Be Positive

• The rash will go away
• Keep drinking water
• Avoid "heaty" foods including spicy food (my favourite...)
• Focus on my exams, not the itchiness
• Look at pictures of my nephews and nieces for they bring so much joy and allievate the pain
• Learn how to deal with it, not agonize over it,
  
• Learn to know and understand how your body sends signals to you,
  
• learn how to react just as i watch my wound heal itself over the past 2 weeks.
• Be Positive, I will Emerge Stronger

The itch is spreading....

I talked abt my rashes and its getting worst...it has spread to my neck area, left arm and some parts of my body..and the worst part, behind my right knee just got worst..at this rate..i'm going to need to buy a giant size prickly heat powder bottle....its IRRITATING!!!

Where did this rashes come from??? shaun said it might be due to stress but i don't feel that stressed..yet as compared to previous exam periods...what abt late nights? well this is not the only time when i sleep late...Sigh today the doc confirmed that i no longer need to bandage my wound since its already closed up, although i need to take extra care to avoid getting into situatuions where it can open up again, then now my rashes got worst AFTER i saw the doc...Oh well, just have to keep applying powder and watch my personal hygiene and hope it gets better...

Now got to focus on my mugging, got a paper 15 hours later...

Funny French Car AD

My friend gave me a link for an awesome Lionel Messi solo goal video, its hosted on metacafe, another youtube so to speak and when i clicked on top videos, i saw this link for a french Car Ad, found it very funny so i'm sharing it, enjoy!


Funny French Car Ad - For more funny movies, click here

Renault, Tres Beau!

même la mauvaise chance vient dans un paquet!

ok what do my title mean?
"even bad luck comes in a package"

Well it all started 2 weeks ago, where i foolishly injured my left hand at Pulau Ubin, the whole story in the entry "Learn From My Foolishness". Then the week after, the temptation for soccer at my Hall's basketball court proved too much...and i injured one of my right toes after the game, the swelling has since subsided. Then just yesterday, my comp started having wierd problems just as i was busy lstudying my unprinted notes on it, and then another "disaster" struck, my spectacles broke!! can you believe that??

Jeez..well i ahve a habit of taking off my specs when i read my notes, because of the fact that i'm short sighted so i prefer to take it off when i read stuff close up. So well it was one of those moments where i took off my specs and the next moment where i place it down on my table, i saw the frame giving way..and a broken specs laid in front of me. So this blind mice is now typing this entry without any specs!! my spare specs i foolishly didn't bring back during one of my soccer training sessions a few months back but that spare pair was already in a very very bad shape. So well today i went to Jurong point, to the optical point shop where i had a voucher, got it through my hall's exam goodie bag giveaway. So i initally wanted to get only a new frame but it would cost me $35 and 4 days later for it to be ready...then i also knew that if i bought new lens, they would give me an extra $50 discount. so i ended up buying one too. Total Damage :$85. well my old lens also very chui :P so its a valid reason!! after all my tenure at Hall 7 is coming to an end...so much less soccer for me...less opportunities for my specs to be damaged haha....

Oh well, i have to live without my specs for the next 3 days since i can only collect them on Sat evening. I'm officially blind - thankfully my short sightedness can tahan my revision, just that the comp and beyond will seem like a 2.4km run....and to end off, i also have a minor bout of rashes..since yesterday after my bath..dunno what happened to me..Wenbao say it might be the water "activated" the bed bugs on my body..not sure if this even true...thankfully got prickly heat to get rid of the itchiness. Alright time to stop, i'm typing more than my eyes are seeing, so pardon if there are any grave spelling errors!! haha...beta not strain my eyes.. Au Revoir!

