Metaphors Are Dangerous

2011-05-05T08:55:00.000+08:00

“Sometimes I’m terrified of my heart; of its constant hunger for whatever it is it wants. The way it stops and starts.”

— Edgar Allan Poe

My sentiments!

2011-05-04T22:35:00.002+08:00

Beauty in the breakdown

2011-05-04T02:02:00.001+08:00

Obliviate!

2011-05-02T11:25:00.002+08:00

Danny the bear - My new boyfriend!

2011-05-02T01:18:00.000+08:00

Danny and I at Clementi Avenue 4 this evening :)

Ignorance Chapter 29

2011-05-01T12:58:00.000+08:00

FYI

2011-04-30T10:52:00.002+08:00

Everyone has a secret they haven't shared. Everyone has a past no one's heard about. Everyone has talents that people don't notice. Everyone has weaknesses hidden inside. Everyone has a story left untold, so never start judging someone thinking you know them back to front. Because the truth is, you probably don't.

♥♥♥♥♥

2011-04-30T02:32:00.001+08:00

FTW

2011-04-29T01:47:00.000+08:00

My brain composition

2011-04-29T01:30:00.002+08:00

60% of my waking hour is devoted to furthering the cause of opposition parties in the Singapore General Elections (and by doing so, increase the proportion of dissenting voices in Parliament)

Why? Because ""Must have co-driver to slap the driver if he is falling asleep; and to talk and keep him awake if driving safely" (Chen Show Mao, Workers Party)

20% of my energies I spend on human relationships - friends, lovers and the like

10% of my energies are devoted to planning holidays, planning (and executing) personal action plans, reading etc.

10% of my energies are devoted to work (for such a time as this!)

2011-04-27T00:38:00.000+08:00

Yours truly is in a joyful state of mind, for reasons best embargoed. Travel beckons, then new opportunities, new people, a whole new world out there awaits... and it's just about to start!

2011-04-27T00:29:00.001+08:00

2011-04-26T00:45:00.002+08:00

Inspired by Sanctum

2011-04-23T02:05:00.001+08:00

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.

Lines 1 - 5 from Coleridge's Kubla Khan

Smash

2011-04-17T16:18:00.001+08:00

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Song of the Day:
The Moment I Said It by Imogen Heap
I'm losing you, I'm losing you
Trust me on this one
I've got a bad feeling,
Trust me on this one
You're gonna throw it all away
With no hesitation

My Musical Pursuits

2011-04-14T00:55:00.001+08:00

Yes I play music, write music and sing too; I do not just dive. And these days, music really is fuel for my soul. For those of you who missed my joint performance with Shawn last night - here are the links for your perusal! Thank you to the friends who dropped by! You know who you are.

Chapter 22 of Milan Kundera's 'Ignorance'

2011-04-11T21:13:00.003+08:00

The more vast the amount of time we've left behind us, the more irresistible is the voice calling us to return to it. This pronouncement seems to state the obvious, and yet it is false. Men grow old, the end draws near, each moment becomes more and more valuable, and there is no time to waste over recollections. It is important to understand the mathematical paradox in nostalgia: that it is most powerful in early youth, when the volume of life gone by is quite small.

Out of the mists of the time when Josef was in high school, I see a young girl emerge; she is long-limbed, beautiful; she is a virgin; and she is melancholy because she has just broken off with a boy. It is her first romantic separation and it hurts her; but her pain is less strong than her amazement at discovering time; she sees it as she never saw it before:

Until then her view of time was the present moving forward and devouring the future; she either feared its swiftness (when she was awaiting something difficult) or rebelled at its slowness (when she was awaiting something fine). Now time has a very different look; it is no longer the conquering present capturing the future; it is the present conquered and captured and carried off by the past. She sees a young man disconnecting himself from her life and going away, forevermore out of her reach. Mesmerized, all she can do is watch this piece of her life move off; all she can do is watch it and suffer. She is experiencing a brand-new feeling called nostalgia.

