it's been a long, long time since i've actually had absolutely nothing at all to do on a saturday evening. i just finished the last peanut-black sesame biscuit in the most unglamorous way possible, digging into the bottom of the bag for all the peanuts and black sesame seeds which had fallen off the top of the biscuits, and shovelling them into my mouth. and you know how your fingers get rather wet and sticky when you do that - the black sesame seeds stuck to my fingers, and i simply proceeded to lick them off.

i told you, it's been a long, long time since i've actually had absolutely nothing at all to do on a saturday evening, and it's wonderful.

***
at the risk of sounding stuck-up and/or small minded, it was only fairly recently that i realised a whole lot more other people i know don't stay in the bukit-something area, or in a house. i never thought it was a big deal to stay in bukit timah and in a house, because, hey, i grew up with people who all did. but it evidently is, and sometimes i just don't want to tell people i stay there anymore because of the reaction i get.

but i went for a walk just now, and i think i will go on telling them after all. because i love my neighbourhood, and i'm really thankful i stay here. it's got quite a number of old houses, and with old houses you get old gardens; with old gardens, old trees. old trees with leaves made silvery-greyish-green by the sun, spindly branched-out branches sillhoueted against the blue-turning-pale pink sky. with all these things, you get what i think must be the most beautiful suburban sunsets ever.

and with houses and gardens, you get, along with crickets chirping and the occasional bird trill, the laughter of children. because of children's birthday parties on saturday evenings - i passed by a total of three on my walk, the last one had yellow smiley-face balloons attached to the gate. all three gates had balloons attached to them, actually. the second one i passed, there was a tubby boy wearing red crocs (he had a very flushed face too) waving a party streamer and bellowing a birthday song rather tunelessly: happy birthday to you, my love to you, may all your wishes come true.

***
rehearsal for the wcdc concert ended about two hours earlier than scheduled, i hopped on the first available bus back home after that and looked forward eagerly to crashing on the couch. but blame me and my smile, i said hi to the uncle at the caltex station - yes, i stay near the petrol station where shakespeare singh works - and he bid me sit down next to him while he launched into a poetry session. he often ended the poems with an emphatic shout and a sort of half-jump, which was quite amusing. i wish i hadn't been so sleepy, i would have liked to remember the poems he recited to me - especially the ones about war and about God.

i pray that there will be world peace
so that for breakfast, everyone can have coffee, bread, butter and CHEESE! (cheese emphatically shouted with a half-jump)

but something he said after his poem on God struck me, about how he thinks he's a small fry. that's a jon line, too. and i was thinking about it later during my walk, i think the people who are most contented and at peace with themselves are those who recognise there're small fries - those who recognise and can accept that there's a God greater than us all, greater than the things of the world, and we're nothing without Him. a God who created everything around us for us to enjoy, if only we would see that we're small fries, and just enjoy it for what it's worth. because i've come to realise that it's only when you acknowledge what (and who) you truly are, that you can stop caring so much about what the world thinks and stop trying so hard, too hard.

not that small fries don't seek excellence in everything they do, you understand. it's just that there's more to everything which this world affords, today.

***
i make an effort to smile at people i encounter on my walks - smiles from neighbours always make a lovely evening even lovelier. and sometimes it's the most unexpected people who have the most genuine smiles. like the contractor gabbling away in hokkien, smelling of sweat and cigarette smoke who broke his flow of words just to smile back at me. and then you wonder at how people can not realise that they're loving God by doing these little things.

i shall probably regret sleeping so late again when i wake up tomorrow - i've already got eyebags i think, and i want NO MORE PANDA EYES. but -

brother: what movie are you gonna watch?
me: TMNT!!
brother: what?? that's so unromantic!!!

so one of the first scenes in the movie, michaelangelo plops himself down on the couch, picks up the remote, and starts channel-surfing aimlessly, yawning all the time.

and i'm like, jon, i didn't know you were starring in the movie. he can even smile like michaelangelo la.

oh no, i've fallen for a turtle. wan2 le4.

i might regret staying up so late to type this in approximately six-and-a-half hours' time, when my too-efficient body clock wakes me up at 0730. which i actually think is an answer to my prayer that i'd wake up each morning to read the bible and pray; whatever it is, at around 0900, depending on how skillfully jemery navigates traffic and traffic lights, i'll either be telling jon to buy me tehohkosongdaizou, or i'll be walking sleepily out of the lecture theatre to do it myself.

