Nue Au Soleil ...listening to this. the yay-yay 60s vibe, french style, makes me want to don some twiggy mini dresses and dot retro circles all over my house. really.

a sudden let's go for supper and we wound up at my beloved upper thomson road, casuraina prata which was too crispy somewhat. and ending off the day with an awesome sms 'i love loving you' at 0014am from the sweet trumpeter.

had a sudden fear that i had forgotten what bits of my old greenmeadows apartment looked like. like what bobby said during lecture about remembering and forgetting in hiroshima mon amour, though this love affair with an inanimate piece of space is quits mild compared to the film. toilets. i have fascinating memories of the toilets in greenmeadows. four toilets, three bathtubs, different feelings for the different toilets, different lights, different memories, all mine. must never be lost though i can't help it. how can one be so attached to a place? T. S. Eliot reading :: "Poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality. But, of course, only those who have personality and emotions know what it means to want to escape from these things..."

Everything is clear in my heart

I feel life, oh I feel love

Everything is clear in our world

- john lennon, oh my love

sms. 25th march 2005

mingyao: i'm freaking loving you

you ren yao da ni. ha.

i am tired but i want to par-tay. two hours of sleep in two days and i'm a wreak. AL for crit is very good. sociopolis. i need to rethink many many many thinks and draw but i am too tired, and i want to par-tay. will take a nap and attempt to wake up at four, do work till six, go for a quick run then go to church. vexed and grumpy, i am in no mood for poetic ramblings. magnifique magnifique.

horried self-pitying posts must be eradicated for eternity. i have the best family to turn my sorrows to; they know when to listen to me whine and when to give me a knowing shoulder pat, and a wonderful mother to give me all the hugs i want when her mother instincts sense my occassional inner torment. what is this crit thing, when i have this my lovely family and philippians four verse seven [and of course, my funny valentine]? naught.

just did 2.4km. mother came home late because of work and ee jie cooked up an impromptu dinner after which we had mango cake for the beloved mother's birthday. seven times a year we do this. seven times a year i love it so.

in a hurry to go do 4km before mom and the rest comes back and we go off for dinner to celebrate. i bought a mango cake for her. mr. saba was so humorous in class today. his big words and slight wit and harmless sacarsm. we did baudelaire today. next week we're doing t.s. eliot. for contemporary theories it was lecan vs. freud. i don't understand bits of it though, it was a good presentation by s's group. quite tired. not sleeping tonight. need to work nonstop for crit prep tomrrow. tired, but i need my run. hope the air will clear. this air is not good for running, there's a nice breeze though. and music makes everything ok.

ran just 2.6km today. was more consistent in pace. i can't wait to shoot some more wedding photographs! it's addictive. walked the supermart aisle to replenish my supply of green tea and the strawberry black tea caught my eye so i bought a packet of that too for variety. my wrist still bleeds sporadically; it's an ugly gnash, not even a straight line. i have to remember to get the cake for mom's birthday tomorrow. not too much cream, siew jie says. i guess i can only see you on fri, love. maybe we can catch stage beauty in the cinema. claire danes of romeo and juliet wonder. igby goes down. i didn't catch that. a claire danes marathon to come. there she is in an old vogue issue above. stina nordenstam - little star. i love her whisperings.

spring catalogue. UO. desktop pic now.

_ i cut my wrist when i accidently smashed a glass on the counter sink. i think i bled several teaspoons. no i didn't get a high, but there was a hypnotic fascination with watching the blood flow ceaselessly under the running water. it's the exact spot where my right hand rests upon when i'm cadding.

_ three rounds round the track before kickboxing. i'm going to make sure i run tomorrow. cannot let the momentum stop or the spiralling downwards will lead me into another catastrophic pit of self-inflicted-sorry-moaning-for-self. not a very nice state of mind to be in.

_ M.Y. Choy just told me i'd be spending my birthday in australia. so neat! photographer's bug biting me nonstop. it eats into me so furiously just thinking about looking at a foreign land through the lens makes my heart skip a beat.