That feeling, that irrepressible yearning to return, suddenly reveals to her the existence of the past, the power of the past, of her past; in the house of her life there are windows now; windows opening to the rear, onto what she has experienced; from now on her existence will be inconceivable without these windows.

One day, with her new boyfriend (platonic, of course), she turns down a path in the forest near the town; it is the same path she had walked a few months earlier with her previous boyfriend (the one who, after their break, caused her to feel nostalgia for the first time), and she is moved by the coincidence. Deliberately she heads for a dilapidated little chapel at a crossing of the forest paths, because that was where her first boyfriend tried to kiss her. Irresistible temptation draws her to relive the bygone love. She wants the two love stories to come together, to join, to mingle, to mimic each other so that both will grow greater through their fusion.

When the earlier boyfriend had tried to stop at that spot and clasp her to him, happy and abashed she quickened her pace and prevented it. This time, what will happen? Her current boyfriend slows down too, he too prepares to take her in his arms! Dazzled by his repetition (by the miracle of his repetition), she obeys the imperative of the parallel and hurries ahead, pulling him along by the hand.

From then on she succumbs to the charm of these affinities, these furtive contacts between present and past; she seeks out these echoes, these co-respondences, these co-resonances that make her feel the the distance between what was and what is, the temporal dimension (so new, so astonishing) of her life; she has the sense of emerging from adolescence because of it, of becoming mature, adult, which for her means becoming a person who is acquainted with time, who left a fragment of life behind her and can turn to look back at it.

One day she sees her new boyfriend hurrying toward her in a blue jacket, and she remembers that her first boyfriend also looked good in a blue jacket. Another day, gazing into her eyes, he praises their beauty by way of a highly unusual metaphor; she was fascinated by that because her first boyfriend, commenting on her eyes, had used word for word the same unusual phrase. These coincidences amaze her. Never does she feel so thoroughly suffused with beauty as when the nostalgia fo her past love blends with the surprises of her new love. The intrusion of the previous boyfriend into the story she is currently living is to her mind not some secret infidelity; it adds further to her fondness for the man walking beside her now.

When she is older she will see in these resemblances a regrettable uniformity among individuals (they all stop at the same spots to kiss, have the same tastes in clothing, flatter a woman with the same metaphor) and a tedious monotony among events (they are all just an endless repetition of the same one); but in her adolescence she welcomes these coincidences as miraculous and she is avid to decipher their meanings. The fact that today's boyfriend bears a strange resemblance to yesterday's makes him even more exceptional, even more original, and she believes that he is mysteriously predestined for her.

You are tired

2011-04-08T09:24:00.001+08:00

You are tired,
(I think)
Of the always puzzle of living and doing;
And so am I.

Come with me, then,
And we'll leave it far and far away—
(Only you and I, understand!)

You have played,
(I think)
And broke the toys you were fondest of,
And are a little tired now;
Tired of things that break, and—
Just tired.
So am I.

But I come with a dream in my eyes tonight,
And knock with a rose at the hopeless gate of your heart—
Open to me!
For I will show you the places Nobody knows,
And, if you like,
The perfect places of Sleep.

Ah, come with me!
I'll blow you that wonderful bubble, the moon,
That floats forever and a day;
I'll sing you the jacinth song
Of the probable stars;
I will attempt the unstartled steppes of dream,
Until I find the Only Flower,
Which shall keep (I think) your little heart
While the moon comes out of the sea.

e.e. cummings

Wouldn't it be Nice?

2011-04-07T21:08:00.000+08:00

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

The Beach Boys - Wouldn’t it be Nice?

You know it seems the more we talk about it

It only makes it worse to live without it

Wander+Lust

2011-04-06T23:55:00.002+08:00

Kurt Cobain’s suicide note

2011-04-06T12:05:00.004+08:00

it's better to burn out than to fade away.

Unfinished Business

2011-04-05T01:58:00.003+08:00

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Letters from the Sky (Civil Twilight)

You're coming back for me.

