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Showing posts with label Travel and Adventure. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Travel and Adventure. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 02, 2009
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This is the old blog. You'll be redirected by the friendly policeman in a while...
Click here if you prefer feeling like you're in control.
Posted by
Audi
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Filmmaking
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My Life
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National Service
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Photography
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Reflections
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Travel and Adventure
Friday, February 06, 2009
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Firstly, congrats to Brennan for getting a mention on The Straits Times paper yesterday. Now everybody knows you SMS to Plurk.
I've been using Twitter for a while now, and more recently, Plurk. They're great platforms for micro-blogging. If you haven't seen them, they're on the sidebar to the right of this page. Then I have to wonder how you could even miss that. I tend to use them when I have a little quip to say that doesn't justify a new blog post. My preference is Plurk, for its rather colorful and friendly way of communicating. I like the prefix that you could choose from like, "Audi is, Audi has, Audi loves...". It helps when you're having a little writer's block. Oh, and it has a privacy function so you could bitch about things and only your Plurk friends could see it. Otherwise... I'd use Twitter via its SMS service when I have a random quote or a brain fart while in the MRT and there's no Internet nearby. What I don't really like, though, is the character limit. But that's fine... there's a saying, "Keep it simple, stupid.", or K.I.S.S. when you're writing. It's trimming the fat so people won't get lost in words. I leave here now with two quips I wrote today but went over the character limit.
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Audi
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My Life
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Reflections
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Travel and Adventure
Thursday, January 15, 2009
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I've added a new poll. It's over at the Nuffnang Ad on my sidebar to the right. I'd love it if you could give me some feedback. Vote away!
Quite a strange weather this week. It's been really sunny and I have my shades on as usual. On top of that, I'd hide in the shadows, out of the sun. What was unusual this time was the wind.  Sunset over Seletar. The trees were combed back by the persistent wind. The palm trees barely made it through the gusts of freezing air, which, again, was weird. I radio-ed back a few times,"Guardrooooom..... it's raaaaiiiinnniiinggg...." only to have the dark clouds pass by, sunny again. It finally drizzled a few hours later but was equivalent to the skies shaking off after a piss at the urinal. I found the raindrops stinging, though. It was icy cold. It seems that the sun doesn't set on time anymore. Normally, it'd be dark by seven, but this time, seven was the new six-thirty. It finally gets dark at seven-forty now. But after all this wacky combination of bright sunlight and cool air (and a new aircon in the guardroom), it's the perfect set-up for a good morning nap. I slept like a baby today after my morning shift, skipping lunch to complete a four-hour nap. I even had time for a dream! Going over to Hooters tomorrow after work with the RP guys. I don't know what to expect.
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Audi
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National Service
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Travel and Adventure
Monday, November 03, 2008
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The US Elections are TODAY.
Obama '08! From the 1st - 2nd November, PUB opened up the Marina Barrage, the first reservoir in the city, to the public. Aside from the green-earth agenda that Marina Barrage promotes, it's also made out in the media to be one of the best places for a scenic view of the Singapore skyline. I've been anxious to visit the place over the past week when I first saw pictures of it in The Straits Times.  It was 6pm on Saturday the first. I jumped into my clothes, took up my tripod and camera, and left for the Barrage. Dropping off at Marina Bay MRT, I was directed towards a shuttle bus pick-up point thanks to the signs put up in the MRT. The intervals for the buses were 20 to 30 minutes. Wait, what? Getting out of the MRT I was greet to a long line of the public shuffling their way across muddied ground and onto the pavement leading to the MRT. They didn't look particularly happy and many were there with their families. I walked the same muddied path which lead down to a tunnel. It was there that I found a traffic jam of pedestrians just spilling over onto the road. Add to that the foreign workers cycling to the constructions sites around the area. Cement trucks were rolling down the road at great speeds. The temporary bus stop for the shuttle bus was packed. I'm not gonna wait 30 minutes to get on a bus that I'd have to squeeze to get into. No, thanks, I'll walk. I activated my Yankee Route Marching legs and walked to the Marina Barrage. I knew where it was thanks to the banners along the road and the fact that Joey and I went there the night before at midnight just for kicks. We were made to turn back by a security guard. It wasn't a particularly short walk. I think I walked a good half an hour, chin dripping with sweat. And I'm not exaggerating. I freaking walked from Marina Bay MRT to Marina Barrage. What the hell was I thinking?! I wasn't the only one that was walking, though, and I overtook groups of families walking along the road towards the same destination. Add that to the heavy construction happening on both sides of the road and the occasional stench of buffalo poo. The journey there was dirty for public standards and it's a contrast to the banners on lamp post celebrating the clean-green-we're-so-clean opening of the Barrage.  I reached the Barrage in a while. I was confused at where I ended up. I didn't receive the whole "Wow" experience upon arrival. Was I supposed to? There were rows of tentage and a ton of people walking all over the mud and sitting on the road sides. But I didn't bother much (though I am complaining, aren't I?) since I was there to try out a few photography techniques. I didn't particularly find the main complex nice or anything. It's the same old, same old. Then again, I didn't explore the exhibitions inside. The surrounding little gardens and water features, though, were turning out to be quite a haven. The city skyline peeks between the saplings of the garden. In a way, it reminds me of the time when I was a little child laying in a big box, looking up at the world. Did you get that or is it becoming flowery nonsense?  