elation over an email
i love professor yerkes.

amidst all the cluttered deadlines and presentations due this week, i survived! but not without a few blessings here and there; and a particular one from my professor for Ethnic American Literature, who loves tiger beer and who always fantacizes about it during lessons.

here's an email he sent to myself and two other friends who did the presentation with me:

Dear Sarah, Serene, and Serene,

I thought you did an impressive job on the presentation yesterday. I had come across the article you covered in your own research, and had not found it very helpful, but your presentation productively covered its main ideas and shed some light on Roth's story, and also raising some interesting questions during your Q&A.

Your powerpoint slides were clear and uncluttered, and your handout was well developed, helping your audience to follow along. Your presentation style was, in my opinion, very effective -- especially in the first and third presenters, but true for all three -- moving briskly through interesting claims that connected together, and you seemed confident and comfortable with the presentation material.

I also like the sense of humor and light self-mockery that gave the presentation a human touch.

Nicely done! Grade (for all 3): A

Regards,
Prof. Yerkes

my heart was all fuzzy wuzzy reading this. all together now, awwwwwwwwwwwww.

Dear Prof. Yerkes,

I love you.

With love,
Sarah

you don't know how i feel
but neither do i.

truth is, i am taking up the sph internship.

but it is a heavy price to pay to pursue my only begotten dream. can you imagine working on sundays? only pastors work on sunday, and the reason is because God won't strike them down with lightning. no wonder so many journalists die in their job.

but you know what? i think i am just going to try it.

not because i am not afraid of getting struck down by lightning; perhaps, because i know deep down this is where i should go. and God knows i will look up the skies and see the lightning fall. so maybe because God has put this guts in me, He will just spare me from an electrifying death.

i think so, i really do.
but of course God is not like that.

i am at an age where every one around me is so worried about their future and their careers and what to eat. it's getting really scary because for me, if not sph, then where? sigh, i need to take a look at God's Book of Life man.

or maybe a good sleep will do just fine.

i can't stop smiling these days
and it's all because of a boy.

i am going to have tuition with a 3-year-old boy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HAHA! sorry this looks really secondary school but omgzzzzzzzzz............................................... he's like so cute lor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i lubs him so much!!

you have no idea what i mean by cute. he's a northern indian boy who lives just 2steps from my gate (or 1, if i jump). YES, no kidding. from my gate to his gate, i need to take 2 seconds. so the story goes: his mother approached me to teach little "prateush" (i think it's spelt like that) chinese because they obviously cannot speak it at all.

he is learning chinese in his nursery now and has homework he has to complete. and i am FREAKING SUPPOSED TO HELP HIM WITH IT! HOW CUTE IS THAT?!

i cannot contain my excitement, seriously. prateush has bambi eyes and speaks as cute as he looks. i have no idea how to speak cutely but prateush can do just that. not only so, he has a little brother, "pranum" (okay, i am quite sure this is wrong spelling) who is only 1-year-old this year and is AS CUTE AS HIM!

what's the best thing?

GETTING PAID FOR IT.
i think i'm in heaven.

the pains of facebook
dear Lord, stop me from stalking.

i have been the biggest stalker. i stalk every one on my list. okay, maybe some who are not on my list. i cannot take it anymore.

the problem about facebook is that it supports voyeurism. why would i want to look into the life of a stunningly beautiful friend whom i lost contact with who is, BY THE UNFORTUNATE WAY, a hot pretty air stewardess now? i do not want to look at anything through her eyes because my eyes are going green from mould.

i do not want to see her peektures (ahem) of her travels to switzerland, sweden, london (Lord, save me) and the likes. I DON'T WANT TO SEE THAT.

well, i am certainly not envious because i am rather happy with what i have now. you know, studies, ntu, lots of books, good tuition kids... did i mention LOTS of books? and oh, i feel happy enough seeing the Universal studios in singapore. who cares about united states, really. like REALLY.

it is precisely times like this when i ask myself how contented i am. the answer ain't holy at all. i seriously feel like laughing at myself in the face. GAH!

dry spell
some difficulty churning out alphabets

it is perhaps a failure to recall certain memories of the daily happenings.
maybe i am too lazy to put them into words
or facebook has become a bigger draw;
maybe twitter's 140 words would suffice
but still i think,
the problem lies with me afterall.

i have, rather officially, gone into a dry, dry season in writing.
i cannot write in acerbic undertones like how i use to
conforming to those societal demands, maybe; i don't know.
but words have certainly drained out.

what i need is not too far-fetched
though it seems a depraved notion as of now
i need some time, i guess.
just a little while to gather my thoughts and remember how i was
i need to forget what is correct

and start thinking like how i did
forget SPH, forget hedwig, forget tutorials and assignments
think justice and dignity and passion and freedom
and think writing.

and then, start writing.
maybe i would find it soon, afterall.
Writing, you scare me.

snake and ladder
there will always be a ladder when there is a snake

i shall never take bus913 in the evening again.

tell me again, what do kids do in PE these days? do they like jump into the rubbish chute for swimming lessons? i do not mean to probe; but i cannot help it when they smell like they have 20 dead rats hanging on them and they are holding the bus handle just beside me. i was really sorry to say i pinched my nose until she got off the bus.

i seriously had a fairly good day so i would never expect the only bane of my life (okay, day) to be smelly school-going kids. well, don't ever associate me with school-going because anywhere that does not incarcerate you with something so smelly called Physical Education is uh-uh, not school. so.

i cannot say that i smell exactly the nicest; but at least i don't smell like i rolled over vomit! twice! honestly, thinking about it makes my blood boil because the poor school girl was standing beside me from causeway point all the way to 2 stops before my stop. that is nearly 4hours if you consider the time i fell unconscious and died from asphyxiation.

a few thousand phrases related to rubbish chute, vomit, decomposing rats and a few biblical ones like "get behind me, satan" ran through my head.

i am so going to lodge a complaint! GAH.

spawn and spawn and spawn
if there's a baby, that means there is a guy involved.

oh my goodness, there is this female i know who has been hiding a very ugly secret. i had thought that she was alone in her house; little did i know, she was housing a male in her hideout. not only so, they have spawned.

SPAWNED!

may the Good Lord bless her soul - i saw her offspring when i stepped into the dark, dark place. fear was palpable in my nervous footsteps. i dropped all my plans to get a cool, nice drink and went back to my room, feeling all at once aghast and nauseous.

it had never felt this bad.

knowing there is an annoying lizard under the fridge and seeing a small little lizard scurrying past the kitchen floor. now i know there are at least 3 nincompoops under your fridge. how comforting.

you know things cannot be all that good if a guy is involved.