_ the most gorgeous mother in the world, her birthday is on wednesday, so the loh family are going for dinner together again. [hoorah!]

managed to run a little today. did a quick 4km today by the park. there are so many people running on a sunday evening. kickboxing tomorrow.

it's one of those rut periods. i feel absolute terror - this shouldn't be. how can designing be so hard? my younger sister admonished me - what irony. this shouldn't be. i always find it hard to be as simple as some people surprisingly can, simple in idea but complex in execution, and add in a dash of soul, a pint of dazzling graphics. i hope i can get there some time. this doubt should never be.

i have wasted many weekend hours trying to materialise unimagined forms into reality. of course that will never happen. i feel guilty even doing this random brainless unnecessary activity called blogging. got the box but what goes in? happy days are here to stay however because of the first success of mandm's project. s and husband are delighted with the photographs - m choy you are right i should been there to soak in their reactions - and i look foward to many other such projects. it is another one of those things i love to do - it's so in you and you feel so happy doing it the joy is almost physical. i failed to run or swim the past two days because i woke up late. it's almost like a drug. an absence of it results in a wasted state. i must do a long run today. i should probably go and soak in the exuberant awareness that i am alive and well and can do much instead of moping around like a lackerdaisical sloth. i am no sloth!

i cannot imagine what it'd be like to be in a relationship where making great conversation was not a big deal. abundance of give and take, abundance of getting to know oneself better through an articulation of one's own thoughts. for a moment while he's your boyfriend suddenly he's a best friend too. in the background there's still all things romantic but you get caught up in the trancendence of thought and articulation - this banter is cathartic. white seats must bump - 'twas dinnering at sushi tei in paragon, our now favourite haunt for love of raw cuttlefish sushi and the prawn stuff - another ritual that is ours and ours alone. and after dinner coffee at coffee bean, yet another ritualised process - both of these places are great complements. we always have the corner sofa seat waiting for us. so we sat there and looked through the wedding pics for s that the beloved one had just collected. and we had the great conversation aforementioned. that, of ilford pearl paper, of vasari, wolfflin and panofsky, of the aussie trip to come and its promises of bliss, of inate style and the natural self, of coolness that explodes from people like m, of the thin ones, and of course, of the pics. would love to join you in the darkroom but i gotta get myself going on my work. that's okay, we're dinnering again tomorrow. shall attempt a swim or run tomorrow morning after today's failure of waking up early and fresh.

we must go through torture to remember that all is done for God and not self. mom's coming back tomorrow from yala. just read reading - charles baudelaire, quite engaging this guy, the dandy. dandyism. very cool. but oh so decadent.

18th Singapore Film Festival.

will only allow myself to watch two films at the max. stuff i really want to see. gotta save for australia.

shall i be honest? i shall. nearly bawled my eyes out during cri. tearingly exhausted. flawed scheme and knowing it. the bigs one probably thinking i was shallow and stupid with one aspect of my idea. she looked like a fool with her silence and intense unresponsive looks - you can't comprehend what we are saying? says them. she was just tired, and afraid, and overwhelmed and knew she had to reevaluate her scheme from the base and she knew it was all crap. being seen as a shallow fool is a hundred times worse than having people hate you. to cry during crit? what a loser. but of cos i had to just let it out a bit - the tears were already up to my neck what could i do? so i went to get coffee from the canteen and sob a little, which always feels good after. after the nightmarish fifteen minutes she came back and sat down scribbling and sketching; the other crits were beneficial. i could move on, thinks she. there is a lot of fear it's almost physical. hardwork and passion must be there. i want F's praises and i have to work doubly hard because i'm not a genius. i don't like literal passages. this has been quite confessional. what a grotesqueness. why am i even writing this? grotesqueness to the core. i hate the periods when i hate myself. these bouts can kill.

late night dinner and talk with the grouplet was good; never have i had such fun with a grouplet. why do i always have the nagging doubt that fun can only be justified with good grades?

will be writing my assignment on e. panofsky's iconology text, submitting it in school then meeting the trumpeter. i look foward to that - i think you are what get me up from my downs; after all i need someone to chastise me at times and someone to just be there to hug me. there is a lot one can get from just one hug.

woke up too late to go running (the eight o clock poisonous sun) and swimming, which i might do tomorrow at dawn. not getting physical is detrimental to the mind.

there are some people you meet in life and you so love their brand of wit and their personalities you want to kidnap them and force them to be your best friends. alas, this self-consciousness that bites me hard. there is an urgent need to filter out some things in my brain, it's getting too crowded. i need a swim in the night. also, begone! oh you wicket sty/boil under the eyelid! you are banished completely!

oh sob. arghs. dun wanna dun wanna but gotta, gotta. i need to vogue and listen to some new musique.

