i like my Fonts too much, SO THERE

It's possible to become obsessed with fonts. And when I mean obsessed, I mean seriously obsessed.

I'm the sort that can spend an entire day downloading and amending and changing and alternating fonts until I get the 'feel' right. I'm the sort that will keep doing it until I can live with it and stare at it and feel comfortable and at ease working with it. After all, if I'm the one who is going to be staring at it and think about it and bang on the keyboard, shouldn't I have the right to do just that?

The funny thing is....

I didn't even know I could change fonts until 10 years of personal computer usage had gone by. It had always been Times New Roman all the way until one day I changed it to Arial. Then I decided on Georgia and I stuck with it for awhile until I decided that Garamond looked nicer and off to Garamond I went. Then I changed the gear and because I changed the gear, it seemed that Segoe UI looked nicer so I went along with that.. after which I headed to Lucida Grande and Lucida Sans and right now I'm in the Kristen ITC phase.

Yeah, I know that it's a kiddy, babyish font. I know that it reflects me in a certain way, and that  technically, it can only be used for children below a certain age, but truth is, I don't care. Firstly, I'm in the Media & Entertainment business where my work and my visuals can move from toddlers to geriatric. I'm in a line where I can be serious whilst expressing it otherwise. More importantly, I'm the one looking at it on my screen, and if I'm happy seeing it appear as my fingers over the keyboard whilst getting work done, why not?

It's not as if I'm using it for official documentation or legal representation or submissions or whatever that's official. I change it back to Arial or Times New Roman for that.

Hey, as personalities and quirks go, common sense still prevails! :)

yeah i Felt like S***

sadako audition shot

Yes, I looked like this that day. I felt like this too. And I'm making no excuses for it.

It wasn't intended that I'd take this picture- I didn't even pose for it. I just dragged out the phone and snapped. I knew I'd look like s*** but honestly I already felt like a piece of s*** and since the washroom lighting made the selfie look the way I felt, I decided I wasn't going to prettify it further.

A selfie can either reveal the best of ourselves, or it can be a mirror memory of what's really happening that day and though it might seem depressive and frightening and fearful and angry and everything, that's what it is.

It was a mode where one had had restless sleep, where showers had been hurried (whilst being thankful for), where one stayed still hungry despite having had a filling meal, where one's life was in its down-down mode and although I knew that tis' a season that will pass, tis' also a season that I didn't bloody want to have.

It was a season that scared the s*** out of me and forced me to re-look at my present beliefs and adapt new ones that challenged my own thought processes and long-held principles. In this season alone, I re-examined two long-held theories and tossed them inside out and upside down. The circumstances alone made me invert the Maslow's pyramid theory (to the level that I know it) and made me reframe what I'd been taught of Satir's theory.

Conclusion: The current two theories are s*** when it comes to real-life survival.

Perhaps some would disagree with me. But I'm one of those who feel a lot, I'm one of those who don't give a f**k about theories and applications of inner strength and coping mechanisms and whatnot. I've heard them before, I've joined others to encourage others to apply it in their lives before and today I repent of whatever it was that I said all those years ago. The believers can just take the theory and go screw themselves. I'm not being harsh. You don't have time to be kind when you're just trying to live, and I  just go for what works for me and I'm making no excuses for it.

Maybe I'll write another post about what I think of those two theories. But I'll wait till I'm less mad. Being mad gets you nowhere when trying to rationalize. Ha. There'll be other theories, I surmise, but I'm not keen on them- for now- and may I never have to use them too. :)

On another perspective, I still stick to the fact that I don't have to like it, nor cherish it, nor be thankful for the s***. And when it's over, it's over. So, GOODBYE, DON"T COME BACK and I don't ever f**king want to look nor feel this way again.  



action Action time

Got it there, finally, I'm glad to say, despite the fact that whatever is banged in still remains as it is- a draft- one that needs to be amended and corrected and revised and amended and revised again and added upon and taken away until the final copy is completed and ready to meet the world.

I've changed it a few times.

Because each time there is this nagging suspicion that it isn't good enough and sure, it really isn't good enough when you sit down and ponder on it and chew on it.

You don't stop thinking of what you're doing. You don't quit leaving where you left the poor elderly lady, even if she's been going backwards and forward through the corridors and courtyards and sat on the same bench and rehashed through her "traumatic" scenario over and over and over again whilst talking to the same person over and over and over again.

I'm feeling so bad about this that I feel like I've gotta apologize to her for putting her through this s***. And hopefully she'll look at me with kind, understanding eyes when I tell her that I'm getting there. 

to The gate, And back

I'm screwed, I'm telling you.

She is supposed to move forward, but I keep sending her back.

Not that I want to, but I have to, and every time I do it, it's so embarrassing. But that's how it is when I'm in the middle of a narrative and I attempt, and attempt, and attempt to get it right.

In the meantime...

More than once she's reached the gate, and one time she actually stepped out of the gate but whilst she stood there searching for her sense of direction, she had to be sent back to the beginning where she was still wandering.

It's become sort of a playback, like how we used to play our movies in reverse on the VCR, and honestly, as unprofessional as it sounds, it can be really quite comedic...

I'm glad she hasn't gone quiet on me completely.
I'm glad that she's still speaking to me and hasn't decided to shut up for good on me.

That would be a disaster.

A total nightmare.



the national gallery Exterior

 

an upclimb

I haven't been here in a very, very long time.

