happy training (:

wheee, and the juniors start training this saturday!

keeping my options open

now it doesn't look so complex

see, all i have to do is figure out how to get there

• get into national team/be in medal contention at national open 09
• study kinesiology
• career
  
• later in life, policy making, govt/ngo

tried finding out more about the Young PAP. went to their website, a bit disappointing, it doesn't say what they DO. yes, there's events and nice pdf brochures, but it doesn't say how the members are involved in carrying out the activities. hm..i expected the forum page to have more 'serious' discussions, but it looked more like the straits times forum page. so there

time to figure out something

not very good news today, first was bad weather in the morning. keep extending the lightning risk till 8.35am, then 9.15am. went for driving test, think i failed in like 2 minutes, for mounting kerb.

driving test circuit was a very strange experience, besides mounting kerb at S-curve, i hit the kerb while trying to get into direction change. for the first time in my life i hit the kerb there. after the test and all, while on the bus home, thought about it, ggxx realised the tester told me to go against traffic/the normal turning direction for both times! yes, i must have not been thinking when i did the test. something felt wrong then but i couldn't quite pinpoint it. all of a sudden it's over. you know what this reminds me off...

more practice then

life is tough but i'm tougher, but whatever it is, it is not the circumstances. anw time to move on, new test date 14 nov, i will get my license before the school hols (that's when i may be able to borrow my mum's car)

happy news, training! (: lots of playground! also the speed is thrilling, can do random quick bursts/hard strokes, and i don't think i'm even at 50% of my potential speed.

"10% more?"
"no"
"twice as hard?"
"no"
"then what?"
"just 8x power"

hi blog

life is good. amazing how much there is to do and how much one can do if time is of the essence. I said this gap year, i take to widen my perspective, and it has. a brief overview: humbling. as i learn more about the lives of non-rgs/rjc people amidst the rapid pace at which the Singapore society is changing (think F1, Integrated Resorts, global hub, tourism and finance industries), i know i can be in a position to change/ work on things for the better.

right now doing the washing and cooking at home; non-essential cleaning (i.e. mopping the floor) aside, i think i can survive on my own. that's part of the plan. see, so when i go overseas next year, i know i can take care of myself, study, read up on my own, work part-time if i have to, do some volunteer work, play and train. well, add one more to the equation but i'll leave it as work in progress yea

Training has been fruitful, doing some speedwork. someone said i should stop doing long d and focus on speed. the irony (: always had a preference for speedwork, so i made myself go through longs rows to hopefully gain some training advantage. turns out speedwork is more fun plus i feel the rush (: stepping up land training again, yes, i do enjoy a good workout.

driving test this friday, after that can drive myself to training on weekends and sch hols! yay (:

it's strange, but i just know what i want to do. Following one's heart hints of irrationality, but i use it in the context of calculated risks towards my dreams.

anw thanks to teammates, i have the chance to learn archi, biz and arts undergrad stuff! must keep the brain juices flowing! on random news, i still fit into my part a part shirt!

know something? what mrs koh said that day really re-awoken that part of me. If not now, then when?

because there is no higher calling than defending your nation

decisions

exciting

just finished week 8 of training (:

wanted to blog the past few days but had to rest early. so well, wednesday decided to do some 2ks. did 2 in the morning, then timed 11.50 and 12.10 in the afternoon. so at the end of wednesday, was starting to doubt the effectiveness of my training plan.

fast forward to thursday, did a 2k in the morning. at the 1k mark, glanced at my watch, 5min30s! was super adrenaline rush throughout the 2k, could feel the catch, made it in 11.15. yup, then started out on my cool down before the next set, at 250m suddenly felt weird, looked at my hand, ggxx bleeding. don't worry it wasn't blood gushing out, just 2 cuts.

friday timing hovered around 11.30. today it rained in the morning. so went to the underpass to run. started at 7 .08am. Unknowingly, when i finally stopped and glanced at my watch, 7.57am. timed myself, one round takes ~1min, so must have done about 50 rounds=7+km. haha, wanted to go for a short warmup run, turned out to be as long as the northern route trail.

the future is still uncertain, here's what i want to do but i haven't quite figured out how to piece them together. :