'tis a cruel time to get a mountained eye. every ten minutes i stare at my unit plans i start to tear and the boil is a tad painful. i can't go swimming or running to stir my soul, to keep the mental engine from frustrated insanity and i have interim on thursday. so i tried to rest the boil away by sleeping the whole of today which of cos rendered my insides trembling with fear of not having enough time for thursday. am on the cliff edge again; could i cry please? ack, no my under-the-eyelid boil would hurt. what keeps me going is perhaps looking forward to thursday night when i'd look back on hindsight and think 'hey it's not so bad after all i made it through crit again'. meanwhile now till thurs i am on the edge trying not to fall. God help, i need you i need you i need you (so they sing, jars of clay)

the bad news or the good news first?

firstly the good news :: bronwyn my australian penpal from age 6 to age 16 (break in between, we stopped writing) has replied to my letter. tis a pity that she's in london and not australia 'cos i'd so love to finally meet up with her. no probs, there is the future to look foward to.

then comes the bad news :: i got me a sore right eyelid. it's as huge as a mountain and is drooping over my eye. this means i can't go swimming and running and will have a freaking horrible time attemtping to do my work. what heals a sore eye asap?

dearest granduncle passed away at ten thirty last night. we just got the news, ah kee uncle called from yala just now. you are one of the most caring persons i've known; much nicer than many of the closer relatives here in singapore in fact - and i can still remember your kindness and affection after ten years of not seeing you. if not for the stupid south thailand violence and if not for that nasty fall i could have visited you in december. ma is flying up to yala tomorrow with another aunt. if i didn't have school i'd have wanted to go too. but it's not so important; i wanted to go more when he was alive. i am aching at the heart - throat is glued. i think you're one of the best persons on earth.

during the holidays i shall surely find chet baker's As Though I Had Wings: The Lost Memoir to read. these types are best, personal and it would probably send me into a deepthinking mood where i would proceed on to have cup of hot green tea and put on some sad sounding mazzy star to feel the minutes tick by, a little silly connecting exercise i might spoil by calling it 'third person affected pseudo-stoning indulgence'. ha. you know trumpeter, when i have enough money i'll definately take up lessons for the sax or some jazz instrument. it's never the same when you're an audience and when you're truly a practitioner, so i must experience that. "There are four qualities essential to a great jazzman. They are taste, courage, individuality, and irreverence" - stan getz. mister choy, you have all of that! you are truly a great musician and i am your biggest fan.

"Invest yourself in everything you do. There's fun in being serious.” - wynton marsilis. quote of the week. hence, do work.

today after church we hopped onto 106 to holland village as the trumpeter was craving for some vietnamese noodles. after the steak, beef brisket, alright soup and beefballs we crossed the road to hagaan daaz as the trumpeter had a surprisingly rare desire for ice cream [ normally it's me, heh ]; we had an overdose of about seven scoops altogether [ tiramisu, fudge, bailey's, belgium choc, strawberry, macademia nut, can't remember my other flavour, and a million kilograms of thick gooey fudge. the orange slices were nice, at the bottom of my long glass - a kind of sour end to my dish, a little is nice ] still quite choc-filled; those choc bit things were nice to crunch. and we sat on the white sofas, i think that's a nice quiet place to linger on an uncrowded sunday early afternoon watching the people [ and cars ] go by. then we went to borders to look at travel books; huddled at the corner - we must always browse books and read menus together -the same one, love, that's alot of fun. decided that reading too many guidebooks that didn't up the excitment level of our destination was damaging to our enthusiasm so we quit it and lingered here and there. nope no rare special recording of chet baker there [ i'd like to think you are the only one in singapore that has it now, heh ] and we sat on the wooden bench in wheelock being couple-ly then lo and behold along came sharon and ying [ i'm sorry M.Y., i couldn't make sharon do the arm thing - try harder next time ]very nice meeting them, very nice. those sweet chicks. and you sent me off to the mrt and we did the lingering thing cos i couldn't bear to go till you sent me off with swift kiss and a tight hug and i wondered if you really did go across the road to view the tubular things after all. ha.

i forgot to collect my notes for theory last week, must remember tomorrow. do work do work do work and go running later in the sunday dusk then do work do work do work. this weekend has been too lazy but i had many hours with the trumpeter's arms around me so i'm saturated with bliss. [ the light orange printed shirt looked very nice and comfortable on you i must say, my dear trumpeter; how did we look today? you in orange i in maroon. light cotton and luxurious knit ]

oh my gosh! you are wonderful.

dinner with uncle richard and auntie elina at my choice chinese cuisine near great world city. the food was fantastic.

strange feeling. families are complicated and very delicate. the threads linking all the members - very intricate, changeable; unpredictable synergy or bouts of irriating silences. what a stark moment that was. bittersweet, mostly just very delicate. could be bitter if one wanted, could be indifferent, in twos, or threes or altogether now we rock differently and i'm beginning to see that i shouldn't let it bother me. much.

