You obviously have too much time

Isn’t it funny about the fruit from the forbidden tree?
..What makes the un-reachable seem so much sweeter to us?
..what makes the rabbit run round and round for that carrot on the stick?
..what motivates us as people to sacrifice everything certain and comfortable just for a taste, a bite, from the fruit which we know we can’t touch?

Perhaps it the excitement,perhaps its the drive to be more, to achieve what we normally would’nt have been able to reach.

Are we validating our self worth by setting un-acheivable goals?

Do we only treausre things that we had to fight / work hard for?

When love comes easy does it slip away just as easily?

One thing is for sure though, at the end of the day, when you’ve sacrificed everything certain in your life for that one thing you crave for ,and failed, you’ll undoubtably realise, that what you forsook originally, that easy,comfortable,certain thing, that that is the hardest thing to get back, ever again.

Heal Over - KT Tunstall

It isn’t very difficult to see why
You are the way you are
Doesn’t take a genius to realise
That sometimes life is hard
It’s gonna take time
But you’ll just have to wait
You’re gonna be fine
But in the meantime

Come over here
Let me wipe your tears away
Come a little nearer baby
Coz you’ll heal over
Heal over
Heal over someday

50 Springleaf Gardens ( 1999 - 2006 )

“you watched me grow up, you sheltered me from the rain and comforted me from the toils of life, you were more than brick and stone or a home , you were a friend who was always there for me”

And now the time has come, for the final curtain call, the big bang before the end. Having lived some 16 years in this house which i call home, I bid it goodbye with much sadness and regret.

Memories:

I remeber the first time I saw it, only 11 years old, the extremly high ceiling and the oddly colored Green tiles.

Walking around the old shophouses,wet market and rubber factory at the back of the estate.( which has now been replaced with a petrol station and a new housing development.)

Exploring the River at the back of the estate and watching the Thai workers catch fish in the middle of it.

As a school kid,walking up and down the moutainous hill leading to the bus stop.( and unknowingly passing the house of a neighbour whom I would only get to know and call a good friend, some 15 years later).

The lush park in the middle of the estate, spending my school holidays playing midnite soccer and afternoon baseball there.( a park which I would bring my nieces to run around in, with the same innocent abandon years later)

Working at the back of the house for 6 months , cuting glass and other sai kang ( yes Gene, I feel your pain).

Friends coming over for drunken parties,camp outs,mahjong,citadel and barbecues.

Toiling away in the blazing sun digging a Koi pond only a meter in depth for my mum.

The arguements,the tears and sadness that would reverberate the walls.

The daily Stroll to Nee Soon camp just 7 minutes away during NS.

The ahem… female friends….and their timely departure during the early hours of the day.

The feeling of familiar comfort and home when I came back from my stint in China.

The switching of rooms (from small to big) when my sibilings left one by one.

The pets running around the garden ( one dog and two cats).

GOOD BYE 50 SPRINGLEAF GARDENS. You will be missed.

We all know we invest emotions and time into relationships.
Something which we all give freely and willingly.

However, what about the financial aspect of a relationship?

It all begins from the first date.

$70 for a nice dinner
$20 for the cab
$15 for the cinema

That first kiss - Priceless?

Now, it can be argued by some ,that guys pay for all these things on a date becuase they only want one thing….(that’s right,you know what im talking about…sweaty,mind blowing…..scrabble)…..

but what about the girl?….is the fact that she accepts these things a consent to the underlying intentions of the guy?

and what happens if the girl keeps on accepting these things and more, for a longer duration of time?…is it wrong of the guy to feel that he has been taken for a ride?…without so much as a kiss?(or a cheeky tap on the bum)..*but nobody forced the guy to pay* they would say.

What about a relationship that has ended?

It isnt uncommon to hear of ex couples who fight bitterly over what the other “supposedly” owes them. * ahhh can i have my money back for all the time you made me wait for you?…now if we pro-rate it by my salary then the sub total of which should come up to…..*
I exagerate here but who can truly make a distinction?

at what cost is the broken heart (excl GST) you gave me? (your personal happy-ness?)

It’s all a gamble.

1) You’ll feel like shit…that constant pounding in your head
2) You’ll say things you wouldnt normally say (ie. of course TI-GER was looking into the toilet bowl for pooh!….duh!)
3) You open yourself up yourself to doing silly things
         3.1) calling ex girlfriends in the middle of the night ( I Love you more than life itself,I DO….I NEVER MEANT TO FART DURING SEX)
         3.2) calling up friends overseas and telling them you’re drunk
         3.3) sending SMSes which really dont make any sense at all (eg. WHR U @ yaoooh?mer hav’; fur!)
4) Members of the opposite sex look better than they actually do.
5) Did i mention that constant pounding in your head?
6) You eat weird shit (eg. Fungi ON Potato wedges)
7) You start dishing out advice with your new found high-ness.Which really dont make much sense.(eg.you should never have a lama as a pet, they stink and drink too much)
You think $32 is a reasonable sum for the taxi ride back home.
9) You walk around the streets with your fly wide open.

