and she went with the wind

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Grandma was cremated yesterday. It was too surreal.

I try hard to search my mind for all the memories to hold on tight to.

In a way, it was less cruel to see her coffin move slowly towards the fire because they hid it from view. My paternal grandma’s cremation was manual and when they opened the huge oven, I could see the flames licking on either side. In Singapore, it is all automated and there is a door to hide the view of the coffin going into the oven.

Still, it was heartbreaking. Although people say that once a person dies, the body is just a shell, but it’s something physical which you can see and hold on to. Once the body is cremated, there’s really nothing left. I can only think that she is now taken care of in heaven and is living an eternal peaceful and happy life.

bad choice to open that email now

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I don’t know when I’ve become so caught up in grades and awards. Maybe it’s coz since Secondary school, I’ve never been the one who got the good grades or any award.  Yea, I know I can only blame myself then for not putting in more effort. Now that I’m in college, I’m putting in all this effort, but I’m not getting anything at all.

The worst part is someone whom I feel is undeserving is getting it instead. Where have I gone wrong? What have I done wrong? 我真的不懂我为了什么在加油。为了什么在拼命的好好读书。At the end of the day, I’m still stuck at the starting point. 真的好累。我真的好累。

Argh. Wrong time to open the email. Why did I have to look at the list of awardees when I have to write an 8 page essay? Now my mood is like shit. Trying to listen to music to calm myself and complaining to a good friend who is trying her best to cheer me up.

I have 2 choices: 1) motivate myself to do even better 2) give up. As much as I hate it, I know which I’ll choose in the end.

the flowers made me sick

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The past week has been hell for me. It started out with a bad runny nose/blocked nose and teary eyes. I thought I had fallen sick, but strangely though, I did not feel one bit tired or lethargic. After 3 days of taking over the counter medication and not feeling any better, I decided to make a trip down to the school clinic. The doctor took one look at me and said I was having an allergy.

I have never suffered from hay fever and the only thing I knew about how bad it is is from watching a red, puffy-faced Takuya Kimura talk about it on Music Station yonks ago and seeing Chun Ming suffering from it last Spring. The doctor told me that some people only get it after they’ve been in Champaign for 2-3 years. Right, that’s me.

Miserable Elisia is miserable.

Just after that trip to McKinley, my right eye decided to get infected with conjunctivitis. I had been dabbing my eye the whole afternoon and by evening, my eye was tearing so badly and I was feeling pain. I stared into the mirror and realised that my eyeball was swollen on the right side. It felt squishy like there was a sac of liquid. I had no idea it was conjunctivitis then and was panicking. I did a search on the internet and found out I was suffering from conjunctivitis and that it could be due to hay fever. Wow, added problems on hand.

If you can’t tell, I’m suffering from conjunctivitis.

That night was the worst night ever. The medicine I got from McKinley was hardly working. My nose was still blocked as ever and runny. My eyes were tearing so badly, especially the right eye. I could hardly sleep. I got out of bed in the middle of the night to wash my eyes and put more eye drops. I was frustrated and miserable. I didn’t know whether to throw a tantrum and cry because I knew that even if I cried, the problem was not going to go away. For the first time in a long long while, I actually prayed.  I prayed that God would bring me relief of my pain for a while so that I could actually get some sleep. It must have worked because I actually got some shut eye after that despite the discomfort.

From then on, out of all the medicine I got from McKinley, it seems that the eye drops worked the best. By last Sunday, the conjunctivitis had almost gone away. Monday, my eye started to itch pretty badly again. I could only pray that my eye was not about to get bad again. Last night, both eyes started itching and teared quite a bit. I woke up to put eye drops and prayed yet again that the conjunctivitis had not spread to my left eye. Thank God the eye drops worked.

I never thought the masks my mum gave me would come in handy one day. She gave me about 20 pieces to use last Fall since H1N1 was still going around. I had not used any of it then since I was not sick and I felt it was stupid to use one even when I wasn’t sick. I started using them last Friday. Screw looking normal and feeling uncomfortable of people staring at me. I am not about to let myself suffer further. At least it acts as a barrier between the air and my nose and I won’t have to breathe in the pollen-filled air.

I’m still not totally well yet, but I’ve improved quite a lot. I still have a bit of a runny/blocked nose and my eyes itch and tear sometimes, but I’m feeling a lot better.