A long curved ramp leads visitors up onto the famed roof garden of the complex. The grass path that runs together with it in the center expands on the top to form the field itself. The view that greeted me up there was, simply put, awesome. I was delighted at the vast open space. The sky was huge. The sea was huge. The fact that I could see these two meet at a point called a 'horizon' sealed the deal for me. The skyline occupied the entire span of the shoreline with the Singapore Flyer to the East and the CBD area to the West. Looking at the skyline from the Barrage, the moon shined brightly with Venus, just to the right of it, clearly in view. Yes, I was surprised as well to learn that what I saw beside the moon was Venus.  I came down to the Barrage this time to specifically have a go at HDR. I've never done it before but read a lot about it. There's a variety of photos out on the net claiming to be HDR. Some are flat out ugly and others are interestingly eye-catching. Personally, I fall for the more realistic version of what HDR is supposed to look like. At the same time, I've never really gotten to taking proper night shots of anything save the occasional snapshots while in the car and giggling at the streaks of lights. I set up my Canon 450D on its standard kit lens (EF 18-55) on my tripod. For a moment there I felt like I was setting up a Matador. Any sooner and I'm afraid I'll be checking my backblast area. What I planned to do was to shoot at a normal EV setting, then climb it up to +2, then -2, and then come home and combine these exposures together. Following that is a tweaking of what needs to have more light, which less, and finally recreate a scene that represents what we might see, on location, with a little dose of artistic interpretation. I hope you got that, I hate writing this way. I shot at a an aperture of around f8, sometimes more, and simply because I read somewhere that this creates a nice star-like effect to lights. Also, I've had too many disappointments with my pictures when I find the camera focused on some random thing other than what I was interested in. This was due to the usual 4.5 - 5.6 aperture size that I usually lock down my camera to. In effect, I did away with auto-focus as well.  Switching on Live View was a ton of help for me. My tripod was extended to the max and there wasn't much things lying around to climb up and look through the viewfinder. I switched on the camera's Live feature, zoomed in my lens, zoomed in on the image on the LCD, focused, zoomed out the LCD, framed up my lens and shot the photo. I took exposures that lasted from 2.5secs to 30secs.I never took a 30 second exposure shot before. The first few times I pressed it I felt stranded as I stood there like a dumb ass with arms crossed and biting on my nails. I shooed any kids getting near my tripod and gasped loudly as any auntie or uncle was about to walk in front of my camera. It's hilarious to see them get down and duck walk under the camera's field of view... In actual fact, they could walk as per normal and not even cross my camera's field of vision. But that's just sadist talk and nothing related to photography. I'm sorry. I realized that a remote or a shutter cable of some sort would be helpful in these situations where repeated images needed to be taken. I think they call this technique 'bracketing'. I've never seen a shutter cable before but I expect it to have a dial to control the aperture and a button to release the shutter. Amirite? It'll help a lot because I found myself playing Jenga with my camera as I adjusted setting and pressing the shutter was a game of Traffic Lights. Incredibly annoying and a big problem when you're in a crunch. I took about 160 shots that day on the roof. For I had at least three different exposure settings for each scene I was capturing. I tried out different things and thought of theories while shooting. Like why not I shoot this exposure just for the highlights... that exposure for that area... and so on. Another thing I believe in is to have a rough idea of your workflow, whether it's shooting a film, a home video, or photographs. Know the tools and how they work, and the process. That way, when out in the field, you can plan your shots and be confident about it because you have an idea on how it'll be processed later on in the workflow. This confidence doesn't restrict but, rather, it encourages experimentation. I think that is an invaluable trait: experimentation. I found a secluded corner of the Marina Barrage. It's on the far end of the pavement and beyond that was the construction site of the upcoming Marina Gardens. The place was pitch black, save the lights from the Barrage complex itself. By the way, I gave up taking a picture of the complex... I simply didn't know how to frame it up. It's a weird design! I tried shooting with flash, without flash, very long exposures, and the whole jin gang.  Processing them with Picturenaut by HDRLabs, and open source free software to create HDRI, I got this image by combining a selection of exposures. A quick export to Photoshop I did the usual tweaking and styling I like to do for the sake of fun. It's one of my favorite pictures. I like the water, the composition and the floating thingy on the water. But I wasn't satisfied yet. The picture grew old after a while and my hands were itchy again.  I re-did the photos again with a different selection of exposures to create this image. I experimented again with the blending and got to this picture, which had a different mood to it altogether. It's not the best, but I really love this photo. I'm quite amazed at some details I see here that I didn't even notice on location. Remember that this whole area was pitch-black. I took notice only recently that there seem to be an altar of some sort just ahead of me with a deity on the top. I could be mistaken, but that's just freaking creepy. After two hours on the damn Barrage, I bailed. My illness got back at me in the form of massive headaches at weird parts of my face and I rushed to a bunch of gay guys, who were in quite a big diva-mood, behind the counter. I bought a bottle of 100plus and gulped down three pills of Panadol Actifast and proceeded to finish the bottle. You're right... I walked out of the Barrage wondering whether I just OD-ed on Panadol. Sure as hell felt high. I took the public bus back to the MRT this time. I waited a good 40 minutes at the first bus stop from the barrage which was a nice fifteen minutes walk. I found a comfy seat on the train, laid my things down and stretched. Soon, I'll reach home to Yishun. That's that. If you're wondering how the hell I could update on a bloody Monday night... Aren't I supposed to be in camp now?!
