A photograph is like the recipe - a memory the finished dish.

Rainy days.

2010-08-19T09:27:00.006+08:00

4AM.
and its raining outside.

i loveeeeee it :)))))

i dont know why but it just feels particularly great when it rains at night :)

not just that it makes it nicer to sleep in.

but it simply gives me a kind of tranquil feeling,
that can instantly lighten up my whole mood
when i hear the raindrops,
when i feel the cool breeze.

and for i know,
it is always

a rainbow after rain :)

the entry that i wrote previously.

i guess it pretty much summarises my feelings too, as it rains outside now.
just love rainy days, especially when im indoor of course.

love seeing the rain drop races down the window glass.
love hearing the rhythm of the falling rain drops.

and its always just particularly weird that how it can always lighten me up instantly
as i see and feel the rain outside whenever im having tuitions everytime.

here's a nice quote to share.

My tuition boy.

2010-08-18T21:17:00.001+08:00

my dear student called me today, in the midst of his test.
so apparently he needed my help to 'cheat' his test!

and yes.

i did him the favour.

OH NO. what kind of a teacher am i!

haha i bet he went to the toilet and sneakily made that call.
so he memorised the question,
and was asking me what are the steps needed to solve it.

well, we did such a qn during tuition for millions of times.

but knowing that he did know how to do it previously,
and that probably he's just stuck and cant recall,
with the benefit of doubts.
so i just told him the general steps in solving that test question.

he's a normal tech boy,
being offered to do normal acad math now.
but, apparently he and his gang who are taking NA math is being looked down in class.

and who are the culprits?
TEACHERS.

heard his complaints during tuitions,
how much that they were being ignored during lessons,
them being deemed as CMI students,
and eventually, being looked down by the rest.

so what will happen to these students who can potentially do well?
GIVING UP.

they dont see the need to study,
they can never feel motivated nor encouraged,
and though they know they can do better yet they chose not do.

all because
peop chose to ignore them.
peop chose to look down on them.
no one chose to believe in them.

but of course,
it takes two hands to clap.

teachers do feel discouraged when these students do not cooperate in class,
or are not submitting their homeworks always.
so they started to ignore these students who do not seemed to be interested to study.
while these students start to feel discouraged upon the neglection,
and there it goes,
they start the give up on themselves,
hence not listening in class nor handing in homeworks.

its a vicious cycle.

but of course,
heard of touching stories of those noble teachers who really gave in all their heart,
to nurture all these group of students,
to believe in them and never once give up on them.

i salute these teachers.
its not easy.
but they had indeed made a difference in someone's life.

they changed all these,
to a nice virtuous cycle :)

anw, back to this tuition boy of mine.
so all that i can do was to fill our lessons with lots of motivational talks everytime.
hoping to infuse him with the motivation and enthusiasm to study,
telling him not to give up and have to work harder to impress everyone
and prove his teachers wrong!

anw im glad that,
it helps :)
and it works.

though these kind of things are usually a short term positive impact,
but well, i believe the consistent encouragements would make this impact a long one :)

and so, helping him to 'cheat' this test was a way
to help him to gain more confidence in himself!

since everyone knows,
the marks on our exam script tell everything.

although as a teacher/teacher-to-be,
i hated so much to see students coming up to me and 'pleading' for more marks.
its either they needed that mark to get a pass or jump a grade.

and i would be there kept on telling them that the marks are not all that matter!

true, in our perpectives.
but not others.

which parent wouldnt flare when they see the red failed marks on their child's paper?
which parent wouldnt compliment their children when they see the high marks on their papers?
of course, im only taking the majority for these analogies.

its so true that the marks tell everything, to them.
apparently they wont much bother to look at their mistakes,
but always set their focus on the marks/grade shown at the top right corner.

probably not just the parents,
but i guess the marks affect the students quite a lot too.

higher marks would definitely increase their confidence level,
boost their morale,
just like how at times my student would come to me happily
showing me her high marks on her math exam paper,
and feeling really proud of it.

as for vice versa,
low marks may demoralise them,
discourage them to work harder the next time,
or discounting the efforts that they could have put in for the test.

kk, enough of my digression haha.
anw my boy texted me after the test,
telling me that he should be able to score 80% for this test!
from the usual failed grades.

so i really hope he can gain more confidence and work harder the next time!
it always give me a great sense of fulfilment,
to see improvements in my students,
in terms of academic,
and their mindset :)

on a side note:
went to ica today to apply for citizenship.
mine was declined, cause i needed to work for at least a year before i can apply.
though all along i thought its more like declaring my citizenship by the age of 21,
since im born in singapore, though holding on to a msia nationality.
but its not.
while bro and sis can apply under my mom, since they are under 21.
but mom's was declined too.
since she is not working and could not of course produce any income tax statement,
which the authority needed.

im okay with the failed application.
it doesnt really matter with me though, since its just a difference in the colour of my ic.
i feel like a singaporean anw,
being born here, having my whole life spent here and with all my friends here.

but i can feel the huge sense of disappointment in my mom :(
she nagged at me for so long to apply for the citizenship.
and then, when i finally agreed to make a trip down to ica,
she spent so much time preparing all the docs for this application.

but, her hopes were dashed. :(

Yishun.

