F1 night race

If you ask me, I would prefer watching the F1 on the TV over at a bar chilling with my friends or something as compared to being at the scene. Guess seeing everything on the TV just allows you to catch everything without missing out too much...and there's so much to look out for, especially with a very drama-mama packed F1 night race. A classic case of irony and unpredictability in life...who could forsee Alonso who had engine trouble in the qualifying rounds and took last spot at the start of the race could make it to the top and win the race? How come so funny Alonso's team-mate in the Renault smashed his car up first only to throw the whole race into chaos and put Alonso in a huge advantage? And how to forsee that both Ferraris crashed out and both in super dramatic moments...Massa by a fueling accident and Raikkonen getting smashed up near the end of the race?

So much action to keep me glued to the TV screen sia...

Awesome publicity for Singapore...can't help but see Singtel banners everywhere though...

Great view from the top

Love this classic moment in the race...the error of all errors...

The Ferrari just grew a tail.....

And the winners Alonso, Rosberg and Hamilton

Think this whole event has certainly raised Singapore's profile...and as a Singaporean, can't help but feel proud of it...hey my exchange friends have been asking me about this event!

To end off, saw the comment that our PM left in the news article about this Singapore F1 race....a bit hmm....funny....as quoted from the Straits Times article "A valuable buzz for Singapore",

http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_283929.html

'I've been watching it on TV the last couple of nights, not watching the cars, but watching the skyline, to see whether the skyline shows up and we see Singapore showing off its best,' he said.

Hmm...thought he should have said something like "watching it on TV last couple of nights, not ONLY watching the cars but also the skyline or something"....haiz....just goes to show how practical us Singaporeans are....economic success and fame! Whoopee yeah!!

Chivas Live!

And Friday night continued with the Chivas Live pool party over at the defunct River Valley Pool opposite Clarke Quay. Great music, free flow of Chivas, great company...wat can I say...helluva random and fun night out!

Funky goggles with the invite

Damn hentai look...super lol

F1 Mania!!

Had in mind to go down to the city centre to catch the F1 race....yes...the first night race in S'pore...but b4 that, headed down to Tiong Bahru Mkt with the guys in the office for a quick dinner, where I was intro-ed to some really good prawn mee by Wee Kiat...(it's recommended from some food programme on channel U...some makeover thingy where they get famous chefs to help out or something...)

Comes with ribs too...and the good thing is the soup ain't too salty...

Next stop: to City Hall MRT...but we sorta hor lan a bit in Outram trying to find our way to SGH and eventually to the nearest MRT...feels quite silly....but anw the road traffic was already piling up due to the upcoming F1 practice race...

Finally reached City Hall MRT and right outside of Raffles City Shopping Centre where the crowd has already built up...Scenes and videos below....

Ain't too dark yet but the cars were already off!!


Oh wow the crowd just gathering outside the gates as the first of the cars zoom off!

Hear the engines go off!! Incredibly deafening!!




Trying a close-up now...


And night finally arrived....

Wee Kiat and Jue Ran went home after that and Zhiwen went to look for his friends, so I was left alone, so I decided to go about hunting for good F1 seeing spots without paying tix...(yesh yesh...cheapo cheapo but that's what everyone's doing....:p)

The first spot...round the corner of City Hall MRT...better than my initial position, at least can see the cars coming in at a turn...but still not good enough....

Walked to Marina Square and found another better spot at the Citylink exit...a whole straight road opposite the spectator's stand...

Incredibly funny cos ppl in the spectator's stand spend $$$ in there and on the opposite end here I am watching the same thing and being a cheapo!! :)



Think the sound of the engine got wayyyy much louder here....

Walked further down the corner to Milennia Walk area...chanced upon what I feel as the best location to watch the F1 for the night....it's over at Turn 7, where I got cars coming in fast before the turn, slowing down during this turn and 3 cars messed up due to taking a straight road missing the turn....Location was so good that I even got to sit on the barrier near the track side with 2 ah bengs and 2 ladies that randomly came up chatting with me and asking if this was a good spot too....lol

Yes...many other people like me camping arnd...sat on one of those construction barriers...





Haha...this car seriously messed up...I guess that's what happens when the driver loses his concentration and misses the turn...


A view from the other side...the stretch before Turn 7 where the cars came in real fast before hitting the turn...

Yeah...it's all a blur trying to capture the cars...


So think showing videos would be better....

Left after a while cos the sound was roaringly loud and my ears were ringing and tingling real bad...so retreated to take photos of a model car in Raffles City Shopping Centre...sponsored by RBS, Hamleys....think is the AT&T Williams F1 team driven by Nico Rosberg...

Sure was a F1 themed night out!!