Love
Eric


tip: go to altavista's translation website here

33 Persons dead in Deadliest U.S. University Shooting

Another sad day, another shooting. I was browsing through my Google personalized homepage news section during my break from studying and i saw the headline. Links to the full news articles as follows:

CNN news article
Economist's coverage

Its so sad that a normal school day turns into something tragic, imagine yourself walking into school, going to class, chatting with your classmates and perhaps looking forward to what the teacher is teaching and suddenly a gunman turns up and starts shooting. The horror, the thought of it, so terrifying. My heart & prayers go to the affected families and friends, i believe God will be with them through this period of grief and sorrow. It may happen at such a far place but i believe what i can emphathise is that the victims are university students, so somewhere along the line, they are like us, going through school, getting an education that promises a better life, enjoying the company of friends and learning new stuff everyday but somehow it got shattered, just like that

Another part of me is asking what motivated the gunman to start it all? was he a student like them but somehow some form of pressure became too hard to bear? questions no doubt on everybody's mind...i can only hope the U.S. Government will wake up and introduce standardized gun laws, and really shut down those gun shops who sell without proper documentation. Its almost like asking that question: if i have a customer who wants to buy, i sell since i can make $$, who cares what he is going to do with it? furthermore the customer can just make use of perhaps the most common reason: "For my own security". so what right have the gun seller have to question that? so you can't use that as an excuse to sell guns! you still need proper methods of determining who can buy guns! not any tom or harry!!! Or rather its an irony? selling guns is my business, i just sell them, i can't control what they do with it. Fallacy?? i don't know...

Alas this Singaporean can only voice out, via this blog, via the public space of the internet. And be thankful we don't have similar incidents here. I can't imagine someone coming into NTU and start shooting, and so perhaps this incident makes us more appreciative of our excellent police force and strong emphasis on determent + no such rubbish gun laws that the US have.

Well, a sad day nevertheless, my condolences go out to the victim's families.

Love
Eric

Fiddling with my Blog's Elements

Ok i've added 2 new elements, a visitor count feature and a Tag Board! so its becoming to look more like a blog! heh this is getting interesting but well i don't even know who visits my blog save for my hall buddies haha...so well..just filddling with something new!

Enough for now, back to mugging....

Check out the modified Labels!

I added a new page element today: Labels. Which displays all the labels used in my entries, similar to tags that you see at youtube and many other sites. So i wonder why did blogger beta not use tags? after all its owned by Google which owns Youtube. My guess is that labels are a more appropriate term to be used for blogging, which is effectively your online journal, so labels describe in gist what that entry is about.

As you can see now, the labels are different from the default ones, they are now what you call a "cloud styled labels! cool eh? here's the link which i got the instructions from a fellow blogger here as well, thanks phydeaux3!

The funny thing is that i only came across your blog and the link while searching for a picasa widget! which your blog has also but i haven't looked at it yet, saw ur labels was actually more interesting! haha..oh well later :) now i got to eat lunch, cya!

Happyness?

The pursuit of and definition of happyness... what would they be? am i re-discovering something that i lost?

1. For my Mum & Dad to get back together. Simple? not so, complicated? very but can only hope.

2. The joy of cooking, especially for a loved one, something that i perhaps re-discovered in recent times after losing it? something to think about...the cutting of ingredients, marinating, getting the fire right and many other stuff. Re-discovering, it may seem.

3. When other people are Happy, like seeing the smile on my nieces and nephews faces, that smile, that gleaning smile, that playful look, that innocence, such joy u wonder. I feel so happy for my cousins although they always say, when kids don't smile, they cry and that, is another different story. nevertheless i can only feel happyness looking at my niece and nephew photo gallery.

So it seems i'm discovering happyness in the small things in life? and so the journey continues. Its only the beginning.

Pursuit of Happyness

---another entry transferred from msn spaces---

I just watched ths show yesterday with Rus at great world. So is it a good movie? well if its motive was to invoke thoughts of what happiness is in our lives and how are we pursuing it. Then yes. If its to meant to be inspirational, to show the perseverance of human character, the strive, the rising from one's lowest point in lives. Then yes. however Rus said certain events was over dramatised, e.g. the scene where Will smith and his son had to sleep in the toilet. But ain't what movies are like? don't they always seem to exaggerate scenes? a particular film technique to emphasise on an emotion? storyline? moment of the movie? Perhaps i don't watched enough shows but i feel there were also other very subtle moments in the show that portrayed the movie, storyline and purpose. I especially like the scene when Will Smith went for his internship interview, the boss of the company asked him what would his response be if he saw a guy who walked into an interview without a shirt

Smith's reply was "he must be wearing some very good pants!"

