summer is here. :)

before tp started; horsing around with photobooth

after tp, life's been good. we keep saying it's our last chance ever to relax, chill out and have fun before we are released to schools to bear to brunt of working life and horrible students.

summer is here early and it's hotter than ever. coupled with fieldtrips to sungei buloh wetland reserve, labrador park rocky shore and macritchie nature reserve, makes for plenty of heat rashes, mozzie bites, sticky skin, cold drinks, air-con blasting.

time has been mostly spent with my crazy nie friends. my other friends are all working in the day. so gatherings, dinners, lunches, movies, east coast park, badminton, weddings (indian temple, catholic church, zoo reception) etc. have been spent with them.

we have eaten everywhere in singapore. we have travelled everywhere in singapore. east, west, north west, northeast, south, central. from city center, traffic jams to the most ulu parts of singapore.

i'm reminded that love is all around. :)

i have started baking again. :) to which i'm very happy about.

i have learnt a lot about plants, sea creatures, animals and birds.

i'm falling in love with my new DSLR and lens. awesome photos.

i love the american idol finale. i love both kris allen and adam lambert. i love the 10,000 performances for the finale show. i love that some kind souls on the internet have made the m*p3s of the performances and studio versions of the songs available. :) and i like the music education i get from american idol.

i realized that kris allen's cover of bob dylan's to make you feel my love, makes me cry.

i have learnt that hope in God's promises is what drives me day to day. and i have to be conscious of His promises so i do not lose sight of what is important in life. that i don't drift from event to event, job to job, day by day. and to see His creations so diverse, creative and lovely, however small and insignificant they may be.

sea anemones

inter-tidal zone of labrador park rocky shores

the awesomeness of march.

why march was such an unforgettable month.

• caught jason mraz live. amazing.
• caught many good movies with good friends (benjamin button, he's just not that into you, slumdog millionaire, marley&me).
• had a great time at MH's. chilling to nice pizzas from serangoon gardens and a night of guitar hero world tour and good company.
• had many catchup sessions with various friends from NIE, bethany, and all over, over good meals. always enjoying good fellowship and the fruits of our labor.
• work was both satisfying and frustrating at the same time. which made for many laugh-out-loud moments at my silly students (and other teachers' silly students).
• work-life balance quite easily obtained at my workplace (for now). the ability to work hard and play hard is something i hope to achieve when i start work for real.
• the march holidays.
• the many rehearsals and practices for the upcoming easter musical. and witnessing the tremendous progress made in just a few weeks, all credit goes to the ones leading the choirs, costumes, stage, props, AV, music, and the Lord's blessings and grace.
• caught coldplay live, for the 2nd time. amazing x2.
• bought my tickets to london for june. i'll get to see zeh, watch musicals and hopefully plays, and travel in UK and europe again! :)
  
• caught the winter's tale. my first shakespeare play live on stage. seeing ethan hawke (and the rest of the pristine cast) on stage. hearing him sing and strum the guitar. hokay. the entire play was kind of amazing in a shakespeare way. more to come in another post.
• caught sight of EH and several other cast members heading out the B1 stage door when i was turning out of the esplanade carpark. and for a split second i contemplated stopping the car and winding down the window to say hi. of course i didn't, and totally regretted it. till now.

all these joys and blessings come to me and i'm ever so thankful and grateful. :) i wouldn't expect any more months to be so filled and enriched, with songs and music, with art and soul, with praise and worship. but hopefully, with the Lord's grace, it can be, and will be.

my funny friends.

on the way home from church,

discussing the WGA writer's strike some time back.

ML: oh i think the simpsons did an episode about the strike.
LY: yahhh parody and all.
L (note: this is NOT ME): oh (J) where do you watch the simpsons?
ML: channel news asia.

silence. then laughter all around the car. :) haha.

LY: you meant starworld.
L: starworld shows channel news asia??

silence. then everyone was laughing twice as hard.

