deep breathing

Hi everyone! For the latter half of April, I went on exciting trips in an attempt to fill up my #sgadventures tag. I really love being out in the outdoors??? Lots of photos in this post!

12 April 2015: Cycling with A12

Yet another cycling trip! This time I borrowed wheels from Yanchez and saved $$!!!!!!!!! We were all pretty geared up to go cycling even though John had just POP-ed the previous day, and to everyone's surprise there were people other than Mark willing to go far on bikes haha. So on a spur we decided to cycle from East Coast to Marina Barrage :O

 Waiting for Dhi, Mark, Ash and Kaixin, so John and I went for a little feet splash

And we're off! We went super fast this time around even though we only started at 12ish.

Ashley went "aiyo yall so tourist for what! Eh wait take with me also!!" 

Chrome the heck out of the bougainvillea shrubs 

Stopped for lunch at Satay By The Bay with the Baes. What a day to be sick! All the delicious food and I was down with cough and runny nose. By right I shouldn't even have been there cycling since I woke up at 6 that morning with a fever. But by left I had been looking forward to this trip the whole damned week. I am both kind to myself and very unkind to myself.

Cycle to Marina Barrage not enough so we cycled some more to the Flyer

Gotta fade this set because the light made me pale as a ghost. Yay cuties!!!!

We even had time to go to Yanch's for our usual game of Avalon!!! 

18 April 2015: Macritchie with Zhen Hui

Our first time at the nature reserve! Ended up walking a whole lot more than expected (~10k) but it was rejuvenating for my senses and we spent good quality time together! :") I really like spending time outdoors!!!

Trekked all the way to the treetop walk!! 

Worth it

 Then took a detour to the Jelutong Tower!

Sat for a bit talking about adulthood and life. About settling for a complacent existence and about seeking something that satisfies spiritually. The topics hit very close to home at this point of transition and moving on to new stages of life :"( But it was a good discussion of ideas while sitting atop trees glistening with raindrops. It made me feel very in touch with nature though it also juxtaposed our constant moving with the seemingly timeless forest. Very Silly Little Girl and Funny Old Tree concepts. 

After Jelutong, we took the Venus loop out of Macritchie because we were starving and tired HAHA. The last stretch was in fact the nicest because we saw very few people, and the path had more variety, smoothed stone and earth steps, winding around small cliffs. It was such a peaceful march that we unwittingly walked right into a big family of macaques having a grooming session!

Whoops (also got a video of this but let's keep this blog more family friendly)

BABY

Then we stumbled upon this note placed at the base of a tree? It was near the clearing of the Venus Carpark and marked with that very date? How exciting!

6 April - 24 April 2015: SYF Stint

The month of April was dedicated to my events job at Firstwave Co., and I was part of the team stationed at Goodman Arts Centre to help out with manpower at SYF Arts Presntation for Drama (English and Chinese)!

Syahirah at the door I was guarding. 

I was lucky enough to have been appointed stage assistant to aid Josh and the other officers in guiding the kids in and ensuring their safety. It was a swell opportunity to be in the studio watching performances (and getting paid to do it wow) and it brought back a lot of fond memories of my own SYF experiences. It was quite a peculiar change of roles; I was now the one cleaning up after students, mopping up baby powder (ash), foam blasted out from a foam machine (snow), sand from sandbags (holding up an attap house) and face paint (from statues and geishas). The three weeks made me feel quite extraordinary and proud that I had once been a part of such camaraderie and spirit, so much so that on the last week, I plucked up the courage to perform my TSD mono for pure fun. Courage it took because I was in front of students as well as big names from the industry, who later politely applauded and gave me thumbs ups. It was a little unnerving but I was honoured to even speak in their presence, so... no regrets?

This photo is hilarious, I love it

26 April 2015: Ion Sky

Visited the buzzing ion sky with Vincent. perfect because FREE. In retrospect, we should have gone up earlier, just to enjoy the day light view more, because the second half was closed as night started to fall. Still, it was a nice panoramic view of Singapore, with quotes and poems on the glass that made the visit very ethereal and tranquil.

1 May 2015:

And because our class is the raddest, we had yet another class gathering, this time at John's. Highest turnout in a while, and also one of the warmest, most heartening gatherings in a while. If I may quote Mark: "We have to keep this going. We can't forget each other." Though sometimes I would very much like to forget him (hahah jkkk), he does have a point and this class is one I don't regret meeting. So many great things come out of having met this class, some of my best friends, some of the strongest, the funniest and the most capable human beings I know I met in A12. In this time of faltering friendships and weakening bonds, it's all the more that we must work to maintain these friendships we want to keep.

bruh dhiraj whachadoin

okokok

Later that night, Dhiraj and I went down to Fort Canning Park for Shakespeare in the Park-- The Tempest, for which he won tickets! Lucky him? Lucky ME he asked me along! It started to rain before the show was due to start, and the Artistic Director told us all to repeat after him "Dear Weather Angels, please clear the skies over For Canning for the next three hours... Thank you." He said it had never not worked when they tried, and true enough, soon, a rainbow appeared and shortly after, the rain stopped! It only resumed as the show was coming to a close :O Thanks Weather Angels!

Not a very clear photo of the curtain call, but the show was splendid! Even though I have never studied the text, a little reading up on the plot kept me on track, and after reading Shakespeare, I could also pick up on a lot of thematic and satirical points, which made for an interesting viewing! There was a little technical glitch that left us feeling awkward for a while, and because the music didn't play during the dance number, it was very obvious, but the team pulled through anyway and it was a great evening in all ^_^

I've gotten more or less up-to-date with recent happenings, because I've stopped working for a while and because all my little Singapore Son's are doing their duties for the nation so there hasn't been many meet-ups. Still, I'm always thinking about them and I really miss my friends, so I'm sure there'll be more to tell soon. Till then, I'll be enjoying some down time and space to regain my bearings before life hammers in on me again.