Hello folks - no I'm not dead yet, definitely not.
Close to that though, I have been a sloth curled up in bed reading shallow books that I've been analysing a little too deeply since I came back from Guides November Camp two days ago.
From when I last posted (8 November) till now (a good twelve days), many interesting things have happened and I'm going to recap the events that have occurred (much to my amusement but possibly to your boredom, whoever 'your' is going to be). It's going to be an insanely long post, apologies for that but click away if you'd wish.
If you haven't noticed, I really like Gardens by the Bay - going there shows me a side of Singapore that most Singaporeans don't appreciate that much and even though most of the plants are probably imported from other parts of the world, this nature part of Marina Bay brings out a great "Garden City" feel which I absolutely adore.
So on the 10th, a day after Emily's birthday I decided to do a little something for her and plan an outing for her with her kept in the dark of where we will be heading to/ doing. Me, being extremely dedicated in my self-assumed job of surprise planner, woke up early on the day itself to bake ham and cheese croissants for our outdoor picnic. As usual though, Emily is an extremely deep sleeper and from past experiences, I know that I should never leave my house before I make sure that she is awake and preparing. (I swear, her future boyfriend is going to be driven crazy by her extreme habit of being late) We were supposed to meet at 11am but we ended up meeting at 3pm. Oh well, it's her birthday anyway.
We made our way to Bayfront and I think she liked the balloon I got her (;
We made our way to the Gardens where the view was absolutely stunning and the air was amazingly fresh. We enjoyed a perfect weather as well, with cool breezes accompanied by sunshine. It was surprisingly empty for a Saturday perhaps because it had rained in other parts of Singapore earlier on and people were probably afraid to have their moods ruined by a possibly wet Garden. I'm actually really glad that Singapore didn't install air conditioning in the Gardens or made it completely sheltered because that would really kill the essence of the place and be insanely environmentally unfriendly.
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Close to that though, I have been a sloth curled up in bed reading shallow books that I've been analysing a little too deeply since I came back from Guides November Camp two days ago.
From when I last posted (8 November) till now (a good twelve days), many interesting things have happened and I'm going to recap the events that have occurred (much to my amusement but possibly to your boredom, whoever 'your' is going to be). It's going to be an insanely long post, apologies for that but click away if you'd wish.
10 November 2012
If you haven't noticed, I really like Gardens by the Bay - going there shows me a side of Singapore that most Singaporeans don't appreciate that much and even though most of the plants are probably imported from other parts of the world, this nature part of Marina Bay brings out a great "Garden City" feel which I absolutely adore.
So on the 10th, a day after Emily's birthday I decided to do a little something for her and plan an outing for her with her kept in the dark of where we will be heading to/ doing. Me, being extremely dedicated in my self-assumed job of surprise planner, woke up early on the day itself to bake ham and cheese croissants for our outdoor picnic. As usual though, Emily is an extremely deep sleeper and from past experiences, I know that I should never leave my house before I make sure that she is awake and preparing. (I swear, her future boyfriend is going to be driven crazy by her extreme habit of being late) We were supposed to meet at 11am but we ended up meeting at 3pm. Oh well, it's her birthday anyway.
We made our way to Bayfront and I think she liked the balloon I got her (;
Who can resist helium and AA Milne's creations?
Us with the signature Gardens by the Bay architecture structures in the background
Then we settled in a sheltered pavilion and had a mini picnic with the ham and cheese croissants which I baked earlier that day (which would have been much fresher if we had met as planned at 11AM) and iced strawberry tea which was literally iced because I left the bottle in the freezer overnight. By the time we got to the Gardens, the strawberry tea flavoured ice has melted and left us with a cool icy drink.
And then, as what tourists do, we started camwhoring (I do not enjoy using this word but it's possibly the most suitable word for describing what we did then).
And finally, a last one celebrating Obama's recent win in the election! (okay, it was a "recent win" at that point in time when we took the photo)
Then we headed to TWG at Marina Bay Sands where I treated her to macarons and something called "Chocolate fondant" which looked a little something like this:
It looked really good, but if you love chocolate, eat this and you'd definitely be sick of chocolate. The two of us couldn't handle the richness of it. It was too decadent for my liking.
Now, here's a fake smile after that chocolate concoction got into my tummy. But alright, the company was good so maybe my smile was real (-:
Afterwards we just went to a couch at MBS and talked about everything under the sun. It felt amazing to have such a warm heart to heart talk with this girl, my best friend. The plus point was that although we came from different schools, we could relate to each other so much and sometimes it's good to view things from an outsider's point of view, as the Chinese saying goes, "当局者迷，旁观者清". Thank you Emily for six years of wonderful friendship and here's to another six strong years and more (':
That Saturday was one to remember.
Moving on,
12 November 2012
We had Guides Company Initiatives in school where the 2nd Coy Sec Two Guides did a pretty great job in planning. I really enjoyed myself at the pseudo Running Man game which was a new concept for me and the picnic had junk food... who wouldn't enjoy that?
Sharmaine, Chris and me taking an apparently camera worthy break from running around school.
Anyhow, that's besides the point. After initiatives, we had a 13atch lunch + meeting although only a few of us could make it because the PGA kids had to go for training for their Pioneering test that was going to take place that same week (which all of them eventually passed, congrats friends :D). Nevertheless, I thought that the meeting and lunch was really productive and fun. I would go into more details of the meeting except that I'm acting on the possibility that there could be Guides juniors reading this and seniors should have mysterious super-secret plans after super-secret meetings (-;
In our super-secret hideout at Plaza Singapura with all of us doing work and being productive. Okay maybe not all.
I became so much more excited about next year after the meeting. The prospect of being the most senior ... intrigues me a whole lot and it's funny but I really can't wait although I'm quite afraid of the pressure that I'm possibly going to face. I have new found faith in 13atch and the speed of which we are growing and assuming our new positions is scary, in a good way if that makes any sense at all.
The last ones left at the meeting (;
15 November 2012
It was the day of House Comm Camp 2012! /shrieks/ It was what has been bothering Channel 5 for a few days and has caused us a lot of rage and frustration but it's over and it went pretty well overall (:
In the morning, I headed to Melissa Tang's house to help with all the bags of junk food which Huiying, Mel and myself purchased the day before together! (If you were wondering why it was only three of us, it's because Minglu and Vanessa were always tied down by ICYL preparation) It was hilarious how much food we bought and how much we had to lug into my dad's car.
We were getting increasingly worried because we have not done any rehearsing for our presentation to the House Commers and a lot of the programme was not exactly firmed up yet. But I think for our first presentation together as Channel 5 was pretty good when we realized that our audience was really just House Comm and there was nothing to be worried about in actual fact.
I particularly enjoyed Intra House Time where Waddle had our own bonding and working time (': I'm really happy with our new lot of yellow people - they were already so productive and they show so much promise in terms of their new ideas because that was exactly what I was aiming for - something different for Waddle. I'm already feeling really glad with the choices JELLO made in terms of subcomm allocations and leaders - yet another thing that is probably going to make 2013 an amazing year.
Four of the sec threes in Waddle House Comm (':
Finally, there was Guides November Training Camp on 16 November (yes, my schedule was really packed last week) but I'm going to save that post for another day (possibly tomorrow)!