L was going to say: starworld shows the simpsons?

hello, gorgeous.

my newest friend.
the macbook 2.4 GHz intel core 2 duo, 4GB memory,
250GB hard drive and the glass multi-touch trackpad.

thursday was an interesting day. actually so was wednesday.

wed was a day of going back to NIE and getting a project done. then i met with C and D for some drinks at xin wang at siglap and laughed the entire afternoon away.

(which job allows me to be paid and have holidays for 1 month plus?)

thursday was a day of crowds, which left me with a splitting headache after it all. first was the insane charles&keith warehouse sale crowd which was already packed by 11am. all these singaporeans like no need to work like that. :| me and XH managed to get some really good bargains and headed for lunch with M near her new workplace. :) then i met up with the biochem boys to scour the IT fair at expo.

hence, hello my new best friend. :) it looks totally sleek and beautiful. and i'm so glad that V and i managed to convert 2 of the boys to mac. now they are the proud owners of the beautiful iMac desktops. and J went all crazy for the credit card roadshows, signing at least 4 new cards at different banks. and he carted home so many freebies that would surely make his mama proud. and my mama too. so head to the fair if you want freebies! contact J if you can't find the booths. :)

so a week of shopping means this week will be dedicated to many new books to read (some chick lits, obama's 1st book, bourdain's latest book etc.), new dvds to watch (alias s5, lost s3, some movies), a new laptop to explore, new CDs to listen to, a wardrobe to clean out and catching up on readings and prep for YC and christmas and songs to memorise for the concerts.

sounds like a plan.

the end of an era.

been feeling sort of quiet and whimsical of late.

returning to a home of comfort and familiarity deeply contrasts with the nomadic lifestyle of discovery and learning when i traveled through europe for a month. it was truly a great trip, with lots of things to see and do, going from city to city, meeting interesting people, and witnessing the grace of God in cities with notorious dangers of robbery, kidnap, pickpocketing, fraud and so much more. and seeing the Lord's hand of guidance, as well as His creations being crafted out in the form of the mountains and valleys, rivers and lakes, flora and fauna, the stories of former great kings and the stories of the Bible, coming alive right in front of your eyes. and these are just the highlights of the the highlights. more to come as i blog city by city.

returning home was sad. especially when your last stop was the beautiful city of paris. when asked (at the effiel tower, no less) what were his thoughts on returning home after his graduation trip, my new-found s'porean friend succinctly replied in one word, "depressing". (:

well, i returned to reality. reality equals admin work, enrolling in NIE, going through a teacher preparatory program at NIE before starting my 1-month stint at temasek secondary. i wonder what are the repercussions of me going into teaching. would i have to give up my lifestyle of blogging and facebooking and chilling out at pubs? would my students respect me more or less? the education scene in singapore is rapidly changing and i wouldn't know until i'm in it. but meanwhile, i have another year of studying to go.

okay, reality also meant catching up on my tv shows grey's, lost, house, american idol and project runway. yep i'm a month behind. and not to mention the SATC movie, which i adored completely and watching it with my sister brought back many fond memories of discovering SATC DVDs and falling in love with the girls and the men and the clothes and the shoes. as well as getting educated about life (and sex).

of course, coming home also meant catching up with friends. i felt detached from everyone at home, even when i received my results and my honors classification, and not knowing what everyone else got. nevertheless, outside of being kaypoh, i love my friends. and it's hard to think about my friends from biological sciences while i flipped through our graduation dinner and dance photos.

it's hard to go from 4 years of playing and studying together to the real world away from the comforts of the walls of our school. but all good things have to end, and i'm glad ours ended in a most thoughtful and positive and hilarious way, not to mention i got sabo-ed onto stage to dance with my kazakhstan friend. and it set the stage for the beginning of our lives, sealed the bond that we had as a class, of 2008. and i'm looking forward to us getting our certs and throwing our mortar boards into the air after convocation.

confessions of a movie/tv junkie in LA.