The last time I actually climbed up these steps, I was still wearing my dorky glasses and sporting short, short hair. *thanks, no thanks, school rules* There was never an opportunity for me to go in. See, to get past its doors you needed a purpose, and since I never got one, I never went in. And because I never went in, I never bothered to ascend the steps either.

Except for one time.

We were on a group excursion, all of us, kids 7 to 18 years old. I was one of the older ones. We were here because we wanted to see the City and because some of the younger ones didn't seem to get out of their own neighborhoods much. We didn't pass through those doors either back then but it didn't matter. Kids weren't allowed in anyway. What we did was to take a picture so somewhere there's a photograph of us kids standing and sitting on the steps smiling at the camera.

Today, the doors are open wide. Today anybody can enter. You no longer need to be of age. And even if you're of age, you no longer need a certain criteria to pass through those doors. There's no more need to be part of an exclusive clique to enter. 

I'm glad for the societal progression.

I'm gladder still that the façade looks the same.

Because whilst many a structure in this area has been torn down and nearly forgotten, with this structure, they took great pains to renovate it from inside out, so much so that at one time, standing at The Adelphi, I was able to look past the outside walls, perceive the cavernous space of its interior and even stare at the sky right through a hole in the roof made specially for the industrial crane.

There're the same windows, the same balconies, the same pillars, the same sculptures up on the roof. Here, right now, I'm feeling like time has stood still, whilst I'm also being very much aware that time has passed. It is like I'm drifting between two different eras, being here yet not being here. 

Very surreal, very magical, one that I can't well describe.
 

lines reflections lines

But it's there.

In the shadows that whisper so softly on the floors and the walls. In the geometric shapes that create patterns on the walls and shuttered windows.

Or maybe in the very fact that this Structure stands as a Symbol on her own, a monument of timelessness, a representation of international trade and global movement, a visible, tangible object of times past- in Europe, America and Singapore.  

You could place your hand on the stone and realize that the same type of stone could be in New York City or San Francisco. You could look up at the awnings and realize that you've seen it somewhere in the streets of New York City before. And it doesn't matter whether you're wearing a leather brogue or a casual flip flop.

It is still the same floor. It is still the same door. It is still the same stone.

 

the tiny opening at the end

 

sushiiiii Supermarket

wasabi and soy sauce so good

So we had just four dollars between us and that was all we had for dinner. And because we had to stick to the diet for the day, fried noodles and economic mixed rice and wanton noodles were out of the menu.

So we popped over to Cold Storage and bought sushi because it was already past eight and prices get slashed by more than half by that time just so they can push out the remaining stock and still earn and not get slapped with a food safety thingy whatever.  

There's still plenty of variety available at that time. There were hand rolls and onigiri and umami and lobster salad and corn and tuna salad and loads of salmon stuff. We wanted the salmon, but they were either $6 or $8 and we had only $4, so we stared really hard at the counter, trying to make the most out of the two $2 dollar notes in hand, and we whittled down our choices to cucumber, umami, tuna, crabstick and tamago.

Tamago and umami won.

12 on 12 @ Ah Hoi

fooooood

To put it as plainly as possible, this is basically twelve dishes on your dining table. Twelve dishes for Twelve dollars, starting from Twelve noon. It's a popular, if not quiet, offering.

 

They've been serving this at Ah Hoi's at Hotel Jen Tanglin- it's seasonal- and so we've gotten ourselves there whenever time and meeting locations permit.

Having a meal here is a little outdoorsy, a little alfresco, a little formal, a little casual all at once. It's a place where polo tees and knee-length shorts with belts would sit most comfortably. It's a place for hats and sundresses and sandals. It's also a place for maxi dresses thrown over your bikini. You don't get the chirpy, cheery, office party one gets at the buffets. (They've got J65 for that) Here, it's an ambience that borders between half-relaxed, half-formal that generates conversation, discussions and everything else. It's a place to appreciate a staff, meet a prospect, have a small-team gathering. It's a nice place for an afternoon date, a rendezvous, a space-out, if one might say, in the middle of a hectic day.

I think of it as a plantation house. You know, that sort where there're verandahs with cane chairs and ferns and foilage and bougainvillea flowers.

 

I think of it too as a very big hut on stilts standing over the shallow waters of the seashore, like how seafood restaurants are in this part of the world, and where you don't know what the catch of the day is until they tell you, and where sunrises and sunsets are breathtaking and you get all-round breezes from the sea around you.

 

Except that at Ah Hoi's, you get more than seafood.

 

Even for their 12 on 12. 

 

You get pork, chicken, fish and beef. You get soup and rice and vegetables. But you also get a menu that's kept afresh. One day you might get stewed pork with egg. Another day you might get steamed pork with salted vegetables. One day there might be pig's trotters bubbling in a clay pot. Another day there would be pork slices with spring onions. There're little surprises. One day you could get chicken drumlets stewed in some sort of herbal brew but the next day you could be presented with fried chicken in sambal sauce. One day you could get a whole chunk of sardine fish. Another day you could get fish slices. It's the same for the vegetables. One day you could have stir fried cabbage but cai xin and kangkong on the next.

Yet it's all very charming. 

Especially if you're someone who loves variety, and if you want to get to know your fellow diners better. Personal preferences speak plenty for one who prefers sambal fish balls over kung po chicken, or someone who will dig around the little dish for long beans but eschew the stewed cabbage.

And when you have fruit infused water on the side with vegetable crackers (a particular favorite of mine) for the taking, when you have fans whirring above your head and you're seated on lovely cushioned garden chairs with the sparkling surface of the swimming pool in sight, it is a great lunch indeed.