• serve my country
• work my way to a position where i'll have the power to change things for the better (policy making, interest areas in education, env, community development, youth and sports)
  
• represent singapore for canoeing at the regional level first
• teach/mentor/coach
• be involved with the outdoors, through training, expedition and adventure racing

and with regards to my immediate path, this is where it gets complicated:

• study kins (degree, masters, phd?) where? (ok, where is quite set actually, western ontario (adam van k studied at mcmasters, next door to western) so i can do exchange program with hungary uni (katalin kovacs!), beijing institute of physical education for masters, and cross over to michigan (phelps and greg barton!) when there's time)
• reapply for psc? apply for mcys/moe/mcys scholarships?
  
• NIE to train as pe teacher? local degree in physical education? teach at RJ or rgs or (unlikely) somewhere else?
  
• join the army? study kins or just hardcore and go into military academy?
• join OBS?
  

In order to fulfill what i want to do, the practical considerations of time and money come in. money not so, just live within my means, but time, well, that's ticking away.

decisions

let's take a walk

My kind of fun!

http://www.letstakeawalk.sg/

hello everyone, anyone interested to walk with me?

this event involves walking around singapore to designated checkpoints (just to ensure you walk the full dist), No prizes and it's not a race. there's the 10km, 50km and 100km categories.

and i was thinking:

100km Walk (: max time allowed 33h

20th dec 7pm Sat- 21st dec approx 10pm Sun

cost: $50 per person, need to form teams of 3-6

Proceeds go to charity, do sign up with your friends!

interested to join me pls tag!

wheeeeee

exciting

just wanted to share about how things fall in place

yesterday did my double training as usual, in the afternoon, i was out there paddling. a secondary school team came earlier then me, but they seemed to take quite long to bring out their boats. quite long was enough for me to finish my training and enough for storm clouds to gather. then exactly when i reached the pontoon, the lightning alert sounded.

reached my target of finishing before 3pm, walked to the bus stop to wait for 93 (sometimes the wait takes 15mins). just when i finished eating, guess which bus came?

at alexandra, hopped off the bus to transfer to 51 (a bus that can keep you waiting a horrendous 45mins). didn't even have to wait, 51 was right behind!

strange huh

ahhh and invader zim is back on nickelodeon! haven't had the chance to watch it yet. btw, i hope to catch 'kallang roar' tmr, it's about s'pore's football team back then.

onward!

happy teachers' day

wheeeeee

happy teachers' day (:

Today while walking towards S11, met mrs koh and had a good chat with her. She taught me upper sec geog and her lessons were something i looked forward too (: haha, the good old times when pet, eleanor and me, ggxx from odac/air rifle training/rike expedition would take turns sleeping in geog class. still rmb how she always say our classroom looked like a squatter settlement.

anw, i was thoroughly inspired by that short conversation we had, standing outside the RJ/RI walls alongside the bustling traffic. It started off as the usual "So where are you studying now?", but ended in something more. She told me to follow my heart and pursue my passion (it's always reassuring when othe people, especially those you respect, tell you you're on the right track). For her she did the science-econs combi in JC, then decided she wanted to do her degree in geog. btw she majored in chinese and did some philosophy study too!

but the insight i gleamed wasn't about following your dreams; the stronger message she told me was this: Every right implies a responsibility. Every opportunity, an obligation. Every possession, a duty. It's been a long while since someone highlighted to me the concept of Noblesse Oblige, so richly received, so willingly give. (that was a founder's day theme) In order to do that, first one must be of sound character. to have a good heart though not neccessarily kind, and to be firm in action and resolve.

Mrs koh kept emphasising our batch was special. This is definitely a matter close to my heart, having considered this issue on countless occassions, I told her every batch of rgs girls is special, what with all the talents and diversity. She said the most important thing is even as we set out towards our dreams, we remained grounded.

maybe we can change the world (: and it starts from here

on the subject of character, doing some readings on nietzsche now. his ideas are very intriguing (mr hau said in class before that nietzsche went mad trying to figure out the good/evil issue)

with the US elections coming up, lots of good but subjective articles in the media. If the United States is characterised by the American Dream, then we have our Singapore Story- a story of survival