JOWEEEEEN

this is everything i didn't say

weekend with the Cambodians!! +

Wednesday, 18 November 2015 || 9:34 pm

hello!! it's me!! (i don't know this joke omg) and i'm back again. so as you can infer from the title above, i spent the past weekend 6/11-9/11 with the Cambodians. nope, not the batch who came in 2013 and gave us the names Chandrea and Sorya, nope not the batch who came last year during the ILC and whom we spent very little time with, but it was just another new batch of students from the Goldstone School of Hope Worldwide in Cambodia. I love hanging out with the Cambodians because even though we start off as strangers, we end as friends, and they're such a nice bunch of people to interact with. 2013 was the first time we hung out with the Cambodians, and it was a wonderful weekend. last year, we couldn't hang out with the Cambodians as they came during our prelims period. and i was actually deciding whether i should hang out with this year's batch and so we decided to just volunteer for the three days. and it was an enjoyable three days, though awkward at first, but no regrets. :) ashley, chhorra, linda, salina, sofia, an, chen, pheaktra, trikea, reach, you guys made my weekend.

4/11 friday
we went to church. because that was where the cambodians stayed at the previous night after they arrived in singapore at 11+pm. me, joey, nick and vivian were like the only singaporean teens there and we were super awkward we stood outside the m floor not daring to go into the room HAHA. but yeah chelsia's parents went into the room first and afterwards we followed in and stood awkwardly there while everyone looked at us curiously. but there was one familiar face, and that is mara's dad -- sok chea!! he said we have grown so much and asked if we still message mara - which we sometimes do. and then we introduced ourselves to the cambodians and chelsia's dad introduced nick as the handsome guy and that was when he chocked on his water and we started laughing so hard and i started calling nick handsome. HAHAH. i'm sorry nick, it's either handsome or small eyes for the rest of the weekend. fyi friends, nick's small eyes forms the foundation of our friendship and nick said "that means if my eyes become bigger then we're not friends anymore la" but i kinda doubt it will happen.... HAHAH. okay so we were really awkward and after the briefing at the m floor, we were told to go down to the first floor to wait. and you can guess who were the first few people who reached the first floor hahaha. we took a group picture outside the church building and then went back in to wait for the bus. and it was pretty awkward still. then the guys started talking to nick (wah siol) and then salina and the rest of the girls came to talk to us. we asked them if they knew mara's batch, and that was when ashley (i didn't know her name then) said that she was kelsey's sister and that was when i started realising that they actually look alike!!! omg. i couldn't believe it they look so alike!! so yeah we talked a bit then the bus came and all the cambodians boarded the bus. they wanted to squeeze two more singaporeans into the bus (me and vivian) so i sat beside an in the bus and talked to him for awhile before moving to the back and talking to salina and ashley for a bit. hahaha. and then we were heading from the northeast to the west of singapore - nus. it was quite a long ride from church to nus, but it was cool. we went to the u town, which was the newest part of nus. and martin was our main tour guide, together with jeremy. i was so amazed at nus i told nick and vivian that nus was my future school and the school tour was a tour around my future school. (i know i'm so full of shit ok) HAHA. the campus was quite big and martin was explaining everything about the homes and stuffs i think hahaha. and we walked one lil round before heading to the canteen for lunch. we sat in lil groups and i later learnt that i was sitting at the same table as linda chen and ashley (sorry i didn't know their names la) together with vivian. the food was good. hahah then i went over to joey's table where she was with salina and sofia and we took a selfie yay hahaha. afterwards, we headed to a busstop to go towards the mrt station and the busstop was right outside newtown sec, which is joesph teo's school! the bus took super long like almost half an hour or something then i called lin foong at around 1.45, 45 minutes before his paper started and he said he was at jurong east. HAHA lame wanna see him also cannot. so yeah we headed to raffles place where we met theo, thaddaeus and edrick before going on the city tour. so it was the same as last year. we walked from raffles place, along the singapore river, to the merlion and to the esplanade. it was a rather long walk and most of the time i was with vivian cos i was too awkward but we did talk a little to some cambodians la. and my snapchat story on that day was so funny because of vivian and the fast forward/ slow mo effects HAHAH. so basically yeah after the city tour, we walked all the way back to raffles place mrt to head to church and something happened on the way omg but whatever everybody got back to church safely and i was so so tired while eating dinner. we ate together with the cambodians and talked some more and i learnt reach's name. today's service was led by the jc ministry! so proud of the people who shared and admired the j2s for serving even though their a's just started!! yay!! it was a long, tiring but a lil bit exciting day.