So what thoughts did it invoke in me? the notion that if u give someone an opportunity to escape from his current situation, or perhaps escape is not the right word, but change might be better. He would grab it but i believe opportunities also have to be evaluated before grabbing it or so what i felt i learnt because Smith thought that the opportunity of being the sole seller of the scanner in the city would have brought him change but he only realized after buying the scanners to resell it that it wasn't as wonderful as it would be. He struggled to sell them off, bringing misery to his wife who left him for new york. So to learn from this, we must not blindly follow and grab opportunities but we must evaluate them, how would it work for us? how would we work it out? what would it be like at the end? what would the process be like? etc etc...

And so what about happyness, what do we make of it? what is happyness to us? A question as old as the world perhaps? and what does it means to me? I told Rus that if i have kids, and to make a minor correction to that statement, i want to have kids. Then happyness would be to watch my kids grow, nurturing them, guiding them, being there for them, loving, giving them good nutrition and not feeding them sweets everyday. To love them, to have healthy Father-Son or Father-daughter relationships. Why? because perhaps of my background, something too personal to share here. someday perhaps.

to add on, that would be a source of happyness, what about other sources? one would be helping people in whatever way i can. help people? who? people i love, my family, my relatives, my friends, my church mates. poeple around me. Why? as i told Rus, i need to and want to value relationships, i believe its a very important component of life, people relationships. Other relationships are important too, e.g. relationships with cultures, diversity, nature and money.

What abt the pursuit? life is the pursuit, the journey of life is the pursuit. So how would u define happyness? such as the diversity of life, we all perhaps have different definitions, some might be the same and at the end of the day, we got to define it and pursue it. and well we all different pursuits, kind of what is similar to my previous blog entry, what are u chasing after today? is it worth chasing after?

Love

Eric

A neverending Chase?

---transferred from msn spaces---

So this is my second entry, not sure if anyone read my 1st but decided to go ahead with my 2nd. Have this urge to write something i thought about on my way back to hall.

So what did i think about? i thought about the things we chase after everyday, or rather what i perceive people around seem to be chasing from my observations.

A Place to seat or time? from the fact that since i started taking the MRT, people still want to rush into the train even before the passengers want to get out. Is this just the ugly Kiasu syndrome that everyone talks abt? Part of it but perhaps these people are chasing time, the urgency to get to an empty seat, knowing that every second counts, knowing every second of delay minimizes your chance of getting a seat. This will carry on, despite the numerous campaigns the Government can have. The neverending chase for empty seats.

Material things? perhaps the most common thing that people possess nowdays is the mobile phone. Afterall they say that Singapore has the highest mobile penetration rate in the world. Then again i believe lots of people like to change their phones, and often i think. Thats why u see so many mobile hp shops all around our neighbourhood centres. esp in the heartland, all catering to people ever increasing want for the newest phone, the slimmest, the prettiest. A neverending chase.

Recognition? recognition for? status? from the mp3 player u r carrying? whether is it an ipod or a no-brand gadget? status symbols so they say, to have an ipod is to be hip, cool, funky, "IN" are these worth chasing? or to me a neverending chase for recognitiong among our fellow humans when i believe you don't need things to make urself recognisable.

Success? how do u define success? material? money? love? talent? recognition? the prefix of your name? your monthly salary? the people u meet? or all of the above?? what about character? But someway or somehow we are chasing after some form of success, again its neverending because there seem to be no limit to success, people are always wanting to be MORE successful, in whatever we are, its what drives the world, the nature of man to desire something better.

But what are we desiring after? are they worth chasing after? questions, to think, to seek, to interact, to discuss, to share, to learn.

What are u chasing after today?

Learn from my Foolishness!!!!

I was at pulau ubin last saturday with the young adults group from my church (International Baptist Church). It was one of many gatherings throughout the year and this time we wanted something different. So off we went to ubin for cycling. Ubin hasn't changed much except there is this new small resort, called Marina Country Club Resort, set somewhere in the middle of ubin, i passed by it while riding. Its one of those nature themed resorts with lots of huts. An ideal getaway from the heavily industralised Mainland? perhaps, after all ubin remains one of the few remaining unspoilt parts of Singapore. Whether this will lead to more development? i dunno but i hope not, or at least try to preseve the original landscape while making such developments.