of course, i could just save myself the torture and read akt's slides at home but, masochist that i am, i like school. i like being around everyone, just because i can be. plus akt is pretty hot. even though he either believes that his trousers are wrinkle-free or he irons them himself. jon thinks he just doesn't wash them, but i think otherwise, simply because he wears a wedding ring. what faith i have in marriage and women.

plus i'm on food duty for efg, and if i don't go to school joseph is going to lynch me.

but i have to blog, because thursday was a day of perfect moments. like jon telling me that he thinks akt is hot too, and he was going to ask him for his number after lecture, and i told him that he should just email him instead because we can get his number off the law website and jon promised to bcc me a copy of the email he would send. or tris making me and yalan laugh during lunch, my tummy is still feeling the after effects now. seeing the lovely drink stall auntie smiling when i dragged her out into the sun to take a picture with me for the law annual - just because i felt like it.

how justin dropped me off at quentin's after my tutorial just because he had a car and it was raining; how aunty patsy (quentin's mother) made me pumpkin soup and gave me a real baked wholemeal roll - the kind where you can taste the yeast, dense like bread was meant to be, not like the conditioned soft loaves we get nowadays - with butter, for dinner. even though i'd only asked quentin if i could come over on a whim, about an hour and a half before i actually showed up, just because i felt like it, during my equity and trusts tutorial. how it was raining during dinner and i sat opposite the window in the dining room drinking hot pumpkin soup, watching the rain fall with one of the people i love the most in the world, in companionable silence. even scalding my tongue slightly, because i can never wait for these hot liquids to cool down before i drink them. how quentin's mother suddenly popped up next to me bearing a perlini's box which held a silver chain with a cross pendant, as a baptism present.

most of all, it was about being baptised - it only started hitting me on wednesday evening that it was a pretty big thing - jon was like, hey it's like getting married you know? and in a way it was, because people kept smsing throughout the day saying congrats. which was lovely, but rather strange - in a good way. it hasn't really sunk it yet that i'm actually baptised. i told jemery in the car on the way to school today that i shall always be very thankful i met him that sunday he was signing up for baptism class, but really, i suppose God planned the meeting.

and it was about eating supper for the first time in almost three years; real supper, not like the leftover vegetables i would snitch from fridge after late shifts at rouge, not even like the yoghurt and apple pie or the chicken foldover i had after working the 2006 new year shift. nor the cheese on toast/crackers and cheese i'd have on a running day, as well as all the fruit i would eat, like grapes and plums - the easy to eat fruit. just wash and pop it in your mouth. it's never real supper, i think, unless you're having it just because you feel like it. not because you're ravenous after running around serving people too-expensive tiger beer, and you have to eat something you don't really want to because it's supposedly healthier. not that we should just go all out and eat whatever we want to, of course - but everything in moderation, and we do know how much we can afford to eat.

some of jon's pig organ porridge - the liver was overcooked but the consistency of the porridge was just right. and prata. i love prata. surprisingly un-oily, hot and crispy, fish curry with bits of fish in it. as jon kept saying last night, wonderful. (although i do think he was just blown away by the company...) and a chicken pau, from lim kee, the only factory mass-produced coffeeshop pau that tastes good.

as i was telling jon just before we parted, God did create everything - and so we should just enjoy it, for all it's worth. don't wait till you're 50 to search for the meaning of life. it's not that you won't find it, but really, life could be so much better now.

i'm really very joyful and thankful that for the first time in my life i actually have good girl friends (tris is included, he's sitting next to me now as i'm typing this and i can't resist naming him). but i don't think it's going to be very beneficial to my wallet - or my ego, for that matter. the following conversation transpired between muikheng and myself yesterday.

me: eh die already la. i'm so breaking out.
mui kheng (giving her YES YOU SO ARE look, wide eyes and all): YES!! YOU ARE!!
me: thanks.
mui kheng: which facewash do you use?
me: ginvera.
mui kheng: that's really too strong already.
me: really? i didn't know?
mui kheng: yes!! you should go and buy the neutrogena extra mild one. i don't even use mild, i use extra mild!!
me: isn't that really expensive?
mui kheng: but it's a very big bottle and it lasts very long...

after my nap yesterday i went to the ntuc pharmacy and bought myself a bottle. i've never spent more than $5 on facial wash before but i bought what she (and the pharmacist, too) recommended - and it was $13.77.