Bintan with the MTs

2011-04-04T21:32:00.002+08:00

I rarely ever profess to thoroughly enjoy my weekends. But the one that has just passed was simply brilliant! We embarked on the most well-attended MT annual overseas trip, and the best one in 3 years running! This time round, we headed to Bintan where 14 of us split ourselves across 2 villas. We BBQed our Saturday away, went for multiple massages + spa treatments and spent Sunday baking at the beach. I must say I have been pleasantly surprised at my Bintan beach experience. Having been quite a regional beach veteren in the past few months, Bintan's beach has surpassed my expectations! Now my body aches - from fighting waves at the beach and the hideous tanning! I'm also suffering from a flu! Most of all, I'm reeling from the madness of hanging out with a bunch of really crazy fun people I love to bits.

Trust me on this one

2011-04-02T09:21:00.000+08:00

will be the key to your bliss.

Everything's gonna be okay

2011-04-02T00:49:00.001+08:00

“I had to learn the hard way that some people walk into our lives and physically walk out, but they never really leave.” — Arminda Meer

Postscript: Some people physically stay in our lives for a long long time, but they are never really ours.

This part is for you

2011-04-01T10:48:00.002+08:00

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

“comes and goes (in waves)” - greg laswell

This one's for the lonely

The ones that seek and find

Only to be let down

Time after time

This one's for the torn down

The experts at the fall

Come on friends get up now

You're not alone at all

This one's for the faithless

The ones that are surprised

They're only where they are now

Regardless of their fight

This one's for believing

If only for it's sake

Come on friends get up now

Love is to be made

Case in point

2011-04-01T01:20:00.000+08:00

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

--- Rainer Maria Rilke

What a teaser!

2011-04-01T01:18:00.000+08:00

Choking on your alibi

2011-03-31T00:52:00.001+08:00

Perfect bolster

2011-03-29T21:46:00.000+08:00

through this black maze of flesh and pain, you always push me through

2011-03-28T21:10:00.005+08:00

Disconcerted and enchanted

2011-03-28T17:29:00.005+08:00

The degree of slowness is directionally proportional to the intensity of memory. The degree of speed is directionally proportional to the intensity of forgetting.

2011-03-28T14:58:00.002+08:00

So desu ne

Love taught me to lie, Life taught me to die

2011-03-27T17:34:00.003+08:00

There’s still a little bit of your taste in my mouth
There’s still a little bit of you laced with my doubt
It’s still a little hard to say what's going on

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Damien Rice - Cannonball

The Wedding

2011-03-27T10:37:00.000+08:00

Sometimes the sun shines and it still rains. The weather changes all the time. You can too.

Lifted from I Wrote This For You

Everything will be a choice.

2011-03-26T13:57:00.004+08:00

The Seconds Can Be Days

2011-03-23T18:23:00.001+08:00

This moth lives for just one day, and yet, you will never see it fall to the ground and curse the futility of its existence. Nor flowers weep when winter comes. Nor the moon sigh when dawn approaches. We are only ever given just so much. But it is always, all we need.

From I Wrote This For You

rolls eyes

2011-03-22T23:42:00.003+08:00

Laughing so hard, no noise coming out, so you sit there clapping like a retarded seal.

2011-03-21T21:57:00.002+08:00

anthem

2011-03-12T16:14:00.003+08:00

From our birthday, until we die, Is but the winking of an eye.

2011-03-06T14:12:00.004+08:00

Thank you to my dearest friends who have kept me well-entertained for the past two nights! You all mean so much to me. Thank you for taking the effort to be a part of my life.

Today is family day!

My idea of a stroll in the park

2011-03-05T14:45:00.000+08:00

Austria - foot of the Hochschwab Mountains, in Tragoess, Styria, Green Lake

what goes around... stays there.

2011-03-04T17:03:00.002+08:00

My best friend, Tania, dedicated this (see comic below) to me.

Darling, there are many things that can't go on Facebook and this blog. But hell did / do they matter!

OUCH

2011-03-04T00:38:00.003+08:00

Let me share with you about my pet, peeve.