Stupid pollen. Stupid flowers. Stupid (male) flowers.

surveying people is hard work

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I like doing surveys. And since last semester, I’ve become the one creating the survey and going out to ask people to fill it in. It is a tough job, but it’s ok…I don’t hate it.

Getting people to do surveys is hard work:

  • You need to be thick-skinned.
  • You need to be able to handle rejection and not let it bother you.
  • You need to be smart so as to minimize rejection.
  • You need perseverance. Collecting data IS long and hard.
  • You need to try every single resource you have. That does not mean you do things blindly.
  • You need to be able to resist temptation. How you achieve this will determine whether your work is biased or not.

since when are flash mobs violent?

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Because there are stupid people in this world. Stupid people who go spoil all the fun in something simple. Then the fun gets taken away from everyone. How do you blame the Government for banning fun when there are stupid people who do stupid things?

I’m referring to this article. Sui lorz, now it’s banned in Philadelphia. If we’re not careful, it’s going to be banned in even more states and perhaps countries too.

Flash mobs are supposed to be peaceful, random, and fun. Depending on who’s organizing it, it can be using to advertise and market products and services or just done out of sheer fun to put a smile on others’ faces.

你说气不气?

sakura girl

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I expected a new single from NewS since it’s Spring and the Sakura season, but I didn’t exactly expect it to be a sad song seeing how 嵐 and their “サクラ咲ケ”.  Ok, the song isn’t a ballad, but it definitely talks about someone leaving her partner aka breakup. I couldn’t catch the meaning of the lyrics except for Massu’s solo part with just listening to the song, but after watching the PV with the lyrics, I could understand it. YES!!! This is huge improvement for my standard of Japanese!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyN479t1sM4

Tego’s hair at the beginning of the PV is HORRIBLE. And him crying? -_-||| Makes me wanna go “c’mon, be a man, Tego!” Massu’s stoned face when he supposedly receives a breakup text message is hilarious. Much prefer his smiley face.

Oh, and when I first heard the song, it reminded me of ケツメイシ’s “さくら” except that this song has a faster beat, but the opening sounds rather similar.

survey for advertising class

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My group mates and I desperately need help. This is a survey for project for an Advertising class. The target market is Hispanics/Latinos/Latinas. So far, there have not been that many responses that are within the target market. If you know someone who’s within that target market, please ask them to fill in this survey. If you are within that target market, please help fill in. Thanks!

The survey URL:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dDF5SXZzdWVMRjBTeExUNkZqUlQtcHc6MA

poupee girl

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After a long long time, I decided to do something on my poupee girl account. Finally got round to taking a few pictures and uploading them. I need ribbons so I can get my poupee girl some nice clothes. I created her in my likeness. Though she doesn’t look quite like me without specs and as much as I’ll like to wear high-heels like her, my feet just won’t allow it. My feet chooses the shoes, not the shoes choose the owner. I often get blisters with ANY type of pumps. Sneakers are the only comfortable shoes I can wear without having those shoes bite at my feet. I think it’s the shape of my feet and the way I walk. Hmmmm…

i will prepare for class x100

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If there was any day I had to be more ashamed of myself than ever, today would be the day. I spent the whole weekend preparing cover letters and my resume that I didn’t prepare for Japanese class. No doubt I studied a bit for the kanji quiz, but I totally didn’t do the stuff in the workbook. Not like it mattered really since we don’t get points anymore for homework, but it mattered coz I was unable to answer questions.

I was praying hard that sensei wouldn’t call me, but the class is too small to even miss me. They weren’t exactly difficult questions that I had to answer, but suddenly calling on me like that and me being unprepared and panicky…my mind went blank. Yes, I was frantically searching my mind for the Japanese word for “exercise.” Not that I didn’t know it, but like I said, my mind went blank. And so, I could not answer even the simplest of questions.

It’s funny coz it made me think back of the time when I was in Primary 4. I had one hell of a mean Chinese teacher. You wouldn’t want to not do your homework or forget to bring something. She would just give the shelling of your life that would make you cringe in a corner. Not to mention her making you tell your parents to write what she called a “guarantee letter.” A letter that just meant that your parents have acknowledged your misbehavior and would make sure that this would never happen again. Of course, this also meant that you would get scolded and possibly whacked by your parents too. Ok, she isn’t that mean. She is just one very fierce teacher. On normal occasions, she is nice and concerned.

So, for today’s misbehavior…

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