2010-08-17T02:30:00.002+08:00

the days when im simply lazy to travel..
and so, i decided to go around yishun to shoot!

its interesting how those neighbourhood aunties uncles looking at you as you hold onto the big

dslr and snapping away, especially on super random things.

and furthermore as you take out your tripod and start shooting ard such neighbourhood places,

i think they would find you a total retard/weirdo, or, a noob tourist. hahaha.

anw initially wanted to go all the way to yishun dam for some nice sunset shots.
but.. yah, too lazy to do so. wahaha.
so just walked around my neighbour and made my way towards
khatib, lower seletar reservior.

its a nice place, especially during sunrise i heard!

i'll wake up at 5am to witness the sunrise there one day.
yes, ONE DAY.
hope that day will come. (erm, with doubts)
hahaha!

its the YOG season now!
my mom kept on asking why didnt i volunteer for such a big event.
but well, i rather have my time spent doing lots of other stuffs that i enjoy. hee.

starburst!

the spontaneous workers turning to me and posing for a shot! :)

the much rave about bakery near khatib mrt.
finally a chance to try it!

their carrot cake!
though i find it quite normal.
still prefer chinese carrot cake, aka caitaokuay!

below are my first attempts towards taking HDR photos.
was randoming browsing the net one day and came across such photos.
was totally captivated by how a tone mapped photo of fullerton turned out.
so went to read up more about it and decided to try it out during that day's shoot!

i love how the photos turned out!
totally got hooked onto taking HDR photos every now and then haha.
all thanks to photomatix too :)
the software is totally awesome!

the swing at bottle tree.

lower seletar reservoir!

the new icon there.
its a few days before the official launch of it, when i was there that day.

Neopets?!

2010-08-16T23:32:00.000+08:00

this is so funny!!

hahahahaha!

neopets sent my bro an email telling him that his neopets account

will be deleted soon, due to his inactivity.

a good attempt from the management team though, cause this email has reminded us

of our neopets that we have long long forgotten about!

right, right!? hahaha.

back then, who doesnt play neopets!?

i still rmb those days where my siblings and me fight over the com just to log in to neopets, feed our pets, train them, earn more NP by playing more games! by haggering at shops and selling the items at a much mark-up price at our own's! and manymany more. hahaha. those were the days competing with my siblings and friends to see who has the most NP, pleading my cousins to trade great stuffs with me or donate more NP to me!

i also rmbed myself kept on refreshing the site so as to be the first customer to purchase new limited stocks from the shops as they add in new items, and then selling it at my own's, or for trading purposes. woah felt like a real businessman then okay!

and buying in shares and act like a real stockholder, keeping a close look at my shares every now and then, praying hard that the value will keep on rising! hahahaha.

great memories, isn't it? :)

so my bro went on to log into neopets for fun after receiving the mail. and there he goes raving about his cute neopet and showing it off to me! its really cute indeed though.
hahaha. i miss my pet too!

i still rmb naming it 'middy_koh', for no reason. i wonder how did i derive to that name. haha!

and so, i was tempted to log in and take a look at my neopet as well.

but but BUT BUT!!

i've totally forgotten my password and even my username. :(

they do have the option of sending your lost username and password to your email, but i think my neopets account was registered under my really oldoldold email add.

booooo.

anw after many many many tries, i managed to somehow recalled my username and..

tada!

yeah, its correct!

my username was petreeneo, hahaha i dont know how the hell i came up with that.

anw they are nice to show the picture of my pet after keying in my username!

though i cant log in anymore since i can never retrieve my password, and for security purposes, they even need you to add in your birthday. which i bet back then, i would have registered with a fake birth date. since last time i kept on thinking that internet is soooo dangerous that i must not reveal a single bit of my own particulars, such as my birthday, real name blabla.

-.-

hahahahahaha.

anw, here's a snapshot of my pet!

awwww i miss her!!

cute right!

Hort Park. 11th aug.