4D @ Brewerkz

Wow...doughnuts really can get so mini....chanced upon them at some random shop at the basement of Central...some light snacks to fill the stomach....eh...Dash's stomach actually, while I was at the side pinching his cream and red bean pancakes..hurhur :p

Mini-doughnuts...the lady in front was super fussing about her choice of doughnuts...


Mini-pancakes

Anw it's a beer-packed 4D gathering to send Alex off to the UK again...looks like it's gonna be another yr or 2 b4 we're gonna see the dude...coincidentally was his birthday too.....so with complimentary cake from Brewerkz....

The man of the whole show himself...and his birthday wish..? BIG MONEY BIG MONEY!!! :p

The black bottom cake...random choice by Alex...sounded better than some other gayish-sounding frutti up god knows wat...and also a bit relevant to our crude conversation topics of the night....(think Anwar plus black bottoms plus our usual 4D porno talk....:p)

The Cowboy burger I ordered, plus large plate of Nachos and calamaris to share around the table makes for a bloody huge meal size....

Xikun's thrilled expression with his Goblet of Fire...


How to resist with a jug of Stout, jug of Alt beer, and glasses of IPA and Ocktoberfest for the early birds, treated courtesy of Alex...total damage of SGD 361 bucks...

Gr8 night spending time with the 4D ppl, as we reminicise abt the good ol' days of sec. sch wildness, porno talk, gals, milk scandal, Anwar giving M the A, investment banks getting served up the A by the B......Cheers to 9 years of knowing you guys!!

Ding Dong Song...WTF?!?

Something silly here...KW got excited showing off videos from his newly bought I-phone and kept showing us videos of ta la las, ding dongs erm.....anacondas (?!?) and lotsa weird stuff in the office. When I googled, there's really such a song called the Ding Dong Song.....holy shit...seriously hmmmmmm.....reminds me of those trashy dance tunes I used to gyrate to when clubbing....

Ding Dong Song....ding ding dong dong...for those that still don't get the meaning...erm...oh well forget it...


Teeny Weeny Stringy Bikiniiiiii...........

Caffeine overdose sia...

It seems like KW's master plan to reunite the world is at hand....an outing with a group of Chem Eng friends, some of whom I would never imagine having dinner with at Hong Kong Kim Gary. Our usual served with gossips and noisy laughter... :p

Anw I ordered the Yuanyang, which is a mixture of coffee and Hong Kong-style milk tea and a must-try over there. It was good....but I remembered that I have a slight allergy to caffeine stuff, and I think the drink was quite heavy on tt.....feeling a bit of headache after the whole thing.....

Interesting fact: According to Wikipedia, the name yuanyang, which refers to mandarin ducks, is a symbol of conjugal love in Chinese culture, as the birds usually appear in pairs and the male and female look very different. This same connotation of "pair" of two unlike items is used to name this drink.

Eh...lol.....did not know that such a simple drink can be so complicated and also lead to a headache......

Shut up and Dance!!!!

Attended Yan gu's long-awaited dance performance at the UCC over last weekend...an event which she booked all the Lufbra ppl for since wayyy back in the SEP days....Really enjoyed the whole hip-hop performance and the energy....and we got really gr8 seats!! It's been a really long time since I caught a show at the UCC so it was a nice refreshing change.

Group pic after the show

Hazel insisted on taking hip-hop "yo-yo wat's up y'all" shots with all of us....so started with me and my pose and style which Hazel invented for me in Potsdam, Germany....keke

And Weixiong down with the attitude...

To Yisi's body hugging pose...wat's up yo!!

The roomie's posing...

Sista!! Pose not hip hop enough loh!!!!

And to Shiwei who looks like she's preparing to perform in a choir instead of a hip-hop pose!!!

Eh.....and with Jared's serious face.....

And finally to Jinyang's 大厨师 cooking pose!!

U kidding me?! No M&Ms, Snickers, Oreos.....and White Rabbit sweets?!?!

I think I am so gonna die from kidney stones or retardation from all these recent food scares...as quoted from today's article "Tainted Milk Items in S'pore" in the Straits Times...

"WHITE Rabbit Creamy Candy, a milk-based treat popular with children and adults here, has been found to be contaminated with melamine.

The candy joins two other brands - Dutch Lady strawberry-flavoured milk and Yili Choice Dairy Fruit Bar Yoghurt Flavoured Ice Confection - on the list of dairy products from China which the authorities here say are adulterated by the chemical normally found in plastics.

The tainted-milk scandal that originated in China is turning into a global food scare, as governments ban imports and retailers unilaterally take China milk products off the shelves

Besides milk and milk products such as ice-cream and yogurt, confectionery items such as chocolate, biscuits, sweets and anything that could contain milk from China came under its latest advisory.

