where has appletoe disappeared to?

i havent been here for awhile have i? well, ive been really busy with alot of stuff.
ive started a new job as a tcher now.. life's been really busy.
thinking about school 24-7.. but everything's more or less fine.
i'd rather be super busy then super free, keeps me on the toes..
til my toes get numb easily nowadays.. no thanks to wearing shoes the whole day,
and walking around. as much as the kids drain ur energy, they make me feel energised too.
(so ironic) as much as i wanna say i have the hang of things now, i don really.. trying my darndest
though, but sometimes i wish i can give more...

alot has been happening since the last time i wrote, and alot has not been happening, like gg for
dance training on sats, haha. as i said, really busy. at least i feel more stable now in terms of
financially. hopefully ill get to go NIE this July, if all goes well.

what kind of person have i become? more organised, better at muli-tasking? more irritable?
well, i hope im able to provide a good future for these kids im teaching. hope they dont turn out
to be idiotic individuals who disrupt the lives of other people, and became failures in life.
seriously i never saw the amount of work a tcher has to do man. FREAKING ALOT! and i don
even think im doin the full load yet. dammit. canteen food's really cheap. but im frequenting
POPULAR alot nowadays.. i wanna get a bike. hopefully by this month. cant wait! transport would be not much of a worry after tt.. can stay out late.

ok, i tin i should go to sleep now. if not cant wake up tmr, need energy to entertain these kids.. haha ok til nnext time!

Am I thinking too much?

I've not been working full time for quite awhile now, actually ive never worked full time, haha. but then i feel my brains not being put to work other than whenever I'm being put in a situation where i have to think on the spot whenever i have to lead dance class for students, last min. i don like that feeling. im a planner you see?
so at this point of my life, i feel like ive got a lot space in my head to think about a lot of things. about life, about the things happening around me and stuff, it's not very good to be honest.
in alot of my friendships that i haf so far i feel that i have always been the advisor, im not sayin tt its not a gd thing la cuz i like to be the giver, but then sometimes i want to be on the receiving end too. and having listened to soo many relationship and life problems from my frenz.. i feel that i learned alot of stuff and im very grateful of it. but the bad thing that i see to it is the fact tt i tend to 2nd guess myself whenever i face problems in life. like ill face a problem and then i somehow will noe the root of the problem but its juz tt it doesnt make it fun anymore tt u get to noe how to fix it in the first place, it makes it too easy. and u feel like u haf a longing to hear it from someone else other then urself, the feelin really sucks.
i feel very confused right now, i dun even understand wat im talkin abt anymore!
im so pissed at myself for being so fickle minded and trying to be righteous abt trying to help everyone else in their lives that i neglected my own. ive always tot to myself, 'who cares about wat other ppl think? the onli person i can trust and the only person tt loves me is myself'.
i duno wat my future holds for me , well i guess nobody does but then now i feel tt ive no direction at all. i need someone to just come up to me and just slap me now, to wake me up. i feel tt ppl have been giving me support and telling me i can be succesful in everything tt i try to do so much so that i tin ive become complacent man. i don feel the drive anymore that challenges face me i don even feel like trying to overcome it anymore. ive lost my DRIVE!
ive been tinking abt the way tt i was brought up, was it the right way? should i be implementing this on my own children if i ever haf any? i feel the MASSIVE lack of apparent love i feel from my family, directly and also indirectly i feel. tt's the reason why i guess i go to my peers for guidance and support, but really, no friend, no matter how close u are, is able to be there for u 24-7 man. and i noe tt too! and it really sucks the fact tt u noe everyone will grow up and become more distant from u as they start their own families and you start losing contact with all ur friends. will i have my own family? will i retire peacefully?
so many things in my mind right now, so many steps to take.. i'd tell myself to juz stop tinking now and do everythin rationally cuz i stil haf time to take everythin step by step. but, i feel tt im not takin the first step now. DAMN!
i want to say tt i need some reassurance now but come to tin of it, i feel tt it might not be reassurance but rather someone to juz tell me TO WAKE UP!
but i don want to be dependent, i noe the solution to that but.. wat should i do now?