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Audi
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My Life
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National Service
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Travel and Adventure
Thursday, September 18, 2008
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 Ten days since we passed-out. I finally met up with Nicholas a few days ago. It's the first time we hooked up again after he disappeared after the parade. It's been a hellish week. Not because we're rushing... but because we're rushing for no reason at all. We're neither here, nor there, unable to pursue our dreams nor unable to sit back and relax. Everybody's anticipating their postings which will be out tomorrow, Friday. I spent the week sitting in front of the computer, my chair wet with the humidity my dirty ass creates. I played Armed Assault for hours on end, kept up with the current Internet news and trends (I caught the stock market crash a day before it came out in our local news.) and had a go again at website design and building. As the days went by I became very anxious and fidgety. Staying at home was a bore - I had my mom nagging me to clean my room and my dad calling me every other hour telling me to remember who God was and how magnificent He is. My field pack, LBV, helmet and duffel bag lay across my room, opened, but still stuffed with zip lock bags containing my clothes. I dressed up and went out. I caught with some of my old friends. I can't say I looked forward to meeting them. We've come to a point where we have to admit that we're entirely different and stubborn. It was the usual yada-yada-talking-amongst-themselves all over again I didn't bother much. My fingers were itchy, though, and I had this itch to spend - Spend all the money I had. I took cabs to and fro home and town, bought coffee from those cafes, bought a new cap without trying it on and walked over to Borders at Wheelock and bombed a wad of cash on books like "The Dummies Guide to Dreamweaver CS3". Then, of course, take a cab home. My legs were tired.  When I met Nicholas, I bluffed him into thinking I broke my arm against my room door on purpose. I don't know whether that actually rushed him to come down. I think not... I waited over two hours for him. Bastard. I was looking for clothes, and he was sporting enough to bring me a couple of rounds around ORCHARD-FUCKING-ROAD. Seriously, what the fuck? I did saw some clothes that were nice. As he showed me more and more jeans and shirts I came up with ideas for a new image I'd like to adopt. Back in my head, however, I knew I couldn't buy anything that day - I was broke from the days before.  Justin came along after a while and he's been up with a few of his own things. Just chillin', he says. Of cigarettes and alcohol. These two things accompany many soldiers in their free time. Or maybe not so free time. In any case, these two have been my best friends since I passed out. I seem to have smoked a lot more than usual. Nick and I talked about it. We kinda figured out it was because we've been controlled on our smoking for the past three months. I mentioned there were times I didn't want to smoke at all when there was a smoke break. I could do away with it, but it was a fucking smoke break! Freedom! Outside in the civilian world - Freedom! And we light another one up. Our eyes look from the corners in an arrogant manner as we flick open our boxes and twirl our lighters. We're free from rules! Free from regimentation! We shall light this stick to celebrate! And then another stick, and another. It doesn't stop. I wouldn't have thought much about smoking if it wasn't made so obvious to me the whole time in camp.  Joey and a few others left for Genting the last weekend. That gave me good reason to hang around the house. I really didn't feel like doing anything. Uncle Jimmy, even him, the guy whom I respected so much, I didn't even bother calling. I know what he'll say - I've gotten lazy. Maybe I have. Or maybe I'm tired. Or maybe I'm too involved with something. I don't know. I met up with Daryl, an old friend of mine from FSV, and he drove me down to Paulaner for a swig. Nicholas was supposed to come along but I think he had more important things to do at the last minute... like tea-bagging his water bottle. The world couldn't have been better towards me than the time I got into Daryl's car. It was an overwhelming sense of familiarity. That whole night we became what we were - young adults. We drove around Singapore (he got lost), ate at Jalan Kayu and to top it all off, he played a CD, set at random tracks, and the two tracks it played were Guns and Roses' Sweet Child O' Mine and Paradise City; part of the album that actually got me through the lame and boring nights in the bunk at Tekong. By the time Paradise City ended, we were infront of my place. No more speeding down the highway, no more music blasting out of the car, no more ferocious winds blowing into our eye sockets. I bid him goodbye and got out of the car. It was back to normality again.  Kwang Wei entered NS on the 15th of this month. It was a Monday, I think. I woke up in the afternoon, way past 12pm. A big no-no. I checked my phone and had a message from him. His message hit me in the face - he was serving his BMT with Yankee Company! An unexpected rush went over my entire being. I felt like screaming it out to the whole world. I felt like gathering people on the streets and getting them into a circle and sing the "Yankee Boleh" cheer. Even as I was bathing I couldn't stop giggling. The image of Yankee - of its bunk, company line, sergeants, they kept coming back and I giggled with pride. I called Kwang Wei over and over for a few days but never was answered. I sms-ed Sergeant Lyndon about the news. I finally did get Kwang Wei after Paulaner and I spoke with him at lengths about wherever he was now. He's in Platoon one as well, but in section 2. He's sleeping on Faizal's bed, the guy with the fastest SOC timing in our platoon. I