Drama mama

Today something very dramatic happened in my neighbourhood. While on the way home from the library with my family, we saw a crowd forming around the driveway-ish area near my block of flats. We thought there was a car accident and upon investigation, we saw three people sitting on the floor in the middle of the driveway - two women and a man. The women were bawling and being dramatic, and the man being seemingly stoic. My sis’ first thought was that it was a love triangle, and the two women fighting it out. Then one of the woman started to ask the onlookers for help. So I called the police. First time in my life calling 999, was quite excited. Actually was more excited about the call than the drama going on. So I told the operator that someone’s fighting here, etc. Then I stayed on to be kaypoh, and partly to wait for the police so that I can see them in action.

So we waited, and while waiting, some nosey neighbour came around and disseminated more information. Apparently, it was a daughter with the mother, and presumably another male relative. The daughter was trying to run away from home, and while the mother was chasing, the mother actually shouted for passers-by to stop her, claiming the daughter is crazy. Then somehow the mother caught her and so they sat around on the floor in some sort of lattice to stop her from running away. While sitting on the floor and bawling and screaming, the daughter found time and interest to light a cigarette. Then we started thinking if she was actually high on drugs or something.

After standing around to observe the drama for 20 minutes (yes, response time for the police was about 20-25 minutes, despite me telling them there IS a fight. I guess if it was a real parang knife fight, they’d be bring bodybags by then.), the police arrived and then the truth came out. The daughter has depression due to some relationship problems, and she was trying to run away from home to (1) be with the guy (2) kill herself, so the mother had to stop her, etc. and ended up in a mess on the floor in the middle of a driveway (and resulting in this poor Ikea van having to reroute itself.) Sounds almost like TV, really.

Hong Kong (Part 2 of x)

I know I’m slow to blog, but I’m starting to wonder if there is any point at all in me spelling out in details what I have done in Hong Kong because fundamentally it is my own experience that has no need to be understood nor shared with other people. Furthermore, blogging in retrospect just isn’t my kind of thing. Even though I kept a daily travel journal that records stuff, I don’t know how to put everything down. Nonetheless I shall try to keep up with the narrative.

On my second day in Hong Kong, I went to the Wong Tai Sin Temple, despite being a non-believer. It was mainly for photo opportunities. On arrival at the Wong Tai Sin station, I was approached by this old lady was being “nice” and told me that I have to go up a staircase to get to the temple. Little did I know that this was a trap. The staircase was littered with other old women trying to peddle me incense, joss paper and talisman. The first one who approached, I thought I could be nice and bought some from her, despite not even knowing what to do with it. Then they became relentless and tried pushing for more money from me. I got quite fed up after a while I told them outright, in Cantonese, that I don’t believe and told them to take their stuff back and cheat other people for all I care. Seriously, if their religion teachings taught them to prey on hapless tourists for a living, then I don’t think I want to go to their form of Heaven.So when I got to the temple I told one of the staff about that and asked him kindly to see what they can do about it, and after a while I saw a couple of policemen patrolling the area, standing at the top of the staircase looking at these old women. Serve them right for taking advantage of my kindness.

Desperate cheating old women aside, the Temple is bigger than I thought it’d be. Part of the temple was closed for restoration, but I think the grand temple is already opened.

Entrance

All that glorified Chineseness.

I walked around breathing in all the incense and left after a while. The weather was unbearably warm, so I sought refuge at the nearby shopping complex, Festival Walk. That was where I updated my blog previously about Pacific Coffee being a marker of civilisation (or something along those lines). I went to the branch of H&M at Festival Walk and bought myself a pair of long pants. Just because it was on 50% discount, so I paid less than 20 Singapore dollars for it. I should have shopped more I suppose, like everyone expects me to. Yet somehow I didn’t have a lot of urge to buy things over there. Maybe I’m too used to online shopping so shopping in a physical shop doesn’t thrill me anymore.

After leaving Festival Walk, I went to meet my friend KL at her university, the Chinese University of Hong Kong. This university is built on a hill, so it’s climbing, climbing everywhere we go.