The Straits Times found on Saturday that a 7-Eleven outlet in Braddell had pulled a list of products from its shelves. The list included Snickers bars, M&Ms, Nabisco Chicken In A Biskit, Dove chocolate bars, Mentos yogurt balls, Oreo wafer sticks, and Want Want Take One Baby Bites."

Don't eat the bunnieee!!!! It's poisoned!!!

http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_281262.html

Okok....lemme see......

1) White rabbit candy....check....I always eat this during CNY celebrations
2) M&Ms....check.....how not to resist that which melts in your mouth and not in your hands?!?!
3) Snickers....check....Mars bars...double check....heck I am even eating it in office now loh....how to raid the office pantry like that?!?!
4) Oreo wafer sticks....check.....you kidding me?!?? Oreo is my favourite....even brought some all the way to Loughborough during my SEP!!!

Die liaoz la.......I am so melamine choked....

Yay!! I stank the entire bus!!

Had a sudden craving for durian, and I just so happened to pass by a Four Seasons outlet at the Takashimaya Food Basement. So I bought a pack of durian puffs and gobbled it down....haha actually gobbled it on the way home on the bus. And I swear that I became public enemy number 1 that very instant!!

1) One ang moh tai-tai keep staring at me throughout the journey....lol...could never understand why people don't like to eat durians...

2) Another auntie look at me like she was hungry and wanna steal my durian puffs like tt....keke

3) I was dressed in greyish super lok cock polo t-shirt, so I look like some tard right out from the land of Ah Tiongs...and nobody sat beside me for the rest of the bus ride home....seriously....oh the journey was 40 min by the way :p

And to dedicate my love for durians and celebrate my inconsideration over my fellow bus riders, I present to you http://ieatishootipost.sg/2008/03/717-trading-no-money-dont-learn-to-eat.html

Start drooling!!

I actually ran!!!

Finally managed to get my lazy ass up and ran 5km for the ESRC Family Run at East Coast....clocked in at 28:45....i think I am so gonna get owned during IPPT...sianz...

Total War!!!

My bro just got Medieval II Total War Gold Edition as it runs fairly smoothly on his laptop...been wanting to play this game and I highly recommend it..Love the combination of the strategic element upon a campaign map that resembles playing the boardgame "Risk" and a real-time strategic placement of troops upon the battlefield for simulation and warfare. To properly explain this, here's introducing a series of design diary clips from the designers themselves...

Cities, castles...it's a bit like Risk eh?


The importance of religion in Total War....elements that need to be micromanaged in the game...


Siege Warfare...the real-time strategy element kicks in here....


Introducing what comprises of a typical medieval army...


And now showing what happens on the open battlefield...continuing the real-time strategy element here....


The Britannia Campaign..(English, Scottish, Vikings, forts, castles, war museums...was so glad that I managed to experience all of it during my SEP :p)


The Crusades..reference this to the Kingdom of Heaven clip at the bottom...

Was brought into the Total War series by first starting on Rome Total War...and that led to an increased interest in Roman history (stuff like its society, military tactics) and that was why I was so excited when I actually got to go to Rome and Italy during my SEP trip. (slight digress :p) Interestingly, I also remembered how one of my JC classmates, Po-lung, would tell me so much about the Shogun and the predecessor Total War series too during our JC days...and I would go nodding my head and half-acknowledging his words (obviously I sounded totally sian and clueless to what he was talking about at that time!!!)......but had I played these games back in those days, I guess I would have appreciated more of his words.

The Total War series has been revolutionary in terms of gaming and bringing up interest in history. In fact, some interesting facts to share here...

1) The game engine for the strategy map was used in 2 series of TV programmes (Decisive Battles by the History Channel and Time Commanders by BBC2) where it was used to recreate famous battles on TV with certain fine-tunes by real military historians and academics to maximise history accuracy. These programmes are really interesting documentaries on their own.

2) Perhaps the most powerful effect has been the increased interest in military history, whether it is in the Roman times or the medieval times. So much so that even Hollywood came in with many big budget epic movies.....think Gladiator, Troy, Alexander, Kingdom of Heaven and 300. Actually, Gladiator came in before all of these and the effect of increased interest in Roman and classical history was dubbed the "Gladiator Effect" by the New York Times. The Total War series happened to run through this time period and served to reinforce this interest.

And presenting the very defining moment in cinematic history from Gladiator....one of my favourite cinematic battles...the one that started the Gladiator Effect


Another favourite....the battle for Jerusalem in the Crusades...

When Bugs and God cross.....

Interesting stuff to ponder about..caught Starship Troopers 3 over the weekend cos I was bored...only thing I always liked was the propaganda stuff that they come out with in support of the Federation. "So you wanna be a citizen?!!" And of cos...mindless bug squashing...