5/11 saturday
we were supposed to meet at bugis at 10 but guess who arrived at like 9.20 ish. :) me. and joey. so we went to eat breakfast at macs. and well familiarise ourselves with bugis too. (ANYWAY THE TICKETS FOR THE VAMPS GO ON SALE TODAY WQHUICHUISDHCIWH) yeah. and when we went back down to bugis mrt at around 9.55, the singaporeans were there, along with sofia and linda. the rest of the group came at like 10.30-ish ahahahah. well. then we walked to the national library. dang, those painful days going to the library to study... will continue soon. but yeah walked around for a while while i slacked and then we headed to bugis street so that the cambodians can do some shopping. but we stopped halfway to get koi first and ya they went shopping while i waited at burger king cos i was tired like really really tired. they shopped for an hour or so and we met at outside burger king before heading to the macs at bugis plus or something for lunch. while waiting for the food, i sat with jason, an, kea and chen. kea and jason were doing some magic with cards and some stuff and i just sat there so confused and stuff because i did not get what was happening. and i joked with jason saying that he can't impress girls so he go impress guys. HAHAH i'm sorry jason we're still friends!! after lunch, we headed to ion. the original plan was to go to botanical gardens, but it was raining, so change of plans. we went to the ion gallery and i waited outside because i got bored. but the cambodians met an artist?!?!?!?!?! what. hahaha. yeah so we were waiting outside the ion gallery and then joey suddenly saw 4 pioneers and then they came up and passed by (but didn't see us) and we realised that two of them were actually jiyu and wincent who are from s22 and have the same pw lessons as us but we have like never talked before kind of thing. then they walked away and we're like okay. then afterwards they came again and stopped right outside the ion gallery? and i just waved at wincent so as not to be chhloy (yay khmer) and like unexpectedly he came and talked to us for awhile before walking off with his friends. phew. awkward hahaha but okay. and after the art gallery, we headed to the national museum of singapore. i waited outside the museum because i was bored and tired. HAHA and then we took pictures and all and headed to church for saturday service. we were early so we went to the m floor and we just sat and talked and played games and stuff and we played songs!!! like perfect!!!!! and drag me down!!!!! omg okay!!!!!! i mean i am not okay!!!!!!! but yeah. afterwards, we had dinner at the m floor. still a lil awkward la but okay HAHAH. and yeah it was saturday service and we said bye to the cambodians and told them that we weren't sure if we could join them for sunday and ashley and chhorra were like "we hope you can" awwwwwww qts.

