blur of traffic

sonder
n. "the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk."


Dying for this week to end cuz there's just too much to look forward to on Friday!! But there's all the obligations + things I must do before I get there ): sometimes I think I expect too much from myself, and I end up feeling bad I can't live up to it, even when I know it's physically impossible to, i.e. be in two places at once

I just hope people are more forgiving so that I can start forgiving myself

OH YEAH HAPPY CHILDREN'S DAY to all my darling kids and yearmates and juniors and all the people I love v v much!! Ahhhh too precious :')

cheers to the freakin weekend

b r e a k i n g ) :

but itsokay I can put myself back tgt.

stop comparing stop judging stop complaining alr what good do ppl get out of it srsly. I don't get how ppl function with so much hate. in fact I don't get how the world functions with so much hate.

okay no time to feel think write go back to your texts verna

what could have been & what will be

Never thought I would end up in smu, much less in law school, but the past month hasn't let me down at all. I'm beginning to think I made the right decision coming here after all. Still remember making a hell lot of fancy plans to study in imperial/ucl/ucla just a while ago (and wasting a hell lot of money holding those places too sigh) but then subsequently abandoning every last one of them in the same month. A year ago, I would've thought this meant "settling for something less than I was capable of", but I guess I look at things differently now that I'm out of rj , and not constantly surrounded by people who had dreams ten times greater than their actions. But on hindsight, law's a noble choice, perhaps a part of me ended up choosing practicality over passion in the end, but who cares, I plan to study hard, make my time in law school worthwhile and figure out my passion along the way. Plus I'm so glad my parents have been so freaking supportive of me :)

Anyway, I've been having so many experiences lately, going for camps and making friends and just generally being a social human being (and hopefully succeeding hahaha). Sports camp set my standards real high, I'll admit, but smux camp, law camp and ftb honestly did not fall far behind, and the people I met have been nothing short of amazing. All extremely different, but in the best possible ways.

But one thing that irks me here is how people are so quick to judge, even those whom I never pegged as superficial end up unpleasantly surprising me (and I'm perhaps also guilty of judging). Like I don't understand how they can automatically classify people into a certain category just based on the way they look/act. And how just because people look/act a certain way, it automatically makes them less desirable as a friend?? How does this even make sense? The one thing about uni that scares me the most (probably even more so than the workload) are the friends (or the lack of them???). Like back in jc I guess I was really blessed to have real friends who had my back every single time. In uni, you can have a million friends, but how many of them would actually have your back at the end of it all?

Approx three weeks left till school starts! Gonna make the last few weeks of freedom count :)

Also, I tend to fall for people I know I'll never be good enough for. Hurts more than anything knowing you're not the one they'll pick. Why do I bring this upon myself ahahahaha okay I laugh at myself a lot

sports camp + stuff :)

Sports camp last week marked the start of uni life, I feel fifty shades darker after camp, no kidding, like even this kid noticed today and shouted at me "CHER WHY YOU SO BLACK NOW!" (to that I replied "WHAT BLACK"). HAHAHAA okayy about time I started realising the importance of sunblock.

This camp's probably something I'll remember the rest of my years in school, not just cuz of the friends made (they WERE pretty awesome) /sports played, but also cuz I experienced things I've never experienced in my entire life (good/bad thing you decide). Like, I'm not even exaggerating. If there was one thing that my six years as a rafflesian did not teach me, it was how to act in such social situations (aka the party/clubbing scene). Not just how to act, but how to not be so awkward/out of place/stick out like a sore thumb (okay a million phrases came to mind so I just had to type them out). I guess I kinda felt bad on everyone's behalf that I was being such a child and robbing them of the good time they could've had if they didn't have to stop and ask me every ten seconds whether I was okay. And at the same time, I felt bad for myself for not having as much fun as everyone else was (okay this part was me being a complete child). But srsly I don't get how I am the only person in the world who doesn't know how to club sighhh I have a lot to learn (yingx promised to teach me!!!)

But sports camp was fun, it's the kinda thing you look back on and remember only the good parts :) and I'm so glad em made me sign up for it. Have always been a strong believer in the "people come into your life for a reason" theory, and well it pretty much sums this up. Insanely blessed to have been a part of this camp :))

OKAY SMUX CAMP ON FRI! needa start packing early if not I'm gonna end up with three hours of sleep again. which, knowing myself, I probably will. 

Oh yes went back to school today to find myself table-less HAHAAHAHAHA can you imagine the look on my face when I realised my old table has been taken over and completely invaded. Maybe this is a sign that I should be leaving soon, I don't even have a proper permanent place in the staff room anymore.

I need to update more often. First off, to prevent myself from becoming completely illiterate, and second, so that I remember the bits and pieces of life, instead of just the huge events. AND YES my kids have cdiv bball matches soon which means I can go down to ccab to support them again, watching bball sure is addictive hehehe.

your string of lights are still bright to me.

Been ages since I last wrote something worth reading. Been ages since I last felt something worth feeling. And I shall attempt to organise my thoughts while everything still cuts raw and deep. Funny how sadness is as much a feeling as happiness is, and how you can't embrace happiness without automatically acknowledging that sadness will be a part of it too.