went further to ask who was sleeping on my bed. I told him by rifle number, its serial, and where Justin slept. I knew it was pointless but I kept telling him to pass on the message to the people who will take over my rifle and my bed and Justin's rifle and bed. I told him everything about every single detail about my rifle. For a moment, I thought I really did miss my rifle. When Nicholas heard my story he chipped in (in between my stutters, no less) - we don't miss Yankee because of "Company Pride" or any of that. We don't live for the sake of others. Nicholas said we probably miss the smokers and the good sergeants and the environment. Probably. I think what we missed, though, was the daily routine and regimentation. It's been ingrained into our body clock that, I, at least, feel disorientated every morning when I wake up at home. Maybe I should stop babbling on. I've lost the point of this entire segment.  As the days to our posting, our next goal, came nearer, I spent more time with Nick... only because the fucking dick ditched us the day before. I honestly wanted to leave him hanging this time. Then again, maybe this might be the last time any of us would ever meet again. We went over to Zouk for their usual Mambo Night event. It's becoming less Mambo now and more generic-clubbing-music. They added new beam lights. It's cool and all but the place is too bright now to go nuts. Nick, Jarrell (MCM guy, we met before in school),Paul (MCM, don't know him, but is Sze Aik's platoon mate) and I spent about half an hour tapping our feet on the dance floor occasionally getting right into the middle in hopes we'll get high with all the bodies around us. It didn't happen, not even after a couple of drinks. We bailed for a couple of sticks and that was pretty much our night. I wasn't happy, to say the least. I wasn't satisfied yet. Nick then came up with the idea to play LAN over at the Meridian. I had some fun there kicking his ass in Call of Duty 4. I shouted and jeered. The mood died quickly after that and we had supper at a place nearby. We all talked about Army, again. Nick and I listened in to Paul and, I don't know, it made me miss my BMT. I still believe we haven't gone through a lot... but this feeling was overwhelming. We finally picked up our stuff to go home. Nick and I looked at each other. He always made this sick joke (maybe it wasn't even a joke) that this was the last time we'll see each other. I got quite annoyed at that idea and I mocked him for saying things like that... it's not the last time! Back of my mind, however, maybe it was. Maybe. I recalled the times we did random things to each other. Like the time I was minding my own business with Kyle and Nick comes over with the cheap-ass SAF shaver and proceeded to shave my legs. Or the couple of times I came over to his bed and we'd lay together and have random emo-talks about our dreams for the future. The night ended with us sleeping on the same bed. I'm thankful enough no commanders caught us sleeping together (almost did, though. Close call.). There was one morning where we woke up a bit later and when we falled in for 5BX a few of the other guy came over and asked,"Were you sleeping with Nicholas last night?" Great, now I have homosexual tendencies. Before we left Nicholas waved goodbye to me. I said bye and he extended his hands for a shake. I just knew what he was about to say. So I didn't extend my hands out. I told him,"I refuse to shake your hands. I won't even acknowledge it. This is not the end." With that, we split. Next week we'll be all over the place attending to our new units. It's a new chapter for all of us... and deep in my heart I hope we can enjoy each other's company as we always did for the past three months. Maybe... 
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Audi
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Henry
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Jimmy Low
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My Life
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Travel and Adventure
Saturday, September 13, 2008
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Was it... three days? Three days since I passed out.
 I think we all had big plans of relaxing and partying after Wednesday. I can't say we didn't execute it, but we did. We smoked when we wanted, drank however we wanted and wore whatever the fuck we wanted. Finally, we were civilian again! We weren't.  We went over to Daryl's place that Wednesday night. I brought over my 360 and we planned to get high on drinks. It didn't take long for me to fall into a deep sleep. I hadn't slept at all since the parade and drinking games never made much sense to me... God knows why I participate.  I was woken up at seven in the morning by Paris, Daryl's dog. It was cold and I found myself on wooden panels - I realized I spent the night at the balcony. He lived on the 22nd story.  I finally did get back home at around five in the evening and within the next hour I was out again to Outdoors beside Centrepoint. I was plagued by cough and flu since the 16km route march and I haven't been saving up much but I still took cabs. I cannot argue enough how right it is for us army boys to take cabs. Maybe it's the kind where transport has always been provided for us in the Army or that we're always in this sense of rush whenever we're back outside... am I alone on this? My sister called me out that night to watch a couple of stand-up comics. Admission for me was free and pretty much everything I ordered was paid for by someone else. I don't know, I was still on a hangover from the previous night and needed a lot of sleep. If you had ever lived in a blur...  It's a few more days left before we get our postings. I haven't seen Nick since Wednesday. We had a plan to go over to Geylang to find some cake. A few days from now a few of the guys would be off to Genting for a holiday. I wonder where the rest will be. Where will I be? So many questions. So many uncertainties.  I need more time in the Army.