2011-03-02T02:40:00.001+08:00

Trust me to almost let slip Vienna's birthday which took place on 24 February! Where was I. My bitch is one hag now! She was born in 2006, and is now... 5 freaking years old! (35 in dog years?) Gawd, and I suspect she's still a virgin. My dreams of impregnating her have not been particularly successful as I have found no worthy mate for her. I think it's time I sterilise her.

Looking back at some old receipts, I realized she cost me (and primarily ww) $880. That's about the cost of a cheap laptop now. Not too bad really, except that I love her exponentially more! (and have spent a hell lot of money on her in the process).

One of Vienna's first pictures in her new home

It's 1 March. Happy Founders' Day!

2011-03-01T01:21:00.000+08:00

Dramatic Irony

Observation

2011-02-28T22:08:00.001+08:00

Women are able to share their deepest darkest secrets (even the hard truths) with their best friend. But men will fiercely guard the truth (especially their darkest ugly secrets) from their best friend. I just hope my future husband never has to treat me the same way he treats his best friend.

2011-02-28T02:58:00.001+08:00

And so, you ask me to take a step of faith.

2011-02-27T20:53:00.002+08:00

enlightened

2011-02-27T20:34:00.001+08:00

“Yet, if love be the supreme good, let woman be only educated to inspire it, and let every charm be polished to intoxicate the senses; but, if they be moral beings, let them have a chance to become intelligent; and let love to man be only a part of that glowing flame of universal love, which, after encircling humanity, mounts in grateful incense to God”

Mary Wollstonecraft, “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman”

I am still alive

2011-02-27T02:46:00.004+08:00

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Portal - Still Alive (The cake is a lie)

But there's no sense crying over every mistake.

You just keep on trying till you run out of cake.

Liz's birthday dinner @ Hyatt

2011-02-27T02:01:00.001+08:00

Happy birthday babe, we are freaking TWENTY-SIX. :) I really don't feel it!

Much Ado about Nothing

2011-02-26T05:23:00.002+08:00

Pay my respects to grace and virtue
Send my condolences to good
Give my regards to soul and romance
They always did the best they could

And so long to devotion
You taught me everything I know
Wave goodbye, wish me well
You've gotta let me go

Human, The Killers

Pomp and circumstance

2011-02-25T09:12:00.001+08:00

He that complies against his will
Is of his own opinion still
Which he may adhere to, yet disown,
For reasons to himself best known

Samuel Butler's Hudibras. Part III, Canto iii, lines 547-550

Rasta Baby

2011-02-25T01:33:00.004+08:00

One love, one heart, let’s get together and feel alright.

2011-02-24T22:34:00.000+08:00

“But better to be hurt by the truth than comforted with a lie.” — Khaled Hosseini

BFF

2011-02-24T15:09:00.000+08:00

Too much pizza

2011-02-23T01:17:00.001+08:00

2011-02-20T22:32:00.002+08:00

Nobody said it was easy

2011-02-17T02:37:00.003+08:00

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

The Scientist (cover) by Natasha Beddingfield

Kwai Lan Face: familiar?

2011-02-15T22:37:00.003+08:00

Happy Valentine's Day, My Dear

2011-02-14T20:08:00.005+08:00

This photo totally cracks me up! Hahahahahahaha

so demanding

2011-02-12T19:40:00.003+08:00

He wanted me to love him unconditionally, but Jimmy was not able to love someone else in return … it was the troubled boy that wanted to be loved very badly. I loved Jimmy as I have loved no one else in my life, but I could not give him the enormous amount that he needed. Loving Jimmy was something that could empty a person.

- Pier Angeli on James Dean

If it's a broken part, replace it.

2011-02-12T16:01:00.008+08:00

Francesca Woodman

Yet another tumblr rip-off!

2011-02-12T13:46:00.002+08:00

these violent delights...

2011-02-12T13:27:00.001+08:00

Probably explains my love for diving...

Take these sunken eyes and learn to see

2011-02-04T11:00:00.002+08:00

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

0 plays

Blackbird by Sarah MacLachlan (Beatles Cover)

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these sunken eyes and learn to see
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to be free

Blackbird fly, blackbird fly
Into the light of the dark black night

Blackbird fly, blackbird fly
Into the light of the dark black night

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise
You were only waiting for this moment to arise
You were only waiting for this moment to arise

Chinese New Year Day 1: Maternal Side

2011-02-03T21:35:00.000+08:00

Knackered!