tris says he can't believe i've typed this entry and he doesn't think $13.77 is expensive. for 200ml?!?! okay what he says. considering he uses BODY SHOP facewash.

oh well. see above for why i'm so pleased.

i've got an esprit shirt which says "watch out or you'll be hooked!"

today, i really, really wanted raffles institution to beat uwc on the arena. and i've started letting myself like the colour green more - i've always liked it, it's hard not to when your very own mother decided to let the interior designer do your room in green when she renovated the house when you were thirteen. even though you were so totally blue and yellow (and red) then. i tried very hard to fight the liking for green though. refusing to buy green clothes even when i really liked them, things like that.

i can see ian rolling his elitist eyes now. oh stop it already.

i'm hooked and i know it. it really annoys me but what to do?

i was reading through my j3 journal, and this post is for jon, quen, ian and bryan - and whoever else who will be mentioned below, who still visits my blog. happy ORD, guys. here's to your future, may you all become men of God - ian i bet you don't know what that entails just as much as i don't. but i've realised that it's different for everyone, so no matter.

i wrote this entry on the 24th of april 2005, it was jon's first bmt weekend out and ching had planned a surprise birthday party for him because he wasn't doing too well (who does in bmt, really? i wouldn't know though, i'm a girl. but somewhere else in this journal, just before nus applications opened and bryan decided he was applying to med, i wrote down that he said "i need to confirm my attitude in sispec."). certain names have been withheld to protect the innocent.

saturday night 2352
this is chloe again i think: fundamentally chloe, just older, but perhaps not much wiser. tonight i realised how fruitless my current relationship with ***** is, how i've clung on to an ideal that no longer exists. seeing jon and ching today made my heart ache, because i had a sudden desire to be that kind of girlfriend. and i was, in my own way, self-sacrificing at times, sweet, smiling always, striving for someone else's happiness and not my own - but he just wasn't that kind of guy, even though he couldn't have suited me better, when he was himself.

this isn't really about ***** though, it's about the people who were in the void deck after school studying, especially towards the As. it's about acjc, the class of 2004, the people on for God, the bleacher people, the music people, and those who came with them. i realised today that beneath all that army bravado and incessant army talk lies a bunch of small, scared boys, unsettled and shy, unsure about the future - the 'lucky' ones, those with girlfriends, have that bit more security and something to look forward to in life, which can amount to alot.

but as we wait to face the unknown like the many people before us, we regress, becoming children: seeking adventure, feeling trepidation and excitement, thinking that we can take on the world armed solely with our youth. i saw everyone differently tonight: ching is a wonderful girl, and so is sheryl, actually. caleb, no matter that he's a bit of a jerk, really does love her to bits. some guys just haven't grown up enough, like jon, and josh nair. people like ****** who believe life's a joyride and the world owes them a living. then there're the people like me and ian and bryan and quen. but we're really all average, normal people who make up the bulk of society, muddling along through life; looking for God through the haze of uncertainty, feeling that sense of what, i don't know. loneliness and dissatisfaction? emptiness, like something's missing? and then we realise God is the one who defines us.

strains of lux aeterna; the time of ave verum, of *****, spring dreams, ronde and soleram - they're over now. those mad love days of j1, which i thank God i was able to have as yet - it's a new set of music, a different sort of life, and it ain't gonna be an easy journey. but i'll never walk alone, for God is with me.

i can't describe this feeling. it's loneliness and dissatisfaction, sadness, contentment, peace and contemplative joy all at once.

how carefree we once were, before the burdens of the world started presenting themselves to us. how precious people are, how futile conversations can be. how do we even begin telling people how much they mean to us, because sometimes words aren't enough to encompass all we're feeling? even now, i realise that i still want only one person to put his arm around me in that slightly possesive, slightly proud manner of a loving boyfriend, one person to tuck me in, to message me sweet nothings - and that's the ***** of my j1 days. funny huh? but really, i realised tonight those days are gone forever. memories i will always cherish and treasure, like the lingering scent of hot cocoa on a rainy day, the bittersweetness that comes with reading winnie the pooh and understanding it fully, at the age of eighteen. when you knew the secrets to the world, to life, to the universe; when you heard the songs of the stars, the whispers of the rustling leaves, and could read secret messages into the shadows cast by the moon. when you understood and knew what true love was. like the smell of roses, a breeze lifting your hair on a hot and sweltering day. snuggling under the blankets in a thunderstorm. kisses from chapped lips, arms encircling you and you never wanted them to let go. wanting to face each day, because every sunset held a new beauty and wonder.

how much these things mean to me, more than people, perhaps - maybe i'll live in my imagination until the day i die. silent, not knowing what to say, really - loving people all the same - missing them but not knowing it, until i see them again. e flat major days. you know.