So the cycling was fun, its been a long time since i went to ubin, last i remembered was 2 years back? So it was good to return and cycle, and feel the wind brush past my face while downslope! ah.....but alas all good things come to an end eh? among one of my group's ventures into some of the less travelled dirt trails, i did what people feared the most, flipping over from my byclcle!! and yes thats what i exactly did thats why i want to blog abt it and let everyone know never repeat my mistake!! learn from it! (including me...)

What happened was that there was this short and quite steep downslope, my friend was ahead and i was about a few metres behind, so from i recall i was coming towrds the downslope with too much speed and i tried to slow down. But my foolishness struck me, i braked too much on my front brakes and promptly the bike threw me over and smack i landed on my ground, hands first as instinct took over as i used my hands to break my fall. Still a little dazed and reeling from my moment of stupidity, i looked at my hand and saw a rather deep cut just to the right of my left thumb. Mr friends came over and the same look came across all of them: the "are you ok" look, the "quick lets find 1st aid" so kudos to them for keeping their cool and taking tissue paper to apply pressure on my wound.

Then we proceeded to a temple we passed by before entering the trail to sought for 1st aid. The monks there and their friends were very helpful, they didn't have a very comprehensive 1st aid kit but they had enough to help me clean my wound and apply some antiseptic lotion. Followed my Handiplast across my cut. To basic 1st aid was adminstered and i'm very thankful to the monks and their friends. THANKS!!! i told Liu Ting today that after my exams, i'm going to go back to the temple with perhaps with a fruit basket and express my gratitude to them. Shortly afterwards my friend James helped to hold my bike as we headed back towards the main group who were resting at a drink stall a couple of kilometeres away. It was also quite funny that my friends were all trying to contact them but most of them were on starhub and there wasn't any reception! only later as we went back the road did some reception appeared and my friends contacted them, alast reporting of my demise!. But well i actually continued cycling, decided the basic 1st aid was sufficient to keep me alive! so i continued to explore the rest of ubin with my friends. But of course this time, with extra care taken!!

So we stayed to abt 2 in the afternoon and went back to mainland. (almost sounds like i'm a chinamen going back! no offence!!!!). Had lunch at changi village hawker and ate nasi lemak, but this time from a different stall as i wanted to compare the difference between the original International Muslim Food Stall Nasi Lemak. So my conclusion, the intl muslim food stall nasi lemak is beta. Afterwards, headed back to Tampines and called my fren Kai Li to ask if she knew of any clinic in the vicinity of the bus interchange. As i decided not to delay further treatment since the wound is pretty deep. So i ended up at Raffles Medical Group Tampines's branch solely based on the clue given by Kai, "did you see any fruit stalls around?" i actually stumbled upon it as i walked towards the polyclinic thinking it would be open, only when i turned back then i saw the sign "Raffles Medical Centre". So i went in, registered, and the nurse promptly attended to me. She further cleaning up, applying further antiseptic solutions and then i waited for the doc to come in. His diagnosis? your wound is still quite dirty, stiching it or closing it might cause infection so i will ask the nurse to try to remove as much dirt as possible and then bandage it. The bandage will help to apply pressure on the wound (it was still bleeding a little when i got to the clinic!) then you will need to see a doctor tommorow (he said that yesterday, which means today) and get him to check the wound again and redress the bandage( there is a gauze and padding inside the bandage). Photos are available at "My blog Photos" album, and yes the bandage makes it look very serious but it isn't really that bad, perhaps just a 1 cm deep cut that is abt 1.5cm wide? haha...

But well i didn't follow his instructions! i sought a church member's advice on sunday (another doctor) and he said as long the bandage is dry, you don't need to redress but you need to see a doctor to let him decide whether to stick or let heal by itself. He said most clinics are closed on sunday so its ok to see one on monday so that is what i'm going to do. Probably will be going to the school doctor, afterall we pay for it! hopefully it doesn't need stitches, nvr got a stich in my entire life!