2011-02-03T20:30:00.008+08:00

Vindicated

2011-02-03T12:03:00.003+08:00

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

A reason deprived of reason

2011-02-03T02:25:00.003+08:00

An excerpt from Milan Kundera's Immortality (Part 5):

... At that very moment a waiter was leaning over our table to remove the empty appetizer dishes, and I was just saying to Avenarius: "The very morning that I started the third part of my novel, I heard a report on the radio I cannot possibly forget. A girl went out on the highway at night and sat down with her back to the oncoming cars. She sat there, her head resting on her knees, and waited for death. The driver of the first car swerved aside at the last moment and died with his wife and two children. The second car, too, ended up in the ditch. And the third. Nothing happened to the girl. She got up, walked away, and nobody ever found out who she was."

Avenarius said, "What reasons do you think could induce a girl to sit down on the highway at night and wish to be crushed by a car?"

"I don't know," I said. "But I would bet the reason was disproportionately small. Or to put it more precisely, seen from the outside it would seem small to us and quite foolish."

"Why?" asked Avenarius.

I shrugged my shoulders. "I cannot imagine any substantial reason for such a terrible suicide, as for example an incurable disease or the death of someone close. In such a case nobody would choose this terrible end, making other people die! Only a reason deprived of reason can lead to such an unreasonable horror. In all languages derived from Latin, the word 'reason' (ratio) has a double meaning: first, it designates the ability to think, and only second, the cause. Therefore reason in the sense of a cause is always understood as something rational. A reason the rationality of which is not transparent would seem to be incapable of causing an effect. But in German, a reason in the sense of a cause is called Grund, a word having nothing to do with the Latin ratio and originally meaning 'soil' and later 'basis'. From the viewpoint of the Latin ratio, the girl's behavior, sitting down on the highway, seems absurd, inappropriate, irrational, and yet it has its reason, its basis, its ground, Grund. Such a Grund is inscribed deep in all of us, it is the ever-present cause of our actions, it is the soil from which our fate grows. I am trying to grasp the Grund hidden at the bottom of each of my characters, and I am convinced more and more that it has the same nature of a metaphor."

"Your idea escapes me," said Avenarius.

"Too bad. It is the most important thought that ever occurred to me."

The Truth.....

2011-02-02T17:27:00.005+08:00

is rarely pure and never simple. So says Oscar Wilde.

is rarely pure and never simple.

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

By Sally Seltmann

To my colour blind friends

2011-02-02T14:47:00.001+08:00

Too much honesty!

2011-02-02T14:43:00.003+08:00

Sounds familiar...

Success

2011-02-02T08:42:00.003+08:00

At uploading gif files to blogger! Yay say hello to tumblr :)

I am increasingly impressed with my HTML skills.

Need You Now

2011-02-02T01:30:00.001+08:00

My brother performs!

Tania Chin is back home!

2011-02-01T02:07:00.008+08:00

Need I go to greater lengths about how dear Tania is to me? She's discharged from the hospital and resting well at home. Best of all, the scan results turned out to be in her favour! Love you forever and ever :)

Facebook cleansing

2011-02-01T01:17:00.001+08:00

"It's good for the social online soul."

I will endeavour to shrink the number of 'friends' I have on facebook by 10% over the next week or so. My goodness, that's like 143 friends to erase.

I will delete you if I've forgotten who you are or I see no need to interact with you in the future.

Stolen Sunday

2011-01-30T22:58:00.003+08:00

I think today's weather has wrecked me with a great disdain for rain. I feel like my weekend has been unduly stolen away by the rain. I sniff, sneeze and shiver at home.

Anyway, let me share with you my new found love for Sally Seltmann and Florence & The Machines. Love them to bits. They have been on my repeat playlist all day.

Come home soon......