- but we never think about, or refuse to see, the sadness that belies things sometimes. life isn't perfect, and we're only human after all. the way rose petals fold so perfectly.

***
different partners and pink i.c. status aside, how much we've changed since then, guys - or maybe we haven't, really. you think?

i read don't ask me why later that year, finished it on 16th july 2005, and i wrote this when i finished it (it's a bit from the book, mostly):

don't ask me why/it's happy ever after: and ash says, i remembered... how he had talked about asking for a happy ending, that perhaps it was more to ask than we knew. i wondered about that. i wondered how we ever got what we wanted in life, how we even knew what we wanted. i wondered if we could make ourselves a happy ending, if we were brave enough to try.

if you ask me, i do believe we're truly older and wiser now, believe that God has worked in our lives - and He's gonna give us the courage and the wisdom to make our very own happy endings.

photo courtesy of daniel chan jj. which is what he calls himself on msn, hurhur.

i'm tired of talking, today. i think it's because i think out loud. yesterday, i had this conversation (or what i thought was a conversation) with jon at the fifth-storey staircase, about prayer - and after we finished talking and we were walking down he said, "you do realise, don't you, that you've spent the past half-an-hour thinking out loud. you haven't actually told me anything, you know."

i started laughing so hard i had to sit down on a step. because he was right, and i do think i think out loud, a lot. maybe that's why i've started mumbling more - my mother says i have, anyway. because i've come to realise as i'm thinking out loud that maybe, just maybe, my thoughts aren't exactly what other people want to hear. and God also made it such that other people wouldn't know what you were thinking, which marigold in magic for marigold thought was an extremely good thing. seeing as i did pray that i'd think more before i spoke, maybe this is an answer to that prayer. it's got nothing to do with being forthright and honest, you understand. i doubt i'll ever not be. it's just that there's a lot to be said for least said, soonest mended.

so, because i thought-talked so much yesterday, i think it's time for my fingers to have a go. unfortunately, i dropped my keyboard yesterday so the spacebar is a bit sticky - but no matter.

***
i'd actually planned to go home early yesterday; come to school, hand up my assignment, pray with jon, have lunch with mui kheng, then come home and do my equality readings. i did all those things, but ended up going for prayer group as well - not because i felt obligated or anything, you understand. i just wanted to, and i'm glad i did. and i came home after that, ate leftovers, and crashed on the sofa for three hours. opened the door after and was greeted by wonderfully evening-ish air, decided i had to catch the sunset at the old holland road open space, and ran off after spending ten minutes gossiping with my mother. i love the place, and it's a real pity but i think they're going to build some monstrosity on it. there's a sign which says "state land, enter at your own risk," but no one cares. every sunday people will park their cars along old holland road and they'll fly kites and remote-controlled toy aeroplanes there; they'll bring foldable deck chairs, sit down and read a book and enjoy the day of rest. people will jog by in the afternoon sun, it's really a lovely place. we need more of them in singapore. true places of solace, the kind you stumble on accidentally, before that, you never knew they existed.

after dinner i decided to clean up my room, and i re-folded all the t-shirts in my wardrobe. i have a great many t-shirts, because in mg we had a choir shirt every year, as we did in ac - plus i went on tour twice as alumni; children's ministry makes us buy new shirts for every children's ministry sunday - i'm getting a yellow one for the upcoming prayer event, i already have light and dark pink and green ones. and i went for church camp every year in secondary school. add various school and school camp shirts - really, i have too many of them. i divided them up into those i usually wear and those i don't - and i'm keeping the latter solely for memory's sake, because i honestly don't think i'll ever wear them again. camp organisers should make t-shirts more wearable. i'm probably never going to wear my prc camp shirt again because it's red, nor the nussu reflections one we got in year one when we did flag day during matric week, because it's yellow. although i have rather fond memories of that shirt, because that was the time i got to know yalan. and the awful nus heritage run shirt - it was my first competitive run, but the shirt is really too ugly for words. it's got an orange border thing around the collar and it has the logos of the various sponsors splashed all over it. kinda like how the law soccer shirt says "colin ng and partners" really big, but worse.