6/11 sunday
we had to meet 9.30 at harbourfront!!! and we reached at 9.25 and i think all the cambodians were there already?!?!?!? so early HAHAH we got something to eat first before joining them to sit on the floor risked getting stomped. it was like around 20 people there? HAHAH. so first we headed to starbucks, and being white people that we are, we got a drink. HAHAH. that was when i started talking to ashley too and started teasing about her and pheaktra for fun HAHAHA sprry ashley khnom srolan nas. (hopefully i spelt it right LOL) then we took the boardwalk to sentosa. GUYS. THE FEELS. THE FREAKING FEELS FROM TWO YEARS AGO WHEN WE WENT TO SUNDAY ALSO ON A SUNDAY WHICH IS THE LAST DAY AND WHEN WE GOT CLOSE. THE FEELS. :( i can't. more teasing happened and walking and soon, we reached sentosa island!! don't know how long i haven't been to sentosa!! and we passed by the colesium and i..... okay..... and we took many many pictures outside uss and while walking and kea just kept selfie-ing and soon, i called him selfie king. HAHAH. we then took the tram to one of the beaches. i don't know which one la the one that we usually go to. and we took more pictures. some people played ball and frisbee but being the lazy me that i am, i just sat down and eat grapes BECAUSE. and we took some more pictures and attempted jump shots with the girls. HAHAH. afterwards, we walked all the way back to the first station. (i couldn't believe my legs were capable of doing that) we stopped by some places to take pictures (and selfie). honestly, i myself felt like a tourist in my own country. HAHAHA. after walking from probably one end of sentosa to another, we took a tram back to vivo, and we headed to chinatown where the cambodians did more shopping and me being me (once again), waited at the meeting place, sitting on the floor, all sticky and stuff, for like 45 minutes? typical singaporean aunty paiseh lah. then it was finally lunch time! we walked to maxwell food market to have lunch and apparently i wasn't very hungry lol. i was just hungry 10 minutes before. oh well. everyone had their fill. then we went back to chinatown mrt and headed to bayfront -- marina bay. just saying, i was wearing tshirt, fbt and slippers. at an atas place. i hate myself. HAHAHAHAH. we waited at bayfront mrt for sok chea to arrive so we were all so noisy there just sitting around, taking more pictures and talking. and i think that was when i first started talking to pheaktra, who was very very quiet the past two days. (to me la) HAHAHA well and i continued talking to ashley (partly because i miss kelsey) and really, kelsey and ashley look so alike sometimes i accidentally call ashley kelsey and i feel so so bad omg sorry yey ashley. clarence led us to the artscience museum where he worked at, and we went to two exhibitions for free. i kinda liked the nobel prize exhibition because guess who i found there? our dearest wole soyinka. HAHAHA lit much. then pheaktra also taught us how to write our names in khmer (SO LOY OMG) and crish came. and my feet were like dying cos the slippers sucked big time la but anyway. afterwards we just slacked right outside the artscience museum?! much needed rest! some people played frisbee LOL. and i just sat talking to people and took some pictures too. i loved slacking outside the artscience museum, it was like slacking with a view. the company was good too!!!!! afterwards, we walked a rather manageable distance crossing a bridge and the floating platform (omg ndp memories) to a food place near the esplanade called gluttons bay where we had dinner. and the food was good. i mean i didn't eat a full lunch and i only had satay for dinner but okay. after dinner, we went to this open area across the marina bay sands and caught a glimpse of the light show. the cbd area at night is just so beautiful, the lightings and stuff, and the company pretty much made everything better. i started feeling a little empty then because i don't know when will be the next time i will get to see them. just like the batch of cambodians from two years ago. we then walked back to the same route we took as we headed to gardens by the bay. this time, we were singing to one direction while walking. like perfect, one thing and so many more! that made me so happy omg help. HAHAHA. just saying, we did not take a proper route to gardens by the bay. we walked around and then sat down at one of the supertrees there hahaha because uncle anthony was coming to pick pheaktra and an. they came and uncle anthony gave a debrief where we all thanked chels for organising the activities for the past three days go chelsia!!! so i went to say bye to pheaktra and an and pheaktra actually wanted us to go to the airport to send them off the next day "because it's the last day" hahahaha. then we walked to the mrt station and took the circle line train back together and like i hugged everyone bye when the train was nearing serangoon cos they were gonna alight there. i went home and felt so dead but i had to prepare for school the next day which started at 8am for the submission of i&r and final gpf and also results day but oh well.

7/11 monday
school. 8.30am. i was dead tired and the lt was filled and whatever. but i couldn't concentrate. all i could think of was sending the cambodians off. (this happened two years ago too, i know, i hate myself) and me and joey were contemplating whether we should write cards for the cambodians since saturday but ended up doing nothing because one we were tired two we felt that we aren't very very very very extremely super close. turns out that was a wrong decision. so in a short period of time, we managed to submit our i&r and arrange our gpf and we we re done with pw for the rest of our lives! what the heck, the past 7 or so months of pw had been brain-draining, creative juice-flowing, and tiring and i had been looking forward to this day since forever! though pw for me did not turn out to be as hell-ish as i thought it would be, in fact, i kinda enjoyed it sometimes (especially op i guess cos don't need to think of gi and stuff), i'm so glad pw is over. i may just miss pw a teeny weeny tiny bit, but no, i'm glad it's over. hahaha and when we got it done, we chionged to the airport. it was a last minute and risky decision as we only had like a three/four hour break, but we chionged to the airport to terminal 3 where the cambodians were at!! caught them on time, and managed to spend one and a half hours with them! so we just talked, laughed (i laughed really hard once i don't even know why), and took pictures. and then the most unexpected thing happened. received cards from kea, ashley and reach & salina. and also while we were walking to take the tram to t1, reach and linda came and gave us their egg friend shirt which some of them wore on saturday i was so shocked and surprised i think i was speechless for five minutes. because honestly, i did not expect that. at all. i'm sorry we didn't do anything for you! but i'll do soon! see what i mean when i said that cambodians are the nicest people i've known? yeah. man, when we had to leave soon, i felt empty. because there was nothing to look forward to unlike this past activity-filled weekend with new friends who became good friends. i'm gonna miss all of them so much, and this just makes me miss the first batch even more. each batch of cambodians are different. we've created different memories, and i definitely miss all my cambodian friends. and before they went in, we left for school for results. to sum it up, spending three and a half consecutive days with the cambodians had been great, though it's just the beginning of the month, i know that this weekend would be the highlight of the month. to all of my cambodian friends: khnom srolanh all of you!!!