YES. I SHALL STOP TINKING NOW.

Lantern Festival!

In the light of the recent mooncake and lantern festival , my dance troupe have organised an event for AMK Pri and we had so much stuff selling and face painting and all. We managed to reach our target of funds that we wanted to hit so we were overall satisfied. i never thot tt actually asking ppl to pay for face painting for their children could actually make money.. if only i can charge for every painting i do whenever i go for events, tin i can be rich la..anyways the event was really successful, tiring.. but realy worth it la ( there's this stupid flying ant which keeps on comin onto my comp table as i type this entry, so irritated)
More imptly, me and my other frens had our own lantern festival celebs. 1stly, me, taufiq, maria and haslinda had free tickets to chinese garden lantern display so we headed on down to chinese garden to look at huge lanterns, nothing much la but we did haf fun in each other's company. and finally the rest of them got to feel wat it feels like to travel sooooo far away to go hm from chinese garden. i tin i reached hm like in 15 mins after they left to took the train, haa..
other than tt, me rau and maria had our very own lantern festival at a corner of Fort Cannning Park. it was actually at the spur of the moment that we thot of doin this as i was lookin for some stuff for my mid-autumn festival at AMK Pri wen they said they wanted to play w lanterns, so we did. 'twas really great as we found a nice li'l to ourselves as we were lighting up all those lanterns and nobody was there to disturb us. (now then i noe they actually built a long escalator tt leads up to Fort Canning, might as well make all the way) we had so much fun and i missed hanging out with Raudhah! i miss that girl man.. since she got together w Yazid, we havent been able to meet up with her much so we really enjoyed her company tt night. i stil rmbr those times wen we used to hang out alot. we had all our creative juices that night and there was no holds barred kinda celebration that we had that night. we felt like we were in poly once again.
hope we can do it again sometime soon.. :)
and miss maria actually bought this tube of jelly thingy for me. it looks like hair gel and its called 'oobz toobz'. super sinful thing to eat and ure cautioned to try it only wen ure low on energy, if not ull be super hyperactive once u haf it (like me wen i had tons of it tt night. all thx to maria.. and we squeezed it into our mouth cuz i had this idea tt it looks like blood, haa. right? right?

Wat's been happening?

I've just quit my job as a graphic designer. Undesirable workplace i tell u.
ok i maybe complaining or a bit fussy but then really, u muz really go thru it to really noe wat i mean.
im kinda sick now to talk abt it so i shan't.
now its the 7th month so alot of burnin haf been taking place, even around my office.
i juz cant stand the fact tt they're burning all over the footpaths.
doesnt create air pollution and also vandalize public property.
i juz don understand.
i found this picture of underwear sizes, i tin its damn cute and funny.
it's true but i don tin its cuz of global warming. haha.
this is for doing research and getting my inspiration for my designs for the past month.
my company had this big, messy warehouse place where they stored all the stuff for events.
i went there once at night to unlaod some stuff and i tell u tt place it NOT a gd place to be at night all by urself.
gives me the creeps.
so now i shall go back into teaching dance and ive applied into NIE to become a teacher.
being in contact with all these people who are younger than me, i find tt i actually tin i haf the knack to handle them.
fulfilling one my biggest dreams tt is to become an educator of the lives of the future.
sounds big but i guess i haf to start somewhere right?
at least in the wkends ill be free and i can stil do my photog and videog weddings stuff.
extra income on the side $$.
lookin back, i feel tt wen i went overseas in the recent months to SEA was a really enriching experience for me.
really once in a lifetime.
at least i got to see a small fraction of how the education systems work in the other countries, and how the students and teachers in s'pore are faring compared to the region.
we arent tt bad after all and it actually has quite a slight destructive effect to the influence tt kids get nowadays.
being over stressed about getting gd grades, pleasing parents, and getting high paper qualifications,
tt we lose sight of doing wat we really like juz by trying to satisfy everybody around us.
well, i guess tt's the culture tt we've been brought up in s'pore.
therefore im grateful for everythin tt ive seen and experience in my life so far and awaiting for more adventures.
im also very grateful to all my close frens who haf been there for me all this while.
whether when i was overseas or they are.
nobody could replace them.
they'll always be in my prayers.
lemme leave you with a pop art of this particular fren of mine!

