to Maryland. And I realized how much I hate goodbyes…

Touched down at the National Airport at 11am after a long four-hour transit at Atlanta and they lost my baggage. I had to stay till 4pm for the next flight from Atlanta and hope that it will miraculously appear on that flight. Lesson learned, never leave your most valuable possessions in your luggage, definitely not your house keys. Incidentally, I lost my house keys the last time I traveled to Utah-Idaho-Montana-Wyoming, and decided that by putting my keys in the checked baggage, I won’t lose it. I guess the next time; I’ll just leave the keys under the doormat!

First time I see a flag flown on half-mast. I asked a lady and was told that the United States flag was flown half-mast till the burial of President Ford.

My luggage didn’t appear at 4pm and I had to leave the airport to stay over at Anthony’s. I can’t even say how much I appreciate him, helping me so much through my year in the States so far.