See that brown sculpture in the centre of the picture? It resembles an archway, and is supposedly the Chinese character for “door”. Rumour has it that if you walk through that archway, you would not be able to graduate from CUHK. So I just had to walk through it. Since I am not a student there, and I do not intend to pursue my graduate course there, the rumour doesn’t apply, right?

After having lunch in one of the campus canteens and sitting for a while in her dorm room, we went to Mong Kok for some shopping.

Ladies’ Street, I think.

There are many cheap things available, and being cheap, there just isn’t much quality to them. Perfect location for picking out cheap tourist t-shirts, but I didn’t get any because … I just didn’t feel like getting any. The area around Ladies’ Market is mayhem; shops that look the same, streets that look the same … we were walking blindly the entire afternoon, or at least it felt that way. I guess when poor students like me claim that they are going on shopping sprees in Hong Kong, it’s the Mongkok area, since all the shopping centres in Hong Kong carry only mid-range and high-end brands like Agnes B. (nearly broke and bought a wallet there, then realised after buying the wallet I wouldn’t have money to put in it anyway), Vivienne Westwood (fell in love with a bag that cost 5980HKD), Coach, Chanel … and since I’m not really for cheap low quality crap, didn’t exactly had a helluva time in Mong Kok like my peers. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not looking down on cheap stuff (I love bargains, most of the time), but considering if I have limited wardrobe space, I’d rather fill it with something of good quality than something of bad quality. Hm. Not sure if I’m getting my point across, never mind that.

And so that’s about what I did on my second day there. Next up is my Ocean Park visit. Stay tuned.

(To be continued…)

Red Cross Appeal for donations

(Stealing KL’s post

If you are in Singapore, this is how you can donate towards the quake in China:

DBS/POSB Fund Transfer 1) Insert your ATM card and enter PIN. Select “More Services” 2) Select “Credit Card/Bill Payment” 3) Key in “99″ Other Corporation 4) Key in “99″ again 5) Key in “18″ for Red Cross China Earthquake 6) Indicate your contact number as the Bill Reference Number. 7) Select account type 8 ) Enter donation amount 9) Press “Confirm” to complete transaction

DBS Internet Banking 1) Log on to DBS iBanking, 2) Go to “Payment Services” 3) Under “Bill Payment”, 4) Select “RedCross China Earthquake” 5) Indicate your contact number as the Consumer Reference Number

UOB Internet Banking 1) Login to UOB Personal Internet Banking 2) Click on “Bill Payment” on the left menu 3) Click on “Pay Bills” on the left menu 4) Click on “New Bill” on the main screen 5) Select “Red Cross China Earthquake” from the drop down menu of the payee corporations list 6) Enter telephone number as the Bill Reference Number 7) Enter the debiting account to debit donation 8 ) Enter the donation amount 9) Click on “Confirm” button to approve payment

UOB Cheque Donations Donations by cheque can be dropped at the UOB’s cheque deposit boxes. Cheques should be crossed and made payable to “Red Cross - China Relief Fund”.

It took me less than 30 seconds to donate, well, a measly $20 via Ibanking, much faster than setting up an online transaction to an online shop. So instead of buying some more clothes and accessories that you don’t need, why not donate and help by donating?

For more information, visit www.redcross.org.sg.

“Miss, what are you looking for?”

I like to shop at drugstore chains like Watsons and Guardian, just randomly browsing the range of products they offer.

And each time without fail, whether I am indeed searching for something, promoters will come up to me and ask me “miss, what are you looking for?” And in the past, being naive and trusting, I will tell these promoters that I’m looking for a facial cleanser, or a toner, etc. And I got duped too many times to trust these commission-driven bitches anymore. Once, I was looking for an alcohol-free toner (because my skin is sensitive to alcohol) and this promoter at Guardian insisted that whatever product she was selling was better, and that it is alcohol-free. I asked if I could test it, and she said, no tester, but it’s good because she herself uses it. So I bought it at a hefty SGD20, to come home to realize not only it is laden with alcohol, and that it only costs 670yen, which is less than SGD10 in Japan (where it was produced). Talk about being double-duped.