i'm thinking back on 2007 more often than i should be. which is something i wish i did less. to look back. but being a sentimental girl, it's hard to not think about good times in the past.

anyway this is day 3 in sunny los angeles. i love the LA weather when i was there. mid-june. it was sunny and breezy and the nights were nice and cool.

day 3 was our private warner brothers studio tour which we paid for. i can still remember i bought the tickets online at the las vegas airport because LAS had free wireless access. and i also checked my spring quarter results and i thought i did SO badly for my human resource management module that i panicked like crazy. my prof emailed me to tell me she forgot to key in my exam marks.

anyway we booked a super early slot. 8.45am. it's good also 'cos we can spend the rest of the day doing something else. which we already planned. it was a sleepy morning and we had breakfast at the motel before heading up the bus to bring us to burbank, calif. we registered and got personalized nametags. so cool right. and hung around the lobby to wait for 8.45am to come.

then we were ushered into a small auditorium to watch a video of those famous movies and tv shows that are shot by warner brothers. and a history of the company. i recognized many of my favorite movies so that got me really excited. then we got introduced to our guide who is this movie-&-tv buff, obviously. we got into a small tram-like vehicle similar to those on golf courses and off we go onto the warner brothers lot.

production offices that double up as buildings for shoot. bicycles belong to production staff who cycle around the huge compound. and it was pretty funny when we met this production assistant working on a new tv show "the chronicles of sarah connor" now showing in the US. and he was complaining about his boss to us, a group of strange-looking visitors. well i understand. since PAs are sai-gang warriors in the film industry.

and we go past many houses on the lot used for shoots. and those sprawling mountains of burbank are usually digitally-removed in post-production.

seems ordinary right. but it's a frequently used set that i recognized on the west wing! it shows itself in several seasons, as a california mexican cafe place where bartlet and his daughter were eating lunch, as a place where a group of activists were rallying against the government during the big block of cheese day, as a hospital where the chief justice was admitted and matthew perry went to visit him. (:

this is sookie's house on gilmore girls! but it's empty inside. a typical facade.

this house, on the outside, is lane's house (also gilmore girls). and i learnt that some facades have working interiors like this one. except the 2nd floor is partically non-existent 'cos they have to hang lights and mikes. this is for shots where the director wants a long, continuous shot from outside to inside the house. so they gotta put up decor in this house and it changes from show to show.

this is the famous town gazebo of stars hollow in gilmore girls. the entire stars hollow town is left as it is, and it was actually a set of a very old film, reused in gilmore girls. and now even as the series has stopped completely, the set still remains. so you can tell i was SO excited when i was there. like i was really in stars hollow. where lorelai and rory were.

this is luke's diner (gilmore girls). with the decor taken off of course.

this looks like chicago at first glance, the very distinct subway tracks. but we're still on the set. this is used, obviously, for stuff that needs to look like it is in chicago.

and because chicago is known for its winds and rain, these lines high above the ground are known as rain-makers. or a water-sprinkler system, if you like. and tey would just drape a huge piece of black cloth above the rainmaker and use lights to create a rainy day.


this is the doors that open to the emergency room of cook county hospital in ER. the show that reigned way before grey's anatomy even was created in shonda rhimes's head. and yes george clooney looks young and cute.

this is the carriage that brad pitt rode in the movie Troy. then he proceeded to kill eric bana and drag his body behind this carriage. it was a super cry-worthy moment.

the flying car from harry potter and the chamber of secrets. (:

and after harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban, the whomping willow left its mark.

this is the couch that 6 famous people have sat on. the couch at central perk in Friends. left in its original state even after Friends wrapped production. in a special corner designed to pay tribute to the only show in history that raked in profits for warner brothers in its first season.

so just an iconic place what must you do. take picture! (: yes i was also very excited to be here.

inside central perk.