And I leave you with this thought:

Sweet Disposition

2011-01-30T15:07:00.001+08:00

Ebb and flow

2011-01-29T13:41:00.002+08:00

Friends come and go, lovers come and go, hobbies come and go, fashions come and go, vocations come and go but two things remain: Family and Tattoos!

Yes, Vienna is family.

CCB!

2011-01-27T23:58:00.002+08:00

This too shall pass

2011-01-24T01:59:00.001+08:00

No, fly me, fly me, far as pole from pole;

Rise Alps between us! and whole oceans roll!

Ah, come not, write not, think not once of me,

Nor share one pang of all I felt for thee.

Okaeri!

2011-01-23T12:43:00.007+08:00

Vintage Collection!

2011-01-21T01:07:00.001+08:00

My cousin Rachel shocked me today with these uploaded pics on Facebook. I was barely in Primary School! From 5 grandkids back in the 90s, we've expanded to a fleet of 9 today. How we miss our beloved grand dad :)

Back in Amah's house

As usual, my dad gets squashed by my lil brother.

The family's favourite buffet coffee house - Hotel Boulevard! (it's been demolished...)

Rachel only 4 days old!

2011-01-21T00:26:00.003+08:00

Met up with Kim Du Hyun for hardcore sashimi and mackarel kimchi stew at Man Bok. The food came in eerie proportions. Kim said the mackeral kimchi stew could possibly feed him for a month. The sashimi was really fresh and satisfying to say the least! Unfortunately, I didn't really know what I was devouring. The sashimi selection was oddly different from the typical Jap type I'm more familiar with.

Hardcore Sashimi Platter

2011-01-18T23:24:00.001+08:00

An Excerpt: The Little Prince and the The Fox

2011-01-18T01:28:00.001+08:00

It was then that the fox appeared.

"Good morning" said the fox.

"Good morning" the Little Prince responded politely although when he turned around he saw nothing.

"I am right here" the voice said, "under the apple tree."

"Who are you?" asked the Little Prince, and added, "You are very pretty to look at."

"I am a fox", the fox said.

"Come and play with me," proposed the Little Prince, "I am so unhappy."

"I cannot play with you," the fox said, "I am not tamed."

"AH please excuse me," said the Little Prince.

But after some thought, he added: "what does that mean---'tame'?"

"You do not live here," said the fox, "what is it you are looking for?"

"I am looking for men," said the Little Prince. "What does that mean---tame?"

"Men," said the fox, "they have guns, and they hunt. It is very disturbing. They also raise chickens. These are their only interests. Are you looking for chickens?"

"No," said the Little Prince. "I am looking for friends. What does that mean---tame?"

"It is an act too often neglected," said the fox. "It means to establish ties."

"To establish ties?"

"Just that," said the fox.

"To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you.

And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes.

But if you tame me, then we shall need each other.

To me, you will be unique in all the world."

To you, I shall be unique in all the world. . ." "I am beginning to understand," said the Little Prince.

"There is a flower. . .I think she has tamed me. . ."

"It is possible," said the fox. "On earth one sees all sorts of things."

"Oh but this is not on the earth!" said the Little Prince.

The fox seemed perplexed, and very curious. "On another planet?"

"Yes"

"Are there hunters on that planet?"

"No"

"Ah that's interesting! Are there chickens?"

"No"

"Nothing is perfect," sighed the fox.

But he came back to his idea.

"My life is very monotonous," he said. "I hunt chickens; men hunt me. All chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And in consequence, I am a little bored.

But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others.

Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music out of my burrow.

And then look: you see the grain-fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad.

But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat. . ."

The fox gazed at the Little Prince, for a long time. "Please---tame me!" he said.

"I want to, very much," the little prince replied. "But I have not much time. I have friends to discover, and a great many things to understand."

"One only understands the things that one tames," said the fox.

" Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so men have no friends any more. If you want a friend, tame me. . ."

"What must I do, to tame you? asked the Little Prince.

"You must be very patient," replied the fox.

First you will sit down at a little distance from me -like that - in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing.

Words are the source of misunderstandings.

But you will sit a little closer to me, every day..."

The next day the Little Prince came back.