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Audi
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Friday, September 12, 2008
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I graduated from BMTC1, Yankee Company, on the 10th of September 2008. My buddies might remember how unsatisfied I was as BMT came to an end. I think this picture sums up my feelings pretty well after the parade. At the end of the day, none of us went through BMT alone. These were the people I fought with, teared with, cheered with and trained with. 
The Platoon One smokers. Top Row from Left: Ah Boon, Junior, Kyle, Justin, Audi, Helmie, Joey. Bottom Row from Left: Joseph, Derrick, Wei Ming, Sean Daryl. Nicholas isn't in the picture, though. What happens days after that, months after that, years... whether or not we'll still be in touch or slowly dwindle away, I have no idea. I will have fond memories from Yankee Company, though hazy as it may be. The pictures from that day may seem insignificant to outsiders, but as I look through them they speak a million words. Thank you, Yankee Company.
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Tuesday, September 26, 2006
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Bullets whizzing past, people yelling, pants getting muddy and sweat floods your balls. The siren blows and everyone on the field stand back and reflect on what they’ve did, smiling at what they’ve done, rejoicing, forging stronger bonds between friends and acquaintances and at the same time having done just a terrific work out.
 It’s not so accurate, but paintball mags and ads promise something along these lines. I’ve had quite the luck to have the paintball idea resurrected with the help of Jason and what a great time to play paintball, a new experience for us, than on Tharik’s and Aik’s birthday?  Cool masks, cool vests, cool gun but ultra-Kiddy-Palace-bubble-gum-loader. Guo Xiong’s gang was present along with Don and Clara plus Jason’s brother, Ronald (finally... i get to see his brother). So that makes us 13 ppl, playing at Yishun’s Orchid Country Club. i wont say anything much…..  omg! REAL brothers! … but one thing’s for sure; paintball will be a monthly event for us now. For about SGD$70 per person for about 2 hours, why not? Just work for two days at least and you’d get the money to play paintball. If you’re a girl, play paintball. If you’re gay, play paintball. If you’re gay and still hiding, play paintball. If you’re a religious zealot with three horns with grey hair and still a virgin, hey, why not? Play paintball.  GX under fire. Umm.... but mummy... wont getting shot hurt? OF COURSE! Just imagine a ball, 3cm in diameter, smacking right onto ur skin at 50 km/h, tearing off the first layer like a cannon ball on a plate of sea shells.  Nicholas relates to us his story of being tortured with ciggarettes after being held hostage by gay clowns. But what is a simple bruise compared to the benefits of finally raining a volley of fire at Henry, hitting him hard countless times and feeling so good about it as you watch him run back in fear? Yeah! That’s what I’m talking about!  Shah got a new job..... So, Audi, Mr. I’m-so-pro-at-FEAR, what’s your injury story? You know those kinds of soldiers who come out of the battlefield without a scratch? I thought I was one of them. The first round had me standing clean and bright from the others who had been stained with paintballs and dirt.  GX is an alien! I knew it! So I thought I was lucky. I went back into the field. The siren rang. I ran… and ran.. and ran… I hid behind a couple of barrels. I shot one guy. Down. I turned over to the other side. Down. I peeked through the openings, the guy was suppressed. Then POW! I felt one hit my right forearms. My first injury of the day.  omg it's looking at me! That couldn’t compare to other people’s injuries; Henry got one on his ass, arms, legs and the most painful he said was the one that hit him straight on top of his head. Just now I talked to him and his skull has reduced to half of its original thickness. He fished out who the hell shot him… and lo and behold – it was Clara.  Supreme being: Thou shall eat this fruit and thou shalt like it! Clara: Orh orh.. ok.. GX had countless on his legs. His knew was shot and it was bleeding. Don had a few bleeding ones. Zhen Ling, standing at seven foot high got a fat one on his inner thigh.  Seven-foot tall Zhen Ling regrets undergoing knee surgery ten years ago to increase his height. And the most battered of all…. Is Nicholas (I just found out you were Niko. Damn, I need to know my readers…). I think he got three on his neck (OUCH), a few on his legs (WHOOHOO) and countless more on his arms (So... this means no nighttime quickie?)  I would hate getting that. Clara and I seem to be the only chickens who never got shot. (actually *some ppl* were urging me to do a friendly fire at her…. But where the hell do I shoot? Her butt?) So I thought I was lucky.  The siren rang again. I trudged out into the field. No one has appeared yet. I kept low. Clara ran across my path, I almost tripped. I swerved to the right, side-stepping to the wooden pallets on my 2 o’clock….. And then….. wwhhiizzz…… SPLAT!  If you're drooling while looking at this shot, congratulations; you're a straight guy. I stumbled. I fell. I said “shit”. I backtracked my way to the left of my field, trying hard to hold on to something, making my way back to the medic hut. I felt someone run past me. “Hey! Bring me to the medic hut!” “it’s there! It’s there!” I tripped. I fell. I stumbled. The guy next to me was shooting. “Where’s the cloth?!” I yelled. “Cloth? What cloth?” “Cloth!!!!” “Why do u need that for?!” “I’ve been shot in the head and I cant see!” Whosoever was the one who had that once-in-a-lifetime chance of flying a paintball straight into the goggles of mine, who was stooping, sprinting sideways and a foot from undeniable cover in addition to the fact that I was at the back end of the field, I SALUTE YOU for who you are and what you’ve done!  Jason is kind and nice. Jason is kind and nice. Jason is kind and nice.... Sometimes luck just balances out everything. I wonder if I had turned me head elsewhere just a split second more, would my injury then balance up to the injuries of others? Then i guess that leaves Clara to be the "clean" one. We'll get her next tme, boys... we'll get her next time...
