I've been struck with wanderlust lately.

This afternoon during lunch, I was so excited!!!
It's not just normal excitement, it's excitement.

I can't put it into words,
but just the thot of leaving familiar surroundings and cultures,
and going to a foreign land,
different pple,
alien language,

It feels scary,
unsafe,
and yet sooooooooooooooo very exciting.

I think I'm beginning to feel bored of safe environment.

Hmmmmm.

Maybe Singapore really is stifling.

I mean, come on,

wat's the most exciting thing tt has happened recently,

tt is controversial?

tt is so unlike our conservative society?

I mean, hello?

We don't even get local productions tt are as exciting as Grey's Anatomy,
or LOST.

ok, ok, I just want an excuse to mention MY doctor Shepherd.

He is sooooooooooooooooooooooo CUTE!!!

Oh yeah, for those of u who still don't know,
I've given up my dream of living on a farm.

I wanna live in a trailer now.

Heh.

I received an sms from a dear old fren earlier on in the evening.

Seeing his name appear in my inbox made my eyes snap open in shock.

Reading his sms made my jaw drop.

"Guess who I met in my camp just now?
******!
He said U've had a crush on him.Haha."

Great, just great.

There I am thinkin,
wondering how my taste could have deterioted in only a matter of years,

and here he is,
proving to me that

My taste has been bad all along.
Since the beginning.

Oh well,

c'est lavie~

But then again,
I guess,
I should feel proud of myself as well.

I've done him a favour.
A huge one at that.

Well,
U see,

at least he has something to brag about.

May I emphasize,

THING.

It was my first visit to a Chinese doctor,
and I tell u,
the temptation to address him as "dai fu" was extremely strong.

It was just like in the ancient kungfu shows,
there was no exaggeration at all.

None.

"Can u rest ur hand here?" Says the dai fu, as he gently places a mini cushion in front of me.

I did as told.

Just like in the shows,
he rolled up the sleeve of his right hand with his left,
and stretched it out to rest three fingers on my wrist.

I was so tempted to ask him if my tai er was ok.

I really wondered, wat he could tell from my pulse.

Hello? I'm coughing my lungs out,
and I really don't think u can tell wat's wrong with my lungs by counting my heartbeats!!!!!

I mean, the most u can tell me is how many calories I'm burning up!

Anyway, the miracle worker, who is damn inefficient,
(when I say inefficient, I do mean inefficient)
prescribed me with 4 different types of tablets and a gigantic bottle of cough syrup.

The cough syrup is the most disgusting thing I've tasted in my entire life by the way.

Oh speaking about the cough syrup,
I really need to mention about this stall in serangoon gardens chomp chomp.

Yummy house of beancurd.

I was eating with some of my gal pals(here on known as makan gang) at chomp chomp.
And after I broke my promise to the doc to stay away from his "banned" food,
I decided to take the gazillion of medicine that he prescribed.

It was a bad idea.

I forgot that the water that I brought from IRAS
was almost diminished by the shiok shiok stingray and gong gong.
I made do with wat's left of the water and took the pills (It was no mean feat ok?With 1 mouthful of water, I actually managed to down 6 pills. And hello? They were not small ones.).
Which means, I have no water left for the superduperyuckydisgusting cough syrup.

And the stupid man told me to take one marking.

Hello? Do u know how much is one marking?

TWO freakin large spoonfuls can!!!!!

Of cos I grimaced.
Of cos my face was contorted.
Of cos I stuck out my tongue.

Of cos I complained.

Then out came this really nice lady from

YUMMY HOUSE OF BEANCURD

"Do u want water? Aunty take water for u lah, take medicine cannot don't drink water one.The water is we boil ourself one"

I was stunned.

And we actually ordered beancurd from her rival stall.

She really offered me the lukewarm water,
and rejected my offer to pay her back.

Heck, she even rejected my offer to wash the cup for her!

She is so damn nice lah!!!

And I tell u,
from now onwards,
I promise!!I somba!!!
That I will only order beancurd from her when I go chomp chomp.

Somehow, that glass of water tastes especially warm and sweet :)

It's been 2 days and I'm still missing my kids like crazy.
Yesterday was THE worst,
I was sooooooo disoriented,
it's as if 2 days away from the office has erased my knowledge of the urban.

and the best thing that happened was receiving an sms from one of my kids.

It brightened my gloomy grey day :)

I felt sooooooo home-sick yesterday,
home being changi adventure cove,
where I shed sweat, sticky, smelly vapour
weight,

get this,

WEIGHT

and tears.

It's frustrating, everytime I do an event, I'll inevitably screw up on the 1st day.
I felt rock-bottom low,
I felt so terrible, I actually cried,

in front of the kids.

It freaked them out.

The program was supposed to be an awareness program,
designed to trigger the unconscious in sec 2 kids and
bring forth knowledge about their DISC profile into their consciousness.

I felt like a total failure.
Ah boy had to step in, TWICE
when she saw that the kids are out of control, and began to go into the "heck-care" stage.

"Ah mei ah, man man lai, ni ke yi de. It comes with experience."

"Tiu lei ah! ah boy~"

Ryan stepped in TWICE as well.

Once to give the kids a dressing down,
and second time was to take over the debrief to maximise it,
having seen more than one person crying, and the rest angry like shit.

I really felt like shit.

The minute the kids were off,
I just grabbed Netty to a corner and started crying my heart out.