WILL THE POUNDING NEVER STOP!!??

the damage ( 4 bottles of Heineken, 4 large pints of HOEgarden, 2 Becks & Fungi on Potato wedges)

Hangovers are temporary, the sillyness generated during your drunken stupor are permanent.

7 Breakups in 6 months.(Do you think you can tell?)

"I love you" isn’t forever,it’s just something we say when it feels right.(don’t be cynical now)
We see the ugly side of the other person we would’nt see , as the result of the breakup,
Love and hate are really just different sides of the same coin.

With our hearts ripped,torn and broken,
A person can still keep on living and breathing.

We really can’t tell,heaven from hell,
When we wonder,what we could have, should have done,
Only to realise that it would’nt have made any difference,
it was all meant to happen.

So alone we are,
staring blanky into space,
a lost soul swimming in a fish bowl,
and we think back to simplier times,
when we were young,
when we shone like the sun.

O how i wish you we here.

(sorry Floyd)

Random head butting
Wembeldon crazy person in tennis gear(those were’nt your tennis balls?)
free food sponsored by Mac (we waited 2 hours!)
a projection screen the size of a certain friend’s well-endowed apendage
the return of the 4th brother
a really scary movie(2 hours of our life’s we’ll never get back!)
beer
more beer
Chins
Mr "chin master" siao!"(and his fetish for chinning)
Rain
1-1,4-5
boomerangs that don’t fly back
intellectual party conversation:

Why did ti-ger look into the toilet bowl?
He was looking for poo

A man walks into a bar
oww

So hello kitty meets doremon…(a joke that will not be repeated due to extreme bad taste)

WORLD CUP ‘06

*see pic in photo album section

Dear        ,
                 I never quite knew you. And right now I still don’t.
My only memeories of you was of you sitting there smiling and talking to me in Hainanese when I was young.
I remember your glasses and dentures.I remeber your clothes and the little slippers you wore.
It pains me that I don’t remember more about you.

Was it the language that prevented me from knowing you?
Should I have tried harder to get to know you when you were still around?

Without you, I wouldnt be here right now.

I don’t quite know why I did’nt talk to you the day before you left.What could I have said?
I did’nt quite recognise you in that bed.I could’nt quite believe that it said "Goh" above your bed.Hooked up to tubes and all…Shrunken and pale.It came as a shock.All i knew was that I had to get out of there.

And I did.I’m sorry.

Maybe it was my own fear that prevented me from doing anything.

You passed.I did’nt feel anything.

5pm.Thursday.25th May 2006.

It came as a shock to me.And to be honest.It still is.
How do i grieve for someone I never really knew?
How do i cry for someone  whom I don’t have memories to recall upon?

But somehow deep down inside I know I should.

In the days to come Im sure that tears will come to my eyes, but I won’t quite know why.And I hate myself for that.

Goodbye Granny.I never knew you.But I know you’re in a better place now.You lived a good life.You lived.

You will be missed.

Goodbye.

Your Grandson.
Paul Goh

The deadliest virus of them all.

We need it.
We crave it.
We get infected by it so very easily
We have no cure for it
It can hit you like a bolt
and leave you just as easily
It turns us into different people
It can make you cry
It can make you smile
It drives some to kill
It occupies your mind at all times
Some hope for it to return

Some ignore it

Some try to maintain it

Some toss it like trash

And yet, we so very desperately want to be infected by it.

Love.

My day breaks, My mind aches,I find that all the words of kindness linger on long after I’ve left guangzhou…I look to the window and see the sun shining thru the blinds like a orange tiger with its shadowy black stripes on the floor..

Turning on the tap, I splash a handful of NEWater (NEWater is the brand name given to reclaimed water produced by Singapore’s public utilities. More specifically, it is treated wastewater (sewage) that has been purified for public use/consumption) to wake me up from my daze…

"shit,I’m not in China anymore" I think to myself.

I walk downstairs and the indonesian maid greets me along the way in accented English…"Gud afernoon surrr"…A issue of the Straits Times and a cup of black coffee sit knowingly on the dining table.

I read the news today oh, boy
About a unlucky girl who made the headlines
And though the news was rather sad
Well I just had to laugh and
I saw the photograph
She BLEW his mind out in her room
She didn’t notice that the handphone was filming
A crowd of people stood and stared
They all seen her face….(ref. http://www.asia.cnet.com/reviews/techbuzz/audio_arsonist/0,39041384,39315856-1,00.htm)

There is a smaller article below it about how the economy is expected to shrink in the next quarter by 0.7%.(How very Singaporean..a girl’s sexual romp is far more important than a "trifle" thing such as the economy)…

And looking up I noticed I was late.
Found my slippers and
Made the air conditioned bus in seconds flat

(only 37% of all Singaporeans own a Car,the rest live a life of buses,trains and taxis)

The cars stop obediently way before the lights have even turned yellow and wait for the green.A driver gives himself a nasal insepction.

Looking around, there are signs in the cabin that gently remind me not to spit,eat,smoke,yawn,live…etc. in the bus.Failure to do so will result in a fine of $500(2500rmb).

Ahh…what a fine city.

Singapore..A day in the life.

writer’s note: I apologize to all beatles fans for bastardising "For no one" and "A day in the life"