outside. filming in progress. the streets have no street lamps if you noticed. that's 'cos it enables the movie people to shoot whatever period of history they want. just pop in the correct type of street lamps and decor correctly and make sure the cars and the clothes people are wearing are of the correct era and voila. you can get anywhere between the 1800s and today.

we saw many many others things in the studio tour and many places where movies were shot. and i was sad that the tour came to an end and i didn't spot any stars. all on vacation i suppose. but i'm glad i went for the tour.

after that we were supposed to wait for the car rental company people to pick us up from warner brothers. so we hung around, take picture, buy souvenirs etc. we rented a car for 3 days over the weekend 'cos enterprise, the company, had this special discount for weekend rentals and it was only US$14 a day! so we did.

on the way to the rental place. we saw NBC studios. where many people are picketing and striking right now. when is it gonna end?!?! burbank is home to many production companies and their backlots. oh yes. rental companies in US pick you up from any nearby place and bring you to the company. so good right. great service.

so after we collected the car, we managed to get ourselves on the freeway and drive back to downtown LA. i was quite freaked at first because the last time i drove, i had my sisters with me and i was much more familiar with seattle roads. now it's all foreign and we don't have a map! but we managed without getting lost. but LA traffic is horrible. even at off-peak hours.

so we got to downtown LA and we searched for a grocery store to buy maps and finally spotted a safeway. yayyy. linda went to buy a map while i scrutinized the car. then we decided to drive around LA and explore the city. which's a really good idea 'cos we would never be able to do it on foot 'cos LA's too big. so here, the pic above, we started at downtown LA.

we parked along the road. learnt how to feed the parking meter. then walked around. (: these were sights around the walt disney concert hall.



this is for the very discreet rainbow peering out from the water. (: so pretty.

this is walt disney concert hall. very very nice design. quite avant-garde and nicer than esplanade. we took a short walk inside and in the shop. very very nice. too bad no time or money to catch a performance there.

p.s. this outdoor place of the concert hall, with the fountains, was where robert mccallister proposed to kitty walker in brothers & sisters. (:

the sky scrapers of downtown LA. oh this is where kevin walker of brothers & sisters works.



the concert hall from across the street.

after exploring downtown LA (and just walking past a nice museum), we drove out of downtown LA and headed for beverley hills and rodeo drive.

this is rodeo drive. and it looks more quaint and prettier than i expected. the building in front is bvlgari. and this intersection is really weird.

anyway rodeo drive is really the most upmarket, 5th ave of manhattan type of shopping. but it has that typical LA vibe to it. rows of short buildings. palm trees. the sun. tons of sports cars and cute cars. and cute guys.

this street, i can still remember, leads to a pretty 3-storey shophouse housing tiffany & co.

this is a car-less rodeo drive, or hollywood drive, the parallel street.



after some shopping. yeah right. i only bought a skirt from anthropologie, on sale. we drove towards the coast to santa monica. and i love this town!

first up, we drove right to the beach. at this time it was approaching dusk and it was starting to get cold. either that or it was the cold pacific ocean wind. we spotted this huskies van at the beach carpark, and judging by its washington state licence plate, it is indeed a university of washington van. haha must be some of my ex-collegemates who had taken a drive all the way from seattle to LA.

the beach!

the fine fine sand and the beautiful ocean. i haven't seen it in awhile. no oceans in NYC or las vegas.

the famous santa monica beach theme park. it's very distinctly santa monica. and this ferris wheel and theme park is always in the sweeping aerial shot in private practice. and santa monica is where addison and sam lives.

this is the 3rd st promenade. where it's a lovely lovely shopping street filled with big brands and big but affordable brands and small cute shops. people are busking and there are many little cafes and restaurants with al fresco dining, to soak in the nice weather and bustling crowd and talented buskers. i even took a video of this acoustic duo who sang beautifully. that's why i love santa monica. (:


well that was the end of day 3. we did more shopping at various shops, esp. forever21. had a late dinner at california pizza kitchen (how apt right) and began my long drive back to west hollywood.