i folded them all up neatly and put them away, but i don't know what i'm going to do with them the day i get married and have to move out. perhaps, by then, i won't need these t-shirts to remember all these things. or maybe i'll just have to recycle them, donate them to charity, to make space for new memories - how callous that sounds, but honestly, you and i both know these t-shirts don't actually mean a thing. jon and i are planning to run ahm before he goes to bangalore, that'll be another (ugly) t-shirt. i'll spend more time talking to yalan in school, out of school, though i doubt we'll ever do flag day again, together at least. and i'll go on trying to coerce linus into planning a gathering with our yayapapayas and the rest of our prc camp group.

memories come quite suddenly to me nowadays. it's quite strange, but i'll be walking along and suddenly i'll just remember things which i normally don't think about. so many things - i'll choose one everyone seems to remember, or some variation of it at least:

sunkist orange cordial which came in that oddly shaped bottle. if you didn't take the pains to stir it up, it wouldn't dissolve at the bottom like ribena does. you'd get this orange sour sludge that was quite nice, but oh, the preservatives! and when we were in primary school, i think they gave out those popsicle plastic bag things - you could fill them with orange squash and put it in the freezer and you'd have ice cream pops!

if you don't remember that, i'm sure you at least remember the ice cream pops part, those that came in many different colours; if you sucked them (which was the only way to eat them, really) you'd end up with bits of ice.


***
i enjoy public law, i really do. although i think LCL thinks i'm a total numbskull because i haven't said much in class, save for that time i told him i thought the government outlawed the whole raising your hand with your fist balled up action because it kinda looked like a hammer, worker's party and all you know? but his classes are really very interesting, and they provide a lot of room for thought. the way he teaches is interesting as well - it's the kind of module i envisioned myself doing all throughout university, not just for a semester, even though i like proper law law as well and i can't imagine doing anything else. but i should be thankful, really, and i am - i'd probably drive myself crazy doing modules like that for four years. i know it.

that being said, i had two interesting thoughts today, from something he said in class about people using "buzz-words"- i think the average minister, in caricature, would be a sort of giant bird man in a waistcoat, with many little persons clinging on to his coat-tails, hopeful (and rather smug) expressions on each of their faces. his wings would be clipped, and when he smiles he has no teeth - but birds are toothless anyway. no prizes for guessing which buzz-words describe which constitutional amendment.

the best thought i had, i think, was about "crushing the opposition" - i could almost see you-know-who (the mm. i don't want to be caught under the sedition act) in his golden years wielding a cane and crushing chee soon juan and j.b. jeyaretnam, both of whom have been shrunk to miniscule proportions - the size of cockroaches, maybe. just like margaret chan in masters of the sea. don't tell me you don't remember that, everyone does.

***
for all my i-don't-really-feel-like-talking-today-ness, i rang jon as i was walking out of school to see if he was around (he had tutorial at 1830) and if he wanted to have some tea. his brother picked up the phone because he was out for a run, and he told me all about how he was going for his friend's birthday party later and he was going to buy him sparkling juice - when you drink it it feels fizzy in your mouth.

i also met vasudha, coming from the bus stop, and everytime i see her i'll laugh because i'll remember what she said about jon being below the untouchables caste in india because he's chinese. which effectively put paid to his plans to get a dowry of 50 cows on the basis of his pink i.c. which is quite sad, because i like steak.

some nights, before i go to sleep, i can't wait for breakfast to come - ever since lee kuan yew said in an interview that he only eats until he's 80% full, i have, dutiful singaporean that i am, endeavoured to follow his example. even if that means going to sleep hungry.

haha. but i think i want breakfast to come because there are bananas, i love toast with peanut butter and banana slices.

in about five minutes i have to go hang up clothes because my grandmother says they'll get too crumpled if i leave them in the washing machine much longer, they'll start drying out. but i have to share a nice thing which happened this week:

HIONG PENG FROM IPOH
(from jon's mum. which made it even nicer.)

enoch, eat your heart out in canada. krispy kremes will never compare to hiong peng. AND YOU KNOW IT.

i suddenly remembered this song, i first heard it when eugene sang it for offering a couple of years back.

today i watched in silence as people passed me by,
and i strained to see if there was something hidden in their eyes;
but they all looked at me as if to say
life just goes on.

the old familiar story told in different ways,
make the most of your own journey from the cradle to the grave;
dream your dreams tomorrow because today
life must go on.