I was disappointed.
Extremely.
I couldn't even get in a decent debrief.

And Netty, being the excellent facilitator that she is,
asked me one question

"What do u consider a decent debrief?"

"Somewhat like the ones I got during the NY program"

"Do u realise what ur saying?Ur comparing sec 2 kids to JC 1s!!!"

Damn, she's right.
Every batch of kids is different.
It takes different tecniques to handle them.

I treated them too maturely.

I cannot expect the same degree of reception of such intimidating knowledge from sec 2 kids as the JC pple.
I also realised that besides comparing the kids,
I was also comparing myself to the others,
more significantly experienced trainers (Damn ah boy and gang!!)

Realising that made me feel hell lot better.

But even so, the "being a failure thing" crept back again.
(My goodness, I'm should've been an I, not a C man!!)
it wasn't until that night,
when we sat under the stars...and the velvet night...
with the waves rushing to the shores with comforting whoosh whoosh sounds...

*ok, stop it. It's not meant to b romantic*

and Ryan started his neuro-linguistic thingie on me.
He said alot that night.
Alot of things which I felt uncomfortable acknowledging,
but acknowledged nonetheless.
I can't really remember ALL that he's said, but a few things stuck thoh.

The goody-goody point.

He asked me why am I beating myself up? What goody do I get from that?
and the goody, it's simple,

An excuse for doing something badly.
An excuse for not succeeding.
An excuse for recognition, acknowledgement.

That shook me up.

The other thing that stuck was the theory that with every action,
there must be an opposite reaction.
Meaning, if things go well this time, things will go badly the next.

These stuck in my mind.
And I went into the 2nd day with the knot untangled,
and day 1, in a box which I threw out of the door as soon as the van door opens.

and Oh my god.
There's so much to tell,
if I tell all, it's gonna take days.

Anyway, just to keep things to the point,
I was very proud of my achievements on day 2.
It went terrifically well.
I even got to go deep with 2 girls.
It got so intense we all cried, and hugged like so many times.

It's amazing, how much hugs tell u.

Sometimes, just by hugging a person, says more than a million "thank you"s

I love hugs :)

Hey, if u think I'm gonna be humble
and not acknowledge myself for the wonderful day 2,

think again.

I'm a new person now!!! HAH!

Day 2 went well cos I learnt from day 1.

*Yesss!!!Ah boy, thanks for saying that!!*

But it went well for me also becos of some pple.
One whom I never realised until I actually had some time,
and lucidity to analyse the days' events.

Dear, as much as u refuse to believe it,
u were a motivation for me.
I guess it's bcos I felt that u and I are so alike,
U noe I even told netty on monday (when I finally calmed down enuf to tok)
that if she thinks that day is bad, watch out for tues,
cos there'll be 2 of me to deal with!!!!haha~

Day 2 went well, cos I knew, u would be there for me.

I could count on u for support.
For cheers along the same frequency,
for ice-breakers,
for those silly lame jokes,
for that encouraging smile and
hand-fly-to-cover-ur-mouth-and go into spasms-laughs

Chemistry between facilitators mean alot to me :)

and of cos, the

I have to be strong and make it work,
cos if I don't,
I won't be strong enuf for *** to lean on.

I mean, if someone supports me,
I wanna be sure to be available to support the person too.
Everyone screwed up the first time,
it's whether or not the person actually admits it.
I'm lucky, so does alot of the rest who has a second day.

I have the second day to prove my greatest fear wrong.
I have the second day to make amends to my style of facilitation.
I have the second day, when I've had the practice and rehearsals of the 1st.

:)

Someone also told me this on the 1st night

you know, pple r always afraid to fall
cos others will always remember that u've fallen,
but u know wat?
it's actually ok to fall,
as long as u urself get back up on ur feet.

I'm going to add on to that.

And sometimes,
U might think that u've fallen
just like parachuting,
but if u really open ur eyes and see,
ur merely floating.
U've fallen, only when u don't realise that.

Gosh...I can only relive the memories of the camp.
There's so much to say,
about Alan-I- can't-believe-he's-26,
Ah boy-my idol-I-can't believe-she's-26,
Ryan-it's-not-a-matter-of-crowded-toilets-trust-me
Aisha and her tiger-hair
Angie-lim-zui-ho-lim-zui-ho
Sheena aka sheenie
Andrew and his 7 seater
Daphne and her wit

Goodness!
I even wanna tok about the huge, green mutant bugs
the one I crazily snapped pictures of,
and the one which drives us crazy in the toilet (and drives Ryan crazy in the room)
the cicak, the beds, the aeroplanes, the jailbirds,

my god.

The cooler.

I finally figured out what's inside.
It's.......

AIR.

Wait!!!

I'm not trying to be lame.

It's air,
until it's filled up with ice :p

There's so many things I wanna tell,
but at the same time,
I don't want to,

cos,
yeah, somehow,
I know it's illogical,
but I just believe that by tellin,
the whole experience will be lost sooner.

And I don't want that.
I wanna keep it, keep reliving it for as long as possible.

And I wanna go rock-climbing!!!!!

The stupid late night climbing session that u guys made me do has infected me with a virus.

Damn.

Bloody hell,
now I have this crazy urge to do the high V.

and burmese bridge...
.........and abseil...
.......and zipline...
....and single log...
..and challenge pole...

yeah, in my dreams.