i love many things in life, and i am very tired. those intangible things might be better off unpolished then gleaming white all the time, 'tis artifice then. very delicate indeed.

anna sui. i'd love to be wearing something like that.

fortunately the sun took a little longer to rise and cast its poisonous rays upon the land _ thus i could go swimming at the pool _ twenty laps_ without getting funny tan lines _ the sky was grey and hardly blue _ and the pool was peppered with children like ants in a cup of honey water _ i feel nicely stretched _ the lights are orange _ the curtains drawn _ and chet baker he croons to me from the pretty silver stereo _ oh trumpeter the sounds of last night the cd is so 60s vibe it's truly a miumiu type of song very biba-esque very you and me eh eh eh _ i'm going to have a mango now _

those eyes, done like francoise hardy. miumiu is as wonderful as marc jacobs.

presenting the miumiu corduroy embossed suede large tote bag. also very beautiful.

my love! the cd is so rare/new that they don't have it on amazon.com! i searched over 290 entries for chet baker and it was not there at all! cool eh. such romantic sounds hidden beneath the layer of blue beautifully patterened washi paper in a retro paper case. my intuition told me it was rare, when i was browsing at the shop. the music flooded over me once it started playing, washes of deep love, such soul in each note. secret dinner place. good for us. happy birthday. i love you.

ten things that made me ride on a wave of happiness today:

_ i did not have to take a cab to studio today
_ SH gave my scheme the go-ahead
_ i wore an extremely comfortable pale pink top
_ i found the longlost steven holl library book under c's table in studio
_ c from a.s. complimented me on my hair and said she will visit mama sally's shop
_ brenda got stuff from mama sally's shop
_ i had a very satisfying hot cup of milo from the drinks machine
_ my love is 80% or so better in good health
_ i anticipated meeting and having dinner with my love, the suave trumpeter
_ i can't remember the last one i thought about. so it shall be dinner's herbal
chicken soup la mian for good measure

thou shalt not slacken thy pace. this morning at 720am the dewy outside was extremely tempting but i had work to finish up. tomorrow morning i shall surely run, run, run, run, run.

monday: ran 4km
wednesday morn: ran 3.2km
wednesday night: kickboxing 1 hour

never underutilise my tuesdays. it will come to haunt me on thursday morns. draw like i eat and life will go on. plums are great; peaches are better; mangoes are the best. sans soleil - sunless and panofsky's iconographic jargon - today was think day and i liked it quite. chaos is ok. life is violent. but i like pretty images and pretty things in front of me. what will the philosophers say to that? will lecan faint? i detest gore, horror and real suffering sadness that brews from tragedy. we shall read books in airconditioned cubes under trees on grass and the clouds will go by above us, like trains in a dream. so we saunter on. the brilliant french electronica duo air croons 'biological'. paradox, paradox. the digital and flesh entwined - no boundaries left uncrossed. i wrote poetry. i'm starting to learn how to create poetics spatially. the wonder of it all. and so we saunter on.

Thousands of hairs
Two eyes only
Its you

Some skin
Billions of genes
Again its you

XX XY
That's why it's you and me

Your blood is red
It's beautiful genetic love...

...Apart of me would like to travel in your veins ...

the pu pocket shopper from miss selfridge. a most connected, apt replacement for my mango ah ma bag. oh this tote, the most desirable thing in the world.

things i need in life

with the b-sides. listening to the above.

"you give me a trememdous desire to love" - a line from hiroshima mon amour
which i watched during contemporary theories lecture. it's engaging and quite heavy, looking foward to bobby's lecture on the film. got an B+/A- for my vasari writeup which i did in less than two hours, heh. design wise, i got enlightened abit this morning, now i have to spend the rest of the day getting the stuff out.

was just reminiscing about the college days, when the trumpeter and i had just gotten to know each other and the horrible time i put him through. the in between periods. i must say i hurt now for having hurt him badly but that phrase had to happen, for us, and for me. so walking through the school on saturday, was more of a personal time for us, than for us meeting friends. elvis preseley's love me tender plays now in my head; i remember with fond aches in year two during campfire, you and me on the slope talking, and mrs lee coming to admonish us. definately, on our metaphorical collage of the courtship history, mrs lee features in there too :)

hi love, take care, o tender boyfriend o mine.

the trees along yishun ring road and avenue eleven are beautiful, purples and pinks, flowers all blooming.

morn was a blur, tired and worried. gotta spend more time talking with the kids but was so sleepy. the love and me went to great world city for lunch. while he happily discovered a great new hardware store, i listened to telepopmusik's genetic world cd in that cd shop. i love these atmospheric sounds. those that are best heard in the dark, different from mazzy star which is not electronica but that sort of feeling. we thomson-ed home today in the car.