but there’s more to this life than living and dying,
more than just trying to make it through the day;
more to this life, more than these eyes alone can see,
and there’s more than this life alone can be.

tonight he lies in silence staring into space,
and looks for ways to make tomorrow better than today,
but in the morning light it looks the same;
life just goes on.

he takes care of his family, he takes care of his work,
and every Sunday morning he takes his place at the church;
and somehow he still feels a need to search,
but life just goes on.

so where do we start to find every part
of what makes this life complete;
if we turn our eyes to Jesus we’ll find
life’s true beginning is there at the cross where He died.
He died to bring us -

more to this life than living and dying,
more than just trying to make it through the day;
more to this life, more than these eyes alone can see,
and there’s more than this life alone can be.

actually. to be honest, i thought of the song because i was reading a rather ranty post on a friend's blog. ranty posts, in fact, on the blogs of friends. this song's for you... Jesus or not, there really is more to this life than living and dying, don't forget that. the semester's almost over, here's to more lunches and talks after lectures about nothing at all, before we'll be free for three months at least. it's really not so bad -

***
which brings me to thursday, even though i really ought to get the slowly crumpling clothes out of the washing machine. thursday was a perfect school day. i almost didn't want to go to school but then i remembered that thursday's the day i almost always somehow end up with yalan, having these semi-emo expositions on love and life and i really thank her for listening to what i have to say even though i think some of it is just totally strange and weird and i'm just. weird. but no, they aren't emo - i think it's really just a lot of what i've learnt over the years, how i've just come to love God so much more. and tris turned up with highlights in his hair. i take very long to get used to new hair, on guys especially, and he's right - by the time i get used to it it'll have grown out. still, it looks very... artsy.

we had lunch, and yalan and i gave up doing our equity tutorials together and just talked, enjoyed the sunshine and the greenery, with tris and rui. and it was lovely, being able to just say heck it to your constructive trusts tutorial (if people didn't get divorced, we'd all have one less confusing equity concept to think about - all the constructive trust cases so far appear to be on divorcing or adulterous couples) which we probably won't be able to do for client's memos when we grow up.

(it's so nice to say, "when we grow up," as though we haven't already grown up, really. but we haven't.)

say heck it to tutorials and risk incurring the wrath of your tutor and just talk, enjoy each other, grasp these last few precious lunchtimes before the semester ends and exchange next academic year and our class just won't be the same. kyle coming to our table with a sardine curry puff - they sell sardine curry puffs in the canteen now i'm going to try one next week! yonghong started playing the guitar about twenty minutes or so before we all had to leave for tutorial, and it really reminded me of jon and quen in jc, how we used to sit in the void deck and do all these things, talk cock, sing, play the guitar - and i'll always remember jon in e flat major at the bleachers one grey day.

***
which brings me to one last thing before i really have to go. i met jon's (ong) mum in the supermarket yesterday, and forgive me for posting this jon (i'll buy you a drink during lunch on sunday like i'll ask the waitress for ICED WATER ok) but she said:

"aiya. this jon ah. so spoilt."

to which i said, "just get rid of the maid! then jon will have to learn to do housework!"

and he'll die, really, i know it and so does he.

it's 0358 by my handphone clock, i'd actually planned to sleep early because i've got a long long long day tomorrow but oh well. got home later than i planned to because i spent another hour talking to emma about a whole lot of nonsense... but it was worth it, really. long lost secondary school friends. funny how we just happen to think of each other at times and then end up meeting and having these long conversations about - nothing at all (no la, actually very got substance one. seriously).

i felt like having a picture with this post, for some strange reason, and i was just looking through my photos quickly and i decided i wasn't really in a food or pretty lights sort of mood... although i'm going to sleep soon. today josiah rang to ask me whether i knew the person who'd planned the transport for last year's church camp (he doesn't even go to my church). which was just super strange la, he tried to coerce me into calling the church office for him? and i was like no jo you better do it yourself. that's him up there. no matter that he looks all big and macho rugby nonsense he's still a small boy. hurhur.

my parents went to kl today. i made them sandwiches and put them in a paper bag with an apple, a pear, and some spread and crackers. i wanted to put in some tim tams too but i was afraid they'd melt because it was so hot this afternoon. i also wrote a post it and stuck it on the bag - it said, daddy please try not to antagonise mummy - and then i added in, "too much, because it's only natural that you will."

on sunday we went for lunch at this chicken rice place - good and famous chicken rice is always shockingly expensive, have you realised? boon tong kee isn't even that good, five star is better. this place was called - i can't remember, but it's next to L.E. pastry at rochor road (the pastry shop with the fantastic sugee cake and golf ball pineapple tarts which i haven't tried yet but i shall, some day. that's also where the tau huay is). so we're eating, and my dad looks at the black sauce and goes...