So there, a very eventful Saturday! both good and bad! so lesson of the day:

NEVER brake on your FRONT wheels WHEN going DOWNSLOPE!!!

get it? you better, learn from my foolishness people!! if u haven't known this fact...which i didn't so promptly paid by my foolishness.( makes me realize how foolish i am...) well I learnt the hard way...So i'm out for the season, no more winning eleven with my hall buddies :( not sure if i can even play street soccer but i got to be thankful to God, at least its my left hand, not the right! if not i don't know how am i going to see for my exams in 1.5 weeks time (although it should heal by then). Liu Ting also said i should be thankful that my vital veins were unscathed and nothing broken! so ya, there is a sliver lining after all! :P

So thats all, hope my wound will heal fast, going to miss my exciting winning eleven matches....at least there's an excuse to concentrate on my exams....

My niece Sarah

My eyes and mind just can't stop exploring what features blogger has for me. The new version of Blogger is still in beta and there seem to be a lack of distinct integrated functionality, currently i'm using google's picasa as my photo management tool. So i click on one of my photos and clicked "blogthis" and here i am. Blogging about Sarah, my beautiful niece or perhaps my friend will call, my 2nd cousin. Ain't she beautiful? she's the oldest of her "generation" the 4th, my grandparents are the 1st obviously, parents 2nd and my cousins and i the 3rd. So Sarah is my oldest cousin's daughter. She's 4 years old this year and certainly growing up! She is now much more friendly and forthcoming, i remember last time during our gatherings with relatives and cousins, she would always stick to her mum, shying away from relatives and fellow cousins. Now she is more willing to open up, strike a smile and even conversation! Although she still needs time to warm up, including me! I love playing with my nieces and nephews whenever there is a gathering, often during festive occasions such as Chinese New year or birthdays. Its really a joy seeing them smile, kind of reminds you of the notion where kids seem to free from worries.

Sadly i got to stop as this is perhaps of a testing of the features, and i really need to study!! stop exploring Eric!! even though i really feel like signing up for livejournal or wordpress and test out...blogger beta seems to be heavily fine tuned by google and not exactly ready, after all its blogger beta! albeit its good for the simple blogger but i yearn for more complementary functions, got to stop though!
In fact i think i haven't told anyone of this new blog since i'm still exploring and not sure if i want to stick with blogger. oh well after exams!! has to be!!

Manchester United 7 x 1 Roma - All the Goals

a night to remember!!

arghh...i just can't stop watching this video!!! Breathtaking!

Sometimes having focus is a struggle

I'm transferring my entries from MSN Spaces, i seem to like the cleaner and less clutter interface here. Much more appealing. Although livejournal and wordpress are also very impressive, probably will explore more when my exams are over. The following entry is my 1st entry into the world of blogging, it was a day where i suppose to be studying for my maths quiz but i just happen to enter spaces and explore it. I like their photo album integration feature, pretty easy to upload lots of photos and start sharing them. Kind of removes the hassle of having to sign up for a separate online photo album storage website since my hotmail acct already registers me for spaces. I heard blogger supports photos too, got to explore it.

---Transferred from msn spaces---

Why? because i'm trying to study for my maths quiz in 2 hours and i barely started!! mind and heart simply not on the notes or tuorials...keep telling myself that i need to FOCUS!!!! but am failing to....then wanted to express this frustration somewhere...then thought that i haven't even added an entry into my msn spaces, my 1st foray into the world of blogging. So i guess this is my 1st entry, perhaps a not so ideal one? but after all ain't blogging an avenue to exporess ur thoughts, feelings, and etc? i certainly believe so! so there arises a question, how many people reading my 1st entry find it a struggle to find and have focus? especially in those crucial moments or be it any time. lets share.

Why am i here?

Because i can't get MSN Spaces Youtube widget to work! i'm trying to make the Man U 7-1 Youtube video to appear on my blog but i can't seem to get it to work. So i'm trying out here since my gmail account already enables me to start a blog, no further registration needed. You got to check that video out man...all the goals in their glory. Indeed a night to savour and remember!!!

another thing is to explore how adsense work, u keep seeing it around so i guess curiousity got me this time round. I only have the faint idea of u getting money when people click on ads that are supposedly related to your content. So i guess no harm giving it a shot for some extra pocket money!