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Audi
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Travel and Adventure
Monday, July 03, 2006
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A few days ago Tianyu and I met up after 13 mnths of absence. Its funny how we live just at the opposite ends of Yishun Town and never hear from each other. Technology in communication has surely brought people closer, indee-diddly-do…
 We caught up on a lot of things…. Once again I let my anger out on pretty much everything. Between blogging and shouting about problems, I’d choose shouting. Then we went to my place and watched the Simpsons seasons 11 and 15. Well he was watching it anyways.. I fell asleep.  Oblivious to the mess at his feet. Tanny coming over has thought me one thing – it’s possible to masturbate behind a friend without him knowing it. …. lol  Reading your favourite blog. One of the things that was brought up was how we all (as in.. the guys) should go out again. I mean.. cmon.. Kpool.. movie.. kpool.. movie… zzz…. The paintball thingy this august probably wont be initiated seeing that the two “organizers”, Don and I, are at each other’s throats, silently. So tanny and I opted for Mt Kinabalu or back to Kuching. Cos the last trip in 2002 was a disaster. But I needed to release that adventure spirit quickly. Cos its like when you have a stomach ache… you go poo poo straight away. I called my Protector From The Mainland Chinese, Jason, and last night we had our cycling adventure. It’s been a long while. I told Jason we’re going to cycle to Adam Road to eat and then cycle back. I thought Adam road was near Ngee Ann so when he said “okay”.. I got kinda shocked. From yishun to adam road? Wow…. Then he said he didn’t know the way so I had to lead. I went for the “town-hopping” route. Meaning we go through all the towns leading to Bukit Timah. Here’s the rough outline of where we’re going… thanks to Google Earth.  Soon we were off. But not after stopping by the 7-11 at Yishun GV. I went in to buy a few bottles of water and the complimentary chocolate bar and when I came out, I found Jason smoking. Mixed feelings…im like.. huh.. hah… what… whoo… what… huh… heh??? “Are you a regular?” I asked. “Nah… depends who I’m with.” Lol.. wth does that mean….  Jason cant wait to go.. hence his blurness. So off we went.. I found some motorcycle debris lying on the road on the way to Sembawang so I got rid of that. It was around 12 at that time and the drivers were already quite reckless. Jason shouted a few times when he saw a car zooming in onto the slip road, its headlights beamed on my rusty old bike. But well I’m here… so nothing happened….  We cycled further up to Woodlands and thought of stopping over at Causeway point to munch. Then I found a group of teens which had some girls in it and they were all mass-hitting one of their friend’s lan jiao. He started screaming and holding his balls, walking around the area shouting. “waahh!! Lan jiao hen tong leh!!!” so we didn’t make the stop. Weirdos.  Whatever was after Woodlands MRT, I didn’t know. Crossing the field was fun. They had this stepped pavement and I didn’t see it…. And the entire pavement ran across the field for about 20 metres. So the whole time rolled down the steps on our bike. “ouch… ouch… ouch.. ouch.. ah my balls… ouch….” That night I was freeballing again in sports shorts and you know how testicles get in the way of a lot of things. Bike seat + thighs = pain. The roads weren’t that lit after woodlands. Lots of tall woods and trees and no HDB blocks. We lost sight of the MRT train tracks so we had to play it by our knowledge of the MRT train tracks which we used as our guide. After Marsiling was Yew Tee… I think. The road lead us to HDB-less places and huge truks were parked along the next few hundred metres of roads. Then the smells started coming in. “mm… Jason you smell that? Smells like Malaysia!” I saw the road sign and we were along Woodlands Road. We saw the Kranji War Memorial as well. Creepy. Then we came to bus stop B12 along Woodlands road.… and a guy was standing in the middle of the road. A car passed and he put his hand out then back down again. Ooo.. peddlers. Better make a run for it… they might kill us. Then Jason stopped. ZZZZ!! The guy was selling cigs from Indonesia at 5 bucks per 20 stick box. He has the Menthol kind and the Red kind. Jason grabbed a Menthol and gave three two-dollar notes. The guy went, “Sorry.. no change..” Then a hired cab came by. I saw a nice sweet Chinese girl at the back seat and when she saw the three of us I think she got pissed scared. The uncle wound down the window and they made an exchange and then sped off. Damn.. I thought it was gonna be a rape case. Only then can I write interesting posts! Cycling further, Jason and I got childish since it was night and no one was around except for that derelict Caltex station. Jason said it reminded him of Indonesia. Jason did this a few times – he sped up on the road, cutting through slip roads and then turning into a bend where I cant see him. Then when I came around, he was in the longkang with his bike and crouching. “Wtf….. Jason..?” He stood up and sighed, “Huh you saw me? Damn!” The next time round he was hiding behind a tree and I laughed my ass off. He didn’t do that trick again. We found more peddlers up ahead. This one