"It would have been better to come back at the same hour," said the fox.

"If for example, you came at four o'clock in the afternoon, then at three o'clock I shall begin to be happy. I shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances. At four o'clock, I shall be worrying and jumping about. I shall show you how happy I am!

But if you come at just any time, I shall never know at what hour my heart is ready to greet you..

One must observe the proper rites. . ."

"What is a rite?" asked the Little Prince.

"Those also are actions too often neglected," said the fox. "they are what make one day different from other days, one hour different from other hours.

There is a rite, for example, among my hunters. Every Thursday they dance with the village girls. So Thursday is a wonderful day for me! I can take a walk as far as the vineyards. But if the hunters danced at just any time, every day would be like every other day, and I should never have any vacation at all."

So the Little Prince tamed the fox.

And when the hour of his departure drew near---

"Ah," said the fox, "I shall cry."

"It is your own fault," said the Little Prince. "I never wished you any sort of harm; but you wanted me to tame you. . ."

"Yes that is so", said the fox.

"But now you are going to cry!" said the Little Prince.

"Yes that is so" said the fox.

"Then it has done you no good at all!"

"It has done me good," said the fox, "because of the color of the wheat fields."

And then he added: "go and look again at the roses. You will understand now that yours is unique in all the world. Then come back to say goodbye to me, and I will make you a present of a secret."

The Little Prince went away, to look again at the roses.

"You are not at all like my rose," he said. "As yet you are nothing. No one has tamed you, and you have tamed no one. You are like my fox when I first knew him. He was only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But I have made a friend, and now he is unique in all the world." And the roses were very much embarrassed.

"You are beautiful, but you are empty," he went on. "One could not die for you. To be sure, an ordinary passerby would think that my rose looked just like you -- the rose that belongs to me.

But in herself alone she is more important than all the hundreds of you other roses: because it is she that I have watered; because it is she that I have put under the glass globe; because it is for her that I have killed the caterpillars (except the two or three we saved to become butterflies); because it is she that I have listened to, when she grumbled, or boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing. Because she is MY rose."

And he went back to meet the fox.

"Goodbye" he said.

"Goodbye," said the fox.

"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret:

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."

"What is essential is invisible to the eye," the Little Prince repeated, so that he would be sure to remember.

"It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important."

"It is the time I have wasted for my rose--" said the Little Prince so he would be sure to remember.

"Men have forgotten this truth," said the fox. "But you must not forget it.

You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose."

"I am responsible for my rose," the Little Prince repeated, so that he would be sure to remember.

Free

2011-01-16T00:08:00.001+08:00

Weary am I of the tumult, sick of the staring crowd,
Pining for wild sea places where the soul may think aloud.
Fled is the glamour of cities, dead as the ghost of a dream,
While I pine anew for the tint of blue on the breast of the old Gulf Stream.

I have had my dance with Folly, nor do I shirk the blame;
I have sipped the so-called Wine of Life and paid the price of shame;
But I know that I shall find surcease, the rest my spirit craves,
Where the rainbows play in the flying spray,
'Mid the keen salt kiss of the waves.

Then it's ho! for the plunging deck of a bark, the hoarse song of the crew,
With never a thought of those we left or what we are going to do;
Nor heed the old ship's burning, but break the shackles of care
And at last be free, on the open sea, with the trade wind in our hair.

By Eugene O'Neill

Story of our lives

2011-01-15T03:14:00.001+08:00

TOC Statement: Keep Calm and Carry On

2011-01-15T00:23:00.000+08:00

TOC Statement: Keep Calm and Carry On

2011-01-13T02:19:00.004+08:00

“I love you,” he whispered, and that was the moment he knew what he was going to do. When you loved someone, you put their needs before your own. No matter how inconceivable those needs were; no matter how fucked up; no matter how much it made you feel like you were ripping yourself into pieces.”

— Jodi Picoult, The Pact

Dinner with the bros

2011-01-10T02:07:00.001+08:00

Today Winston commented, "Marcus everytime you're back in Singapore, my life is very intense." That couldn't be more true! Marcus Chin brings back to Singapore his "bling bling" energy and that evil sinister laughter. I had great fun at dinner with the bros!