so we went back to school to receive our final promotional results. it started at 1pm and we were done by like 1.10pm because it was so informal and fast? got promoted. i didn't think my results were fantastic. i'm not exactly too happy or excited, but i do know that i really need to step up my game. it's gonna be one hell of a year ahead, and i need to be prepared.

8/11 tuesday
no plans in the afternoon, but went to meet minray, alice and gyt in the early evening!! we met at costa coffe at town because minray was "studying" and it was actually the first time that she was early and had to wait for us, like you finally know how i feel. and surprisingly, everyone arrived before 5pm today! and usually minray would dress up and put thick make up and all but today no. HAHAHAH. so we walked around f21 first because 5pm was too early for dinner. and all of them tried clothes except me. HAHAHA. then we didn't know what to eat. at first we decided said saizeriya, then we decided on ewf. and just as we were gonna order, we changed our minds and decided to settle for saizeriya instead. lol guess that's how fickle-minded girls are. honestly it wasn't me HAHAHA i was fine with any type of food. it was my first time at saizeriya, and the food was really good!! i had carbonara and we shared 8 piece wing and it was really good and filling and i was satisfied!!!!!!! weeee so good! and i had llaollao after my dinner for like dessert or something and yay we walked around looking at stuff, and then we walked to orchard. and while walking, we could feel the christmas vibes! the deco was pretty, and alice kept singing the chorus of deck the halls HAHAHA. we entered ion through the atas part and yuting was like "how do we get to the cheaper part" or something. HAHAHA so we walked around ion for awhile. awhile only because we had school the next day. and then we went home soon after. even though it was a short meetup, it was a good time. it's always a good time with them! ((but then i had a really really terrible stomachache in the train and almost died lol))

15/11 sunday
so dgroup in the morning. normal service. and then jc poly lunch. or more like jc campus lunch with some teens. you've got no idea how awkward i was and how i was not very looking forward to it. we met at a sheltered area for lunch and we sat in an awkward circle with the campus dominating and the jc forming one small part. then arthur come and like sat in between us to talk hahaha. and robbie came too so it was kind of a funny conversation. then robbie said "eh the three of you (me joey arthur) have something in common -- you go to chua chu kang everyday. the two of you for school, arthur camp HAHA" okay that's something i didn't know because the camp was like super near school? AHAHAHA and so far we haven't seen arthur before. then we talked somemore about pinoy and the maintenance of jc girls vs poly girls. brb doing homework studying digging clothes but all are school related. HAHAH. lunch was okay. then we proceeded to the field just beside where wesley briefed us on how to play ultimate frisbee (which i never knew) and where we also split into teams. each team sent 7 players, 5 brother and 2 sisters. and if it was not obvious enough, i was super useless lol. bye. HAHAHA we switched players sometimes and then i practiced how to throw and catch the disc with crish and later joined by sean and gabriel. then afterwards we practiced with dayna and wesley came to teach us and he related it to physics HAHAH i don't even know why man. but yeah i was super nervous and scared especially since wesely was there and he PLAYS frisbee. so. HAHAH afterwards we were joined with crish and nick and nick was like doing funny patterns with the disc and i'm just like omg stop man stop. HAHA. afterwards some of the sisters decided to play our own game and in one game, you could hear a lot of screaming and like after a game we were all so tired already so we just decided to practice our throwing and catching. with crish kyla dayna joey bantzu and annabelle. i think my frisbee skills just upped by 0.1% after today. HAHAH it was good practicing frisbee with the sisters, and we left at like almost 6pm...........

it's only wednesday, two more days of ecp and on to the "holidays". i honestly don't know whether i should find a job or not. but i have a lot to catch up for school work especially all the content, and i need to work on my spirituality and so many other things tbh...

till next time x