I have read somewhere that the original novels on Starship Troopers as well as the movies was a satire on militarism. The world is portrayed as dystopic, jingoistic and militaristic in nature. In addition, it depicts a state which evokes Nazi Germany, with the strong use of propaganda and iconography (although I must confess again...this is one of the more interesting parts throughout the franchise)

However the latest movie satires heavily on religion as well as modern current events. Issues like the nationalisation of religion, separation of the church and the state, terrorism (in the form of peace terrorists), weapons of mass destruction (mechanised units at the end of the movie) and the war on terror and aggression surface, which clearly shows the current troubles and concerns faced by the US.

Will leave a few clips here just for thought...again...warning advisory...Do NOT watch if you feel seriously offended by what is proposed by the Federation!!

Intro clip with current propaganda from the Federation network...serious propaganda sia...Would you like to know more? :p


A recruitment advertisement to join the Federation fleet and pilots


God is on our side!

Don't steal my car!!

Chanced upon this video feature for the Grand Theft Auto series which describes the influence of real-life cars on the car designs within the game franchise. Interesting....how I wish I can play GTA IV on my PC.....oh w8....my PC died on me.......sighz.....and it's not even released on the PC yet...

It's here!!!

Yay!! Finally the 46 inch and 32 inch TV I ordered back at Comex are here! Cool.....time to become big time couch potato lohz!!!

MAF 2008 -- How the years have gone by...

An annual event which I try not to miss, but somehow this yr the usual gang could not make it, so I was kinda disappointed that I did not meet up with Michael, SS, WQ. Everybody's so busy nowadays. Nevertheless, joined up with the girls and KM for our trip back to the past in HCJC.

Group pic here with our 77 direct juniors...kinda unexpected cos we met Sue Chen's friend whom we pulled along to help us take photo...and our juniors arrived at the same time!


Headed to the main square where the sight of the huge lantern greeted us...argh...we missed the light-up yet again!!!


A flying lighted carp




The wishing pond

I bet after the whole thing, the Student Council drains the pool and pockets the money thrown in...lol :p



I honestly swear that there's a fountain behind us and not the night sky...

We tried looking for our 77 class bench...cos all these years our former location was replaced with the student lounge....so we set about looking out for the tags labelled under the benches....to the point that XQ had to ask the students....

Yea!! Finally found it!!! Tag was absent and we could only confirm by asking a group of 77 juniors from the 06 batch!


Sue Chen's disappointed face from the looks of our class bench...hurhur


Totally random here...chanced upon this group of juniors whom we thought were from 77..so we decided to take a photo with them...turned out they were from 76 instead!! And they are mostly the 06 and the current batch of students...(Btw did I mention that we were from the 01 batch? So that wld make us great great great great I-can't count grand seniors!!)

KM was cut out from that previous random group shot, so we took one ourselves...make that two...


And the juniors decided to start lighting up the sparklers...

Which led to alot of smoke...time for us to clear the area :p

Broke away from the group for awhile to find yy....and ahem....a series of failed camera shots ensued with funny effects

Take 1: Fingers!!!

Take 2: Since when I became an angel?! *Halo***

Take 3: Erm.....need I say more?!

Take 4: Slightly.......better

Take 5: Omg!! Half-asleep!

Take 6: Finally got it right!!! XD XD

Proceeded to the hall for the mass dance and songs session as it was raining heavily. First time in my going-back MAF years that the event was held indoors...and now for any HCJC readers out there....presenting to you a walk down memory lane with the following clips....enjoy! :)

只为那爱我愿....a classic slow piece to warm up...


心旅....HOI HOI HOI!!! Where guys and girls interrupt each other :p


Another hot favourite...细水长流...pardon my horrendous mono-tone singing!!


当你孤单你会想起谁....one of my favourite songs...totally caught the girls by surprise when they were on video humming, singing and swaying to the song :p


唱一首华初的歌....another classic to end the songs segment


Up next...the mass dance segment...starting with Beechwood...one of the easier dances...Sue Chen and XQ went downstairs to dance, and Lijie had evil intentions of "blackmailing" them and asking me to film them....lol :p


Together in Electric Dreams...another personal favourite...the song.....not the dance...was never ever good with mass dances...haha...still no sign of Sue Chen and XQ though.... :p


I've Got My Mind Set on You...another favourite...although I think the dance quite funny...even to this day....TAP TAP TAP!!! Twist twist twist!!!! To do it...to do it...WOO!!!! Finally caught the girls on tape...much to Lijie's help in spotting them...keke :p


Wild Wild West...think this is the most difficult dance...the classic "Inner hand outer hand inner outer hand grab Pull!" Always brings several ?!? as to how to perform this...and I swear they always get the best butt shakers to be the dance ICs on stage just because of this song!! And the finale...a cheer to end the evening!!