21 01 2007

The Charge of the Light Brigade
Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward, the Light Brigade!
“Charge for the guns!” he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

“Forward, the Light Brigade!”
Was there a man dismay’d?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Someone had blunder’d:
Their’s not to make reply,
Their’s not to reason why,
Their’s but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley’d and thunder’d;
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.

Flash’d all their sabres bare,
Flash’d as they turn’d in air,
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wonder’d:
Plunged in the battery-smoke
Right thro’ the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reel’d from the sabre stroke
Shatter’d and sunder’d.
Then they rode back, but not
Not the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volley’d and thunder’d;
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came thro’ the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.

When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made,
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred.

                                                                          

Sharon Chua-Boesch
Wife, daughter, sister, family, loved one.

You are a true General. God rest your soul as you spend many happy days in the comfort of His arms.

Till we meet again, I love you.





19 01 2007

Ways to survive class nights’ out:

  1. Be late, like everyone else
  2. Get someone to drive you during heavy downpour
  3. Have late dinner, but stay off garlic, at all cost. Have another snack, and hydrate yourself at nearest 7-11
    NB: 7-11 dinners can taste good to any pre-clubbing soul. Just remember the garlic bit though.
  4. Check out 1-for-1s and the menu.
  5. Move away from bar engaged in juvenile drinking games.
  6. 1-for-1s go easy on any pocket (consequences to be discussed later)
  7. Leftovers go to Target of the night
  8. avoid O bar and double O unless you want to really drink
  9. once high, continue dancing and do not stop. if not, mind will start whirling
  10. Always advantageous to have someone’s bf stopping at a pint.
  11. Do not have garlic then 4 shots and 2 jugs thereafter.
  12. Leave when Target’s not well
  13. Take lots of pictures
  14. Never refuse a mint
  15. Swig water
  16. Sit down and sleep.
  17. Obey the instructions of the company who are sober
  18. Thank everyone who got you home.

Repeat process (with variants), 6 months later… Y’all wait for me, I’ll be back!

*adapted from whiny friend’s blog, with thanks.





I feel the love.

15 01 2007

I already expect panic to set in tomorrow. I am still not packed and not ready. One bag lies sprawled next to my bed and has random pieces of clothes stuffed into it. Still deciding on the other check-in bag, and contemplating buying a Crumpler sling bag.

Things to do tomorrow: get a bank draft, get a proper pencil case, maybe a webcam, extra camera battery, memory card, collect altered pants from JP, get keyboard from hall. Oh, and of course, pack.

It’s expected to snow on the day of my arrival with temperatures predicted to be between -3degC to -12degC. Cold cold.

Today I spent the afternoon at my cousin’s place. She’s due to deliver her little girl anytime now so I wanted to just be around her while I could. Delicious food for lunch, yummy laksa, mee siam, popiah and chicken wings! We also reminisced the old days when we spent terrorizing the Sunday school teachers HA-HA.

Felt the love, and been feeling it for some time already. Gifts coming in from my hall mates, and church people. Plus really fun times meeting up with people the whole of last week. Special thanks to Kel, Gladys, Abel, Jiali and Daphne for making Project Jeremy successful.

Today I tried in vain to return a monetary gift this lady from church gave me. I just couldn’t take it. But she was so nice about it. Said the Bible told us to bless others but it didn’t say anything about returning the gifts. To which I replied that I already had more than enough. And she said use it to bless others then. Treat someone to dinner and share the good news of salvation with them. I kept the money in my pocket and immediately resolved that I will do just that. At least once during my time in Ithaca.





11 01 2007

Just received my housing list from Ithaca and I have four other housemates! So looks like I did manage to get my choice of apartment after all. Yay! I think I have a roomie cos I was assigned a double room within an apartment while the other three guys have their single rooms.

I’m a little ashamed to admit it but I googled my housemates’ names just to find out whatever I could. Haha.

Turns out two of them are music majors. One of them is doing theatre performance, I think. And the other guy is a trombone major who’s president of the College’s jazz club. Sounds so cool! At least they are not engineers!





9 01 2007

One week from now at precisely this time, I should have just arrived at Narita, Japan en-route to USA. 6 days left to one of the most major experiences of my (still short) life.

Anyway I just set up a new blog: NY State of Mind which is purely for the chronicling of my time over in USA but I’ll still blog here from time to time. For political sensitivity’s sake. So to keep up, checking both sites would be good.

I’m far from ready in terms of preparations. Still have outstanding items to buy, errands to run and tasks to settle at home.

Yesterday I went for my medical checkup at NTU’s medical center. Some background – I lost my health booklet so I had to do my vaccinations again. It was my second time back there and I still have to go back another time. I also had a positive result on my mantoux test so I need to have an X-Ray done. A simple process is turning out to be rather frustrating.

And another time my tongue has gotten me into trouble.