was selling an entire carton of cigs. Wow…. We then found ourselves at Choa Chu Kang. What happened to Yew Tee? Dunno. The place was busy as ever even at the time of the night. Huge gahomonous trucks were roaring by and the place had a lot of road blocks till the point that we had to get off our bikes and push. The lane was narrow and the trucks were there so what better way than to think of your head being crushed by a 10 ton truck? We were crossing a slip road near the Indian temple nearby and suddenly a motorbike, car and taxi turned in at one go. I heard Jason’s horrified laughter… uh. I mean.. yelling… and by God’s will that bought me the split second of time to get outta the way. So how about supernatural encounters in the trip? Well if you’re cycling underwear-less-ly with a rusty bike and making so much noise…. There’s bound to be sth happening rite? Well sorry but no… maybe the most I had was this sinking feeling at the back of my bike when we passed through a quiet road which had tall old trees on both sides… but it’s probably fatigue. The feeling was indeed there all the way till I got home from the trip… And soon enough we were at Bukit Timah. The trip is almost over…… now to have supper and then cycle back home. But I decided to give Jason a little trip around the area first.  I showed him the Salvation Army that I bought my quality blazer from. It came in for about twenty bucks. My sister asked if it was so cheap while she was putting it on and I said it came from a dead person. She threw the thing on the floor and ran out of the room. Then I showed him the train trestles and wanted to tell him about that story that happened to one of our FSV students during a film shoot but he kept on saying later.  Then came the Old Ford Factory. You cant see it in the picture.. but it’s there. In old photos it looks huge and deep in the jungle but.. there it is… a small fry bulding where cars were made to supply the entire Singapore population. It doesn’t look haunted at all. But.. then comes the most spine-tingling moment during the trip. I turned back for bit and saw a bit of clearance in the forest behind us. Nothing look peculiar even with a single fern growing in the middle of the clearance. I got back on my bike and while waiting for Jason to get ready, I looked again and found a muslim tombstone. Not only that.. a white sheet was covered on the ground below it. Jason saw it too and we kinda looked at it. I found it more weird than spooky though… funny how it’s still there even with all the heavy traffic right next to it. Then I showed him the best poly which has the best chio bus and has the best number of girls and the best number of uh… stuff… in the whole of Singapore…  NGEE ANN!! Whoo!!!! Fuckable girls!!! I don’t know how it’s like in other schools but in my class some of us share our fuck stories quite openly and not in a childish way but as if it’s some kind of a…. in a very grown up way so to say. Under the flyover. A few months ago Singwei was here recording the tracks with my camera and suddenly the train came out from the bushes and almost hit him and me. He was so stunned he froze and the camera was still rolling. We stopped by at King Albert Park’s McD for a bit of munching. Mc D says it’s 24 hours… yeah.. for CARS maybe. The counter registers were closed when we came around and some stoned teens and parents were around walking aimlessly looking for the place to order. Some left in frustration. So I did what was the obvious… I ran in from the car entrance… went to the ordering booth and shouted, “HELLO?!?!! EXCUSE ME!?!?!” No reply.. i only found a speaker way below the counter window. Then I peeked through the blinds, through the smashed windows, obviously punched, and didn’t see anybody inside. Damned machines. Maybe the speaker worked only when the weight of a car is on the platform infornt of it. So I thought of calling Jason to stand there but didn’t cos I didn’t wanna hurt his feelings… Finally I managed to order at the collecting booth itself. Two Fillet O Fish meals. By the time I walked back to my seat, the guy was already coming with a bag holding our orders. Do we all work faster at night? Then a bit of chatting. Seeing Jason smoking like that…. Thinking go Javis…. Thinking of Kasson… thinking of Henry’s stern damnation for cigs…. I kinda gave a “what the heck” and asked for one.  “Indonesian cigarettes… poorly made and tastes bad.” said Jason and he offered me one. And so I did. I know all about the bad for health thing.. all the bad things about cigs… but well… I guess the recent developments have been putting pressure on me.  DON THIS STICK IS FOR YOU. Then I took another. This time in the name of another person. Then another, for all the other fuck ups people are doing. And then a final one… to celebrate in the name of Vis and Son. Pretty soon Jason and I were doing cig games like the donut smoke thing. It was fun… in a way. I have asthma… im weak… i have a lot of salt in my body… low blood pressure, unhealthy diet of fast foods that’s taken its toll by causing Audi Jr. to shrink in a way… and yet here I am puffing on Indonesian cigs. Im not sure if its normal but I felt kinda dizzy after a while. Jason said I should try the uh… Viscelroy one because it’s made in Singapore and it’s stronger. He also said it tasted different. I tried it and went like… nooo it doesn’t. And ice lemon tea never tasted better after a puff. No wonder a lot of them like to drink that. Jason and I plan to go back to kuching or Mt. K to do a bit of climbing as well. After that Jason had cramps. It’s some problem he has ever since… forever. So we walked all the way to Clementi sometimes cycling. After that I found myself taking another stick.  