i think you look great in that blue polo-t shirt today, love. can i stop praising you? i think never.

orient influences, from time.com via cnn.com. calvin klein. i like being chinese.

vjc homecoming was a disappointment. festivity was absent. most places dormant. met most of the odac people. in the morning me and the man went to chinatown to collect s's b and w wedding shots. lots have been learnt. be stingy with film next time etc. great contrasting prints. shop with cute name. then had crayfish and prawn hor fan at the hong lim food centre. it was great, slurpy.

at night it was yummy char siew and pork ribs at the fav place after bible study. very blissful but very tired. got to do a lot of work tomorrow actually touched nothing this weekend. sigh.

met brenda yesterday after dinner with uncle eddie. nice time of catch up and comfortable chat. we can never get bored, no never.

stina nordenstam.
telepopmusik's 'yesterday was a lie'.

i want to dream. today i plan to have a good day. in fact i am suddenly near-bursting with whimsical silent-but-heavy-sensitivity to every single emotion that is hitting me now; some songs make you feel this way. you feel like a puppet in a noir-tinged land. woo, music can control you.

despite waking up later than i wanted to, i had to run. so i did about 3 - 4 km; the after-eight sun is quite hateful and lovely at the same time. i like the warmth of the shine but hate the way it's too extremely glaring these days - blinding, and hateful sunrays. next time after-eight i'll have to go running with a cap. i want to go swimming in the evening's darkness now. dinner with the fam and uncle eddie in town tonight. meeting bren for coffee after; she's in town watching a movie.

something very satisfying ( i see myself in black and white snapshots, this music playing)about making an omelette sandwich alone in the house after a good run. the quiet chop chop of tomoto, sprinkling three different spices and a very good closure with a cup of camomile tea with vanilla and honey. i've shadowed myself with the curtains.

oh dear i really can't take it anymore. the singing, the music is digging into my skin; it's pinching the epidermis, searing the flesh and doing a potpourri with my blood and this fluid concoction is flowing into my brain. hypnotised. morphine - i think i'm flying.

hotel corridor, thailand 2004

you must have been tired, and i'm thankful you met me late after your meeting. zonked from the mad mad night - i detest being tired to tears, sometimes i only have myself to blame. do work earlier. anyway highlight of the day was knowing someone was in the west and there was the potential of meeting up. we had dinner/supper at crystal jade in holland village; the table was too wide, i'd have like to sit next to you. anyway we both had ee fu mian. this too, like the prata, was just an excuse to see you and hold your hand for several minutes. it makes my night and my tomorrow morning. antidote, you are.

uncle eddie from L.A. is here for two days - the whole family is having dinner tomorrow with him. i look foward to having another meal with the entire loh corporation yet again, on a weekend too, tis rare, tis a great unit this beloved family of mine.

kickboxing yesterday was great while it lasted but juliana repeated the moves from the previous two workouts so i didn't ache today. late studio meant i couldn't swim. so i shall try to wake up early tomorrow and go for a long long desirable run. running with music is great. i get to play-act in my head, either raging with some rocker or feeling urbane-like with nu-jazz electronic wallpaper type music.

man, i miss you already.

sms before the sunrise:

mei: i love you to the vein.
m.y.: i love you to the intercellular boundaries of my body

heh.
got idea, got strategy. life is good for a wednesday that started with brilliant cooling rain in the dark and will end of with some power kickboxing.

telepopmusik. i love the song 'breathe' woohoo.

reading e. panofsky. realised i should have researched the extra readings in the library last week when i had more time.

art history critique in a foreign uni or something? past regrets, thoughts that should have been considered when i was then eighteen. but for what? this path is quite a good one. either way i've been exposed to some things for better i'd like to assume. got a wake up call today. design! don't think too much. really. what do i want. the question i have to discipline myself to answer. focus is the key. siew jie swallowing her pharmacy texts should be a physical inspiration in the room. talk less do more. fault discovered hence must do something otherwise i will continue to wallow in the mud.

other than that today we had mushy ebi-fry. white seats bumped and cookies and cream hersheys drink ended the day. love develops deep from strong, intoxicating, very good and broad conversation. and the handlocking and eyegazes. this very tactile nature + the intellectual mind-stimulation = a potent concoction. we are all alive and well. anything can be done. what keeps you not merely alive but jubilant, engaged with the world and fire in your brains and your heart is very important. this is one of them. another i have to work harder on. strategy!!!!