That is not an isolated incident; I have been blinded by these ruthless promoters in other instances. There was another time recently when I was looking for toothpaste, and this promoter came up to me, “miss, what are you looking for?” I honestly told her “toothpaste”, and in the back of my mind I thought, they can’t possibly have promoters for toothpaste, can they? Well it turned out true enough, she wasn’t a toothpaste promoter, and disregarding what I said, she started to promote some skincare product. I was pretty miffed at that point I wanted to ask her, “so miss, I can brush my teeth with this?” And recently, I met a relentless one who doesn’t seem to understand “never mind, I can look for it myself”. I feel that these promoters have this underlying assumption that I cannot make my own choice when it comes to buying things. I must have the face that says “I’m a sucker come fleece me”.

So my bottomline is, I hate promoters. I’m sorry to stereotype them all, but I have met more evil lying scheming promoters than genuinely good ones. So I can’t be faulted for being antagonistic towards them, and my tendency to avoid them, right?

And after discussing this matter with my mother and sister, we came to the conclusion the next time promoters ask me “miss what are you looking for?” I will reply henceforth:

1. Mas Selamat
2. Inspiration
3. money
4. opportunities
5. soy sauce (in a drugstore)
6. my primary school teacher
7. my true love
8. my mother
9. My pet snake that escaped
10. Glycol stearate-free products (or input any other cheem chemical terms to throw them off)

10×10 challenge

From The Ink:

Generate ten random words and link those words together using no more than 100 words, I’ve called it the 10×10 challenge.

Here are my ten words :semantics, friendship, sauce, approves, poetic, dire, automated, sells, draining, peer

I sit in my draining semantics class and peer out the window. I look at the automated vending machine that everyone approves of and wonder if it sells friendship because the dire state of my social life is nothing poetic, only pathetic. But then again, isn’t friendship just like the dipping sauce of life; it is not terribly consequential? (59 words)

Well, obviously that is not true. Sure my semantics class is draining but there is no vending machine outside my class, nor do I think my social life is pathetic.

I said then you said.

“Fly me higher to the clouds the stars the moon!”
You said yes.
“Hold me tighter through the storm the wind the cold.”
You said yes.
“Teach me to dance to swim to paint to love you.”
You said yes.
“Tell me it’s fake it’s play it’s nothing like it seems.”
You said nothing.
“Leave me alone leave me to cry leave me to die.”
You said no.
“Allow me to leave you to move on to love myself.”
You said go.

It was not too long ago

It was not too long ago since …

that Monday morning where we painted the skies pink through rose-tinted glasses running in the wind chasing our shadows
that Tuesday midnight where we flew amongst the stars in our rainbow coloured slippers kissing like our life depended on it
that Wednesday evening where we danced in the rain under the street lamps skipping puddles laughing
that Thursday afternoon where we curled up on the chaise whispering sweet nothings reading sonnets together
that Friday night where we met at the pub we weren’t supposed to be at with whom we weren’t supposed to be with
that Saturday dawn where we fought and tore at the fabric we knitted with sweat and tears over the past years
that Sunday morning where we parted ways with one last kiss and apology with our boxes packed and the cat sent away.

Mark your calendars, people

because today I cut my own hair.

My own fringe to be exact. It’s quite a radical change though.

I will put pictures up once I get a nice shot of it (which could take forever)

“Thank You” project

I was blog surfing and I came across this post. It is about this publication (?) of cards filled with thank you messages and I thought they were rather cute. I like all of them! Favourites include:

1. you made me laugh in the rain. Thank you.
2. you idiot. Thank you.
3. you rock. Thank you.
4. you stopped the time. Thank you.

Actually I love all of them!

Freerice.com

I got to know this website through Sulz, and I think this is a great project. Freerice.com will donate 10 grains of rice through the UN for every word that we know; it’s a simple MCQ vocabulary test whereby just answering a few questions we can help to end world hunger.
Rather than saying silly things like “finish your food, the children in Africa are starving”, why not do something to help them? This does not require you to give up money or a kidney; it is just tapping on our knowledge that is not expendable. Till now I’ve donated about 1500grains of rice, and I’ll keep doing it. So why don’t you do it too?