Dover MRT. This place is full of people preparing to load newspapers in their vans. We met up with Jason’s friends at Dover.. and lo and behold they smoke as well!  Ive never seen such amounts of different packs laid out infront of me. Zippo lighters fascinate me. Jason’s girl friend fascinates me too – small body, cute legs, sporty………. Hello erections! You know.. Jason shared with me the kinda girls that turned him on and I listened and all I could say was,”…..”  Signs that make old people go crazy. There was more smoking involved… one of the things that stuck in the back of my mind was what would Henry think. 5.30 came.. the clouds came in… so we made a move. Jason has a test on Monday.. plus a report to pass up.. and a fw other things… it’s a miracle he went out … In total so far we’ve cycled about 20 odd km. Jason’s cramps were starting to have children. My muscled were tensed yeah but it kinda flew over my head… I wanted to pee! I opted to follow the bus 74 route back home to Yishun. We’d be bypassing Ang Mo Kio so that’s nice….more things to see. But to do so we have to go back to KAP. We found a petrol station along the way. Peeing time!!  Do we really need that many locks in the guy’s toilet… The whole time we had to walk when an up hill came about because Jason had cramps. I was looking for a place to pee… but the bushes wasn’t my option because little people live there. Plus.. I think I was lost. “DON’T.. don’t be gay…. It’s going on my blog ahhahahaahahnvm…” I found myself at the REAL Adam road. And oh my god what have I done. The roads were starting to enter the expressways and the morning traffic starting pouring in. We pushed our bikes all the wy to the Adam flyover and traffice was a buzz.  Then I realised we had to go over the slip road, onto the flyover….. that part was easy. Stopped a while to take some pics… And then our side of the road turned into a slip road. To continue on was easy…. Just cross the slip road…. But they had the huge road barriers on both side of the slip road… our bikes weren’t those light ones.. we were tired and traffic was merciless. So maybe this is it.. stuck here forever… Then a volley of road-bikers in their spandex zoomed pass us. Jason and I laughed a bit at the spandex… then realised traffic’s stopped. Go go go!!! I carried my bike over the barrier.. ran across the one-lane slip road… jumped over the other barrier and heaved my rusty old bike over it. All seemed fine till Jason.. who was just a bare two feet away from me…stopped on the grass… his bike was on the road. Shit… headlight beams started bouncing off the flyover railings… “CAR!!! CAR!!!!” He tried getting his bike on the safe side. It got through.. but he was still on the road. “FUCKING CAR!!! FUCKING CAR DAMMIT!!” ZOOM! He managed to flip over at the last moment. Whoohoo!!! “sorry.. leg cramp…”  Further on to Thomson road…. Nice prata… We found ourselves at Mc. Ritchie reservoir. And then up lower pierce reservoir. The road lead deep into the forests... we saw squirrels running here and there.. monkey poo poo… loads of road bikers and joggers.   Then in the middle of nowhere was this town.   Jason said Fann Wong lives around here or something. Everyting pretty much became a blur after that. Jason was getting sleepy. I was getting tired… and when he’s sleepy, he shuts up. When I’m tired, I don’t shut up. And when someone doesn’t shut up, it becomes like what I’m doing now.  When we saw the sign that had YISHUN in it, we rejoiced… by smoking! Entering Sembawang road, on to Mandai, passing by Amoy Quee camp, watchin the medic cars passing by us… we got off our bikes and started walking. Walking up and down the terrain… smelling the early morning traffic… all the way to Chong Pang.    Yishun never looked so much more beautiful. “The next time I wont go out to cycle with you.” Says Jason. “Okay.. next time we’ll just go to orchard and back, okay?” And he chuckled. The entire trip ended near his block. We sat down for a while, smoking. I looked over at the Cateye and it showed sth like 58km. We started at 12am, from my place and its about 830am. The longest distance ive ever cycled and it’s the same with Jason. And he’s the adventurous one. If only we all can have more adventures like these.. not tied down by parents or petty girlfriends. I told Jason that we’re 18.. going on 19… and we still really haven’t done anything much yet. I don’t feel like we should just waste opportunities at this point of our lives when we’re the strongest. When I grow old I wanna look back and give advices to people not because I read it from somewhere but because we actually went through with it. An advice needs substance anyways. Then I took another stick. “Audi…. I think you’ve become a chain smoker.” Shit…
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About MeAudi Khalid 28th January 1988 Yishun, Singapore Currently serving National Service. ! BLOG STATUS !: Upcoming Posts: 
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