My new job..

I've been working as a graphic designer for the past 3 weeks, for an events company.
Yeah, finally i got a job and pending to go into full time.
Basically, kinda bao ka liao la my job, everything my boss needs, ill haf to do it.
Been thinking a lot about whether i wanna continue working there after 1 month, but then i really have a lot of doubts.
Just really not my cup of tea.
Originally i thought that my previous job in the production industry was not my cup of tea but then lemme tell u that this one is actually worse.
A lot of times i feel that my boss thinks i can do magic, asking me to do rather impossible stuff and then, blames me for everything.
Just within this one month of working there I've already experienced so many dislikes about him and how he runs the company.
Frankly, i tin i'd say there isnt much space and leeway given to me to let me learn and discover myself there.
Too fast-paced for me and he wants to take my dance away from me.
I think overall, that sucks the most.
I cant believe that at the previous event, he badmouthed me in front of everybody, making me look like some fool or some failure in front of people who I don't even know.
How often is it that an employer can just blame one person for everything that goes wrong?
Really bad working bad environment... Think after this one month of working there i'll be gg back to teaching part time at pri and sec sch students.
And then consider going back into production cuz even if im very busy with work during production, at least i feel that i stil have a life.
i guess tt's the thing abt me and living my life to the fullest, i cannot just be doing one thing in life, ive to really embrace and i feel doing this, im not able to embrace anything.
i cant even meet my frenz for heavens sake.
this is not the kind of life for me.
well some people may believe in working hard and making lots of money for their future but then i tin there's no point in torturing one's self to do that. really no point i think.
ive been thinking about a certain phenomemum tt's happening in s'pore.
u noe how older, more experienced people always say that young people nowadays dont seem to be contributing alot in terms of creativity or the expansion of s'pore in terms of development?
the conclusion i came up with was the fact tt THESE OLD PEOPLE and so-called more experienced people are not allowing us to take things into our own hands.
to let us run the show because their afraid they might lose face.
i don believe that they didnt make their own mistakes when they started off...
they juz want us to do everything their way and follow their direction, so young people like us juz follow suit and eventually juz stick to the old ways that things have always been done.
wat's gonna happen to us man?
and quoting from wat my boss says, HK seems to be so far ahead of singapore and he juz don understand why...
well here's ur explanation up there! haha

i guess im juz being bitter abt everythin la but i guess i just needed to get all of it out...
haiz... i miss dancing..

Had beens and has beens..

I've finally settled down back in mainland singapore... after sooo much of travelling and stuff. been a really gd experience and all but it's time now for mr appletoe to come back to reality.
since i was back i was painstakingly looking for a job for myself. and let me tell u tt it isn't really that easy to get a job even though u've a diploma. after so long of looking for one...
i've stumbled across one! all thx to maria. im workin now as a graphic designer at an events company called Sonamyang. been working there for a wk now and so far so gd. i juz don like the fact tt i haf to be sitting in front of a computer for the whole day. i jus like to be out there doin things. the tiredness pays off and i'll feel i'd had done somethin for the day. luckily i can stil take mornin dance lessons. at least i can stil see my wonderful cute kids on wed mornings before i go to work. my sec sch students on tue n thurs are diff though. but i tin its a just a teenagers phase of life tt everyone goes thru. i noe wat it feels like so i noe wat they're gg thru now. i tin really, everyone should juz act their age. nobody should try to grow up faster than they're s'posed to. u'll really regret it i feel.
as long and as far as i've lived my life i feel tt i've always been living at tt age of mine (and sometimes younger too) so i guess no regrets. i've lived a life of very few regrets and i feel tt everythin happens for a reason. ok im getting really philosophical now but then i guess tt's jus me. sometimes i get worried if ppl will eventually get bored of me. cuz i tell alot of ppl alot abt myself tt i feel there isnt much of a surprise anymore.. but anyhoe.. at least im doin wat i want to do in my life now. working stable, teaching, dancing and enjoying the company of my frenz (even tho most of them are overseas now) so ill juz make do with wat i have for now..