Honestly, I love being in greenridge. That last week of school was especially precious: I loved that I have something in my life that's worth every ounce of my energy. I loved that I had something worth waking up to everyday and that I can fall asleep happy every night. And I don't think I'll ever feel this strongly for anything ever again. I'm no teacher, definitely not trusted with math, but I'm just glad I've been a decent friend. That was all that mattered to me anyway. Sigh okay I'm in serious shit. This is what six months in the same place does to you: you start anchoring roots and you start feeling safe and comfortable being you again. Perhaps that's why knowing it'll be taken away all too soon leaves this giant lump in my throat and an even greater emptiness in my heart. Is it even possible to keep them in my life while I carry on with the rest of my life?? I sure hope so.

This eight-month long 'summer' break's (only because it's forever summer in sg) gonna end soon, and I'm so not ready for this next chapter of my life. Everyone seems to be set on where they are going, already making a ton of plans and signing up for camps and housing and whatnot, while I'm still left here hanging, thinking about what to do with my life and finding comfort in the one thing that has meant so much to me the past few months. Does it even make sense?? Studying overseas has been what I always wanted, but what if there are people here that makes studying locally much more worth it? Studying law was never what I had in mind, but what if it's more rewarding than I actually thought? Ughhh still so uncertain and I don't trust myself to make the right decision on an issue as important as my future.

I find myself being more and more careless about what I say lately, like I suddenly say stuff without thinking and people get mad and they don't want me in their lives anymore. ): And who am I to try to keep them in my life if they don't want to be in it in the first place. Either I try too hard or I don't try at all THERE IS SRSLY NO IN BETWEEN that's what I hate about myself sometimes. ugh maybe I just haven't got my priorities in order IDK just fuck it

OH YES the most important thing I've learnt in greenridge thus far (AND PROBABLY AN ESSENTIAL LIFE SKILL) : sometimes it's okay to use the f word, when you're sad or mad or just annoyed at your life in general. Yknow here I am where people use 'fuck' ten times a day and don't give a damn, and you realise that it's actually kinda okay to use it too. HAHA how trivial but I have a knack for noticing trivial stuff.

But I guess it's also in greenridge that I learnt two great extremes of the world. How so damn superficial people can be and how so damn brutally real they can be too. It's the superficial people that scare me, you can feel it radiating off the words they say and the things they do. Worse still, it's these people that seem to have the best of everything, and everyone can't help but bow down to them cuz it does wonders for their reputation. SRSLY mean girls in real life much? And then there are the people who talk to you not because they like talking to you (I mean what other reason is there to talk to someone??) but because you have something they want or it puts them in a more advantaged position somehow. That's the part that hurts more than anything I guess. But it's also the part that prepares you for the real world. RG/RJ was honestly too safe to be true, even if this kinda thing existed, it didn't permeate the school grounds as much as it does here. That's why I'm like the frog in well (井底之蛙).

When you've bared your soul entirely, and given all that you could possibly give, and that still isn't enough, then just suck it up and learnt to live with it.

sometimes all you need is just one person who cares, and you feel like you can accept the other nine-hundred and ninety-nine people in your life who don't.

never a solution

50% of the time I'm a tangled mess of emotions, so freaking unsure of what the hell I'm doing and scared I might be getting myself in too deep to ever get out. The other 50% of the time I'm just too tired of feeling, so I attempt to distance myself from my emotions (emphasis on attempt), which sadly never works. Remind me again why I'm such a mess. 

It's funny though, I honestly love going to school, the people being the main (and perhaps only) reason why I actually bother to drag myself out of bed at the crack of dawn everyday. Hahaha or maybe I'm just grateful that there are people who bother to acknowledge my existence. I think I'm putting it a lil too harshly, but I honestly feel like such a waste of space sometimes, maybe it's about time I rethink whether I'm meant to stay on. It's getting too hard. Grrr I don't even get myself sometimes how can a thing like this be hard whaaaat am I saying.

Guess what, I'm getting too emotionally attached, but I don't even care. This place is worth all the emotions in the world.

"Those who are hardest to love need it the most." - Socrates

loose threads

Although the past month wasn't the most perfect, this is definitely as close to perfect as it gets. So blessed for the months I got here so far, and if everything goes according to plan, I might have three more. I never thought I'd stick around for so long, kinda expected myself to not like school as much as I do now, but now looking back, I'm sooo glad I made the right decision. Might have been more stressed than I'm allowing myself to be (still in the post-As holiday mood that I'm probably never gonna get out of) and sometimes I end up forgetting that this is not something I'm doing long-term. Makes me sad, really, that I'll be gone in a few months and will end up nothing but a mere memory. But honestly grateful for the bestest kids/students/friends (terms can be used interchangeably HAHAHA), I'm really getting to know them more and more each day. Times like these I wonder if I should do away with the humane, friendly part of teaching because the more I do this, the more painful it is gonna be to leave. Oh well just gonna go with the flow and enjoy the rest of the time I have left. Note to self: don't make too many promises I know I can't keep.

Anyway, the past two days of interning at alexandra hospital have made me miss school so much more. It wouldn't be fair to compare the two though, especially because in one place, I see old miserable people (okay not fair to generalise, they're not all miserable) cooped up in a place they have no desire of being in, and in another, I see students openly disliking education but secretly loving it.  But if there's one thing that links both doctors and teachers together, it's definitely how emotionally draining their jobs are. I personally think teachers can choose to distance themselves from the emotionally demanding part of their job, or even cut themselves off totally from it. It's more of a choice for them. I know for certain though that the best teachers feel for their students, even feel with them, and in doing that, emotions must come into play. OKAY I'm not making any more sense so I shall stop here hahahaha.

"In your hesitation, I found my answer." Sometimes silence speaks louder than words.