2010-08-16T13:45:00.000+08:00

And so, here's our third time at PART OF southern ridges! yes, part of it. as till now, we havent even completed the whole of southern ridges yet. hahaha. started from mount faber and the furthest we went was hort park.
canopy walk, kent ridge park, west coast, we'll visit you on our next visit!

the second time at this beautiful place anw. hort park.
and the second time that it rained almost the whole afternoon when we were there! :(

so in the end we only stayed at the park for a short hour. while the rest of the time were spent shopping at anchor's point. okay the intention to stay at the shopping mall was to wait for the rain to stop. but yes, all three of us bought something there, at the outlet stores, haha!
and i had my fav sausage bun at the ikea opp too!
side note: hort park is in fact walking distance from ikea/queensway mall/anchor point (a 'SHORT' 1km plus though. hahaha)

anw, i always enjoy my time with my dearest girls :) hence, working with them on our blogshop is a fun thing as well, even though we have 5 peop managing it. haha. and interestingly, this seemed to be sort of the first outing the three of us had, upon the start of our long 3 months holidays! or rather, last wed wasnt even a holiday for dap anymore. sch has started for her. anw as compared to last year's holidays, we are always out together to kill time, since we are categorised as the 'free-est' during the wonderful holidays~ woohoho.
lets meet out someday to EAT EAT EAT!! we havent been meeting out to eat, other than birthday celebrations.

ps: click on the photos for a larger clearer view. :)

the entrance of hort park.
im so in love with HDR photos!

this is dap!
our miss eyes-closed-at-the-count-of-three!
longest name ever. hahaha.

peiyu and dap!
our miss dwarf! hee.
and the ultimate digger in gg! :p

the three of us :))

our usual attempts for jump shots!
its not easy especially trying to coordinate on a camera timer mode!
but well, we succeeded on our last shot. haha!

dap's solo shots.
at the nice spiral staircase where most couples have their wedding photos snapped there too.

♥♥♥♥♥

Saturday.

2010-08-15T02:01:00.000+08:00

Went on a shoot with my little cousin, zara.

but due to the 'unforseen circumstances' (overnight mj extended tuitions blabla), we only managed to meet at 4plus before heading out to shoot! thats kind of late, since dusk falls shortly after with the sky turning real dark and hard to carry on with the shoot.

anw, im back at hort park again! though just visited there few days ago with my dearest girlfriends, dap and py. haha but undeniably, its really a nice greeny place! greeny places are always great, cause the photos always turn out really vibrant rich and refreshing!

but of course, this time round i didnt really want to explore hortpark again. instead, im more interested to explore the 'meadow' near there! googled really hard to find the directions there and we walked really far before we found that nice place! not to mention the yuan wang lu we had upon being 'trapped' at hort park and me trying to gei giang and refusing to use my iphone gps at first, haha! yeah, how i wish i have a car! not to say i need to have a license first though. and im just pure lazy to kick start with the driving lessons. hahahaha.

but well, anw its definitely all worth it after finding that nice 'meadow'! just a pity that the sky has turned dark and the sound from the rustling trees kind of freaking me off. afterall the whole place seems deserted and its quite a distance away from the main road. just imagine even if i need to flee, its going to be a damn long way out! and anw, im so worried that a downpour will come out of a sudden. my camera equipments cant afford to get wet please!
and yes, i see the need and importance of bringing an umbrella out for subsequent shoots now.

so after snapping a few quick shots, we sped off from that place! but we promise to force ourselves up one early morning to visit the place again.

here's the few snapshots! and i want it the 'vintage' way :)

the swing is the highlight there :)

saw this really cute dog on our way to the meadow!

the sky has turned quite dark as we make our way there.

that's all! :)

new look. new start.

2010-08-15T00:34:00.000+08:00

here's an absolutely new layout!
and i love the raindrops in the background totally. ♥♥♥

decided to do a big revamp!
thus the shift of all my previous entries to somewhere else, hee.

anw hasnt blog for sooooo long. near to a year since my last entry from the old blog.

i wonder if anyone still drops by here, at this pathetic blog?
i wonder if blogger's photo uploading speed has improved? be nice to me! i wanna upload lots of photos! but i dread stoning in front of my laptop waiting for the photos to be uploaded.

3 more weeks of holidays now before returning to the role of a student again. yes, i really cherish this period of time! finally a good break after a long 5 weeks of attachment. though im missing the attachment days now, the nice teachers, fun-loving kids, cheap canteen food... and... i miss and enjoy piling up lots of books, and the process of having them all marked!
yes im weird. hahahaa.

how i wish i can go for another holiday now before sch starts! since i doubt i'll have the time in dec, given such a short holiday then. but i dont think there will be a chance for it, sigh. well, shall save more for a better trip in the future then!
self-consolation. what to do? hahahaha.