Myanmar 18th – 20thJune

We almost weren't able to enter into Myanmar cuz of Cyclone Nargis, furthermore with all our equipment, but we still managed to thanks to some higher power. In Myanmar we cant use our phones so we had an escort to follow us all around wherever we go. Mr Sim, from the Singapore Embassy. He didn't seem very happy that he was actually supposed to accompany us everywhere we go for the next 3 days we were there. Actually, he wasn't really happy with a lot of things actually. Well, no matter, we'll just have to entertain ourselves and pretend like we have no host, as what we've done at some of our previous countries. Got a hint from him that the people in Myanmar were quite shy, so it wasnt really good to hear for me and Damien actually.
The aftermath of the cyclone tragedy could actually be seen as we were traveling over to our hotel. Fallen trees, broken fences, abandoned homes. But more or less, as we learned from our driver, life Myanmar has somewhat gone back to normal, or rather, they're trying to work towards living life the same as before. Where we stayed at, our hotel, was really in the middle of nowhere. Everywhere surrounding us, was dilapidated houses and lots of rubbish piles. As expected, Damien went round taking pictures and he did come back with some great ones. Very good photo opportunity. Dinner that night was at the hotel's cafe itself as there wasnt really much places to go to eat where we stayed.
Next morning, back to work. The first school we went to held it in a very big school hall-ish kind of place. Then the school headmaster approached me and pointed out this big hole at the roof of the place. He said that that was caused by the cyclone. Imagine, part of the ceiling coming down towards you as you're sitting there. Scary. Halfway through the events, i realized that most of the children were very good at using paints for their art pieces, and some of them really awed me when i saw how skillful they were at their age. But one problem that arose was the fact that works couldn't dry fast enough. So after awhile you see the whole hall packed with people as you see the parents of the children coming in to help their children fan at their paintings. I really could sense the closeness of the family evident in the Myanmese families. Really inspiring.
We didn't really spend that long at in Myanmar as our Visas only lasted a week. In total, only 3 days that we spent there. We went to the Shweddagon Pagoda, apparently built about 2,500 yrs ago! But then thanks to cyclone, some of the tips of the temples were broken off and there was construction going on to rebuild the whole place again. I was telling Damien that we might never be able to capture the Pagoda in this state, so i told him to take more pictures. We then bumped into this cute little boy there. Apparently he was one of the students that attended one of our school sessions. So cute la he, such a coincidence. One thing i must mention is the fact tt our driver was really hospitable. He brought everywhere and told us everything. Even brought us to his house where his youngest daughter was actually celebrating her b'dae. And then Pete gave her crayons as a present and she was really happy. She wanted to pursue fashion design in the future, but i really dunno whether she was gonna be able to pursue that looking at the situation over there.
On the last day we paid a visit to a Myanmese Master Artist called U Lun Gywe. He was 78 yrs old and he was actually good friends with none other than our S'pore president. He had so many inspiring words to say about his many years as an artist. Imagine, 78 YEARS OLD! The interesting thing was the fact that actually his whole family was all artists. His son, daughter in law, wife, grand daughter and even his 3 yrs old grandson! This boy has the potential for great things to be able to start exploring his creative talent at such a young age. One of the things that is really worth mentioning is the fact that a big part of your life is influenced by his parents, because of the fact that they are the first people that you meet and you see them from birth. Therefore a lot of your life is influenced by them.
Finally we were waiting for the flight back to S'pore on our last day, and it got delayed for 2 hours. So we had to sit there doing nothing in the middle of Myanmar airport as it had no commodities in there. Only one makeshift table stall selling coffee, tea and some snacks, pathetic.
When i reached s'pore it was so late, ther was no more train anymore so i decided to stay overnight at the airport's viewing gallery and wait til the first train. Had to rush for dance training after that in a few hours so had to rush back on first train, shower, change, sleep for one hour and go for training. Was late, but i couldnt miss it. I miss dancing! Haha. Glad to be back..