Winston, LL, Marcus, Guanwen, Samuel, Zhengxi

2011-01-10T00:54:00.000+08:00

Here is my secret. It is very simple: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.

The Little Prince

Pitterpat - Erin McCarley

2011-01-09T19:26:00.000+08:00

Tugged the moon into the ground
Turned this bedroom upside down tonight
Took my faith and i breathed it out
Then walked right through a cloud of flashing lights, bright lies.

Pain takes my heart's place
The love we made, we cant erase it, don't wanna face it

Pitter pat, the angel on my shoulder
Is haunting me tonight
Tick tock, the clock is getting louder
Ready for me to decide

I've lost my sense of right and wrong
Well-justified my soul to carry on
It feels so damn good to write off the rules
But when a new day breaks, I'm left a fool I'm such a fool

Pain takes my heart's place
But your sweet sweet love, oh I can taste it but still can't face it

Pitter pat, the angel on my shoulder
Is haunting me tonight
Tick tock the clock is getting louder
Waiting for me to decide

The sun is coming down on me
Could fate be so unkind?
Pain takes my heart's place
The love we made remains

And we wish you a happy 2011!

2011-01-09T17:20:00.000+08:00

2011-01-08T03:14:00.001+08:00

Much can be inferred about a man from his mistress: in her one beholds his weaknesses and his dreams.

--- Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

Must be the period

2011-01-08T02:52:00.001+08:00

Vienna appears to be under the weather!

Hello! Anybody there? I can see you!

2011-01-07T03:05:00.001+08:00

For some strange reason, I am unable to fall asleep. And I think you know why.

3 New Year Resolutions

2011-01-06T01:40:00.000+08:00

I work towards....

A Career Breakthrough
Financial Independence
Better Sleep

Keeping it short and sweet this year!

Metaphors Are Dangerous

My sentiments!

Beauty in the breakdown

Obliviate!

Danny the bear - My new boyfriend!

Ignorance Chapter 29

FYI

♥♥♥♥♥

FTW

My brain composition

Inspired by Sanctum

*Smash*

My Musical Pursuits

Chapter 22 of Milan Kundera's 'Ignorance'

You are tired

Wouldn't it be Nice?

Wander+Lust

Kurt Cobain’s suicide note

Unfinished Business

Bintan with the MTs

Trust me on this one

Everything's gonna be okay

This part is for you

Case in point

What a teaser!

Choking on your alibi

Perfect bolster

through this black maze of flesh and pain, you always push me through

Disconcerted and enchanted

The degree of slowness is directionally proportional to the intensity of memory. The degree of speed is directionally proportional to the intensity of forgetting.

Love taught me to lie, Life taught me to die

The Wedding

Everything will be a choice.

The Seconds Can Be Days

rolls eyes

Laughing so hard, no noise coming out, so you sit there clapping like a retarded seal.

anthem

From our birthday, until we die, Is but the winking of an eye.

My idea of a stroll in the park

what goes around... stays there.

OUCH

Let me share with you about my pet, peeve.

It's 1 March. Happy Founders' Day!

Observation

And so, you ask me to take a step of faith.

enlightened

I am still alive

Liz's birthday dinner @ Hyatt

Much Ado about Nothing

Pomp and circumstance

Rasta Baby

BFF

Too much pizza

Nobody said it was easy

Kwai Lan Face: familiar?

Happy Valentine's Day, My Dear

so demanding

If it's a broken part, replace it.

Yet another tumblr rip-off!

these violent delights...

Take these sunken eyes and learn to see

Chinese New Year Day 1: Maternal Side

Vindicated

A reason deprived of reason

The Truth.....

To my colour blind friends

Too much honesty!

Success

Need You Now

Tania Chin is back home!

Facebook cleansing

Stolen Sunday

Sweet Disposition

Ebb and flow

CCB!

This too shall pass

Okaeri!

Vintage Collection!

An Excerpt: The Little Prince and the The Fox

Free

Smash