"this is very sweet."

i was like... dude, it's sweet sauce?

and at dinner i tell my mother that i don't like the black forest fantasy tim tams and that i'm going to restrict myself to ONE dark chocolate tim tam when THAT packet's open. i think they had a tim tam sale at ntuc over the weekend, my mum bought three packets. anyhow my brother looks at my mother and goes, "there's tim tam?"

my mother, being the witty person she is (or so she thinks), says, "yes, of course! i bought them in case of an emergency. you can only eat them if there's an emergency. i couldn't imagine my babies being without food when i was away!".

i also made tang yuan with my grandmother on sunday, i think i've learnt the secret to making good ones. we'll see, in time to come.

i realised today that many important people in my life are named jonathan. and many important people who were in my life are so named, too. if i'm not wrong it means gift from God? they all were, in their own way. i took out my old worship songbook today, it belonged to my ex cell-group leader when i was in sec 1/sec 2 and his name was jonathan and the person who gave it to him wrote him a note telling him she hoped he would be a blessing in rj. then there's lovely jon ong, and jon huang whom i think loves me simply because i love abi so much. i still remember him at fifteen...and we both agreed he was more dashing and attractive then. my girlfriends who encountered him would be all "oh he's such a man of God and he plays the guitar so well and he's badminton captain and he's just the perfect guy blah blah blah" and i'd look at them and go, "err, it's just jon? and he's a weirdo?" - he's not really a pastor's kid anymore, he's a pudgy kid. seven years it's been and i'm still praying the right girl will come into his life. my godbrother's name is jonathan, and jon chia made me laugh through most of jc. jonnifer, mei and i used to call him, because he used to act really gay with melvin in class. that's still his name in my phone, jonnifer with a <3 next to it. the first boy i ever had a real crush on was jonathan too. and it's so strange because he's now dating someone i knew from jc, in these english language speaking circles (okay fine the whole ac/rj circle) it's not uncommon. and of course now there's jon - just jon, really, i'm sorry but i'm going to have to call everyone by their chinese names soon (jon ong has the weirdest one of all, it's chungsiong and it's both the first sheng1). jon who fed me bak chor mee and made me see how good life was with it, once more.

i think i might have just really baked the perfect chocolate cake!! being too lazy and too not in the mood for using baking chocolate i just used the recipe on the back of the hershey's cocoa tin, for "the perfect chocolate cake." they really do look quite perfect don't they.

there're just a few catches though.

1. i haven't tasted them yet because they're for baptism class tomorrow. i decided to bake them on a whim because we're on duty again for food so after i mixed the egg and tuna mayo (mayonnaise+whole grain mustard+black pepper+salt+cayenne pepper and a dash of paprika - different proportions for the egg and tuna though, i think the egg's a bit too wet for my liking but we'll see tomorrow) i cycled over to kathleen's house, picked up the cocoa we bought the last time and cycled back to bake cakes. just because i felt like it. it's been a long week, smelling the chocolate was good.

2. cakes aren't supposed to crack along the top, actually. but i think they look nicer that way, more home-made somehow. and cracks are good for putting in gooey bits - which brings me to my third point.

3. i cheated. i can never bring myself to use the requisite amount of sugar in these american recipes - this one called for TWO CUPS OF SUGAR to ONE AND THREE QUARTER CUPS OF FLOUR. wouldn't you just die of a sugar overdose already? so i cut the sugar so it was almost equal to the amount of flour - but less i think. then i started worrying that it wouldn't be sweet enough because of the other ingredients - also because i didn't have milk milk so i had to make milk from milk powder and i have no idea whether i really fulfilled the requirements yes but thinking about it proportionally i decided i had to do something about it so i used that old trick abi taught me. if you want to jazz up any cake/cupcake, right after you take them out from the oven just put semi-sweet chocolate chips on top of them, preferrably hershey's...they'll start melting and then you can spread them nicely over the top of the cake/cupcake. i even mixed in grains of coffee...

BUT I HAVE NO IDEA HOW THE CAKE TASTES LIKE.

we'll all have to wait till tomorrow - or later, rather, to find out.