One has a right to Bunbury anywhere one chooses.

I'm set in my own ways. It irks me when people intrude on my belongings and into my personal space and attack my habits, even if indirectly.

Does that mean I'm selfish?

It didn't seem to be a problem last year, with the suite-style living. But other experiences involving shared spaces - not so good. Maybe it's just Americans. All the Americans I've lived with tend to just sprawl all over whatever space lies in front of them.

Some kind of territorial mindset I guess.

I'm finally done with setting my room up, and I'm so very proud of it. Pictures of my room will follow soon, but right now I'm choosing pictures to put up. I don't want a photo mosaic, because that is, in my roommate's words, "so summer camp". Here are my options:

This is by far my favourite, but if I saw this in a friend's room I would totally think she's got parent problems.

Very cliched, journey-esque message photo. I like the wet footprints. I remember halting my mum and dad from crossing the bridge before I could snap it.

Whimsical, cheers me up, but doesn't resonate deeply at all.

Yes, yes, most definitely yes!

THIS is how I want my home to be:

I returned to Singapore last Friday, and since then I've done nothing conversation-worthy. I like to think that my vacation attachment with CAAS does not qualify as a conversation topic or something that should be prodded into because, really, it belongs to the rest of my life, which is already an inevitability I signed up for one year ago, and that I will have abundant opportunities to talk about.

I miss Penn to bits. I really do. I speak not with a banality that underlies small talk and idle banter, but with a very real inertia that consumes my thoughts almost every second of the day. I've met so many people (I probably should add customarily that they are awesome people) that made me feel awesome and brought me into bits of knowledge and experiences and what-ifs that I used to deliberately exclude from my comfort zone. I was also given an independence that I loved through and through and that I never for once took for granted. Most important was an independence of time. My time was my own, and it was up to me to manage my time relative to others. Right now bits of my time is arbitrarily given to my parents.

Gah. Pictures!

As many of you know from my begrudging comments, my dear Ricebowl crashed last week, just amidst holding a bunch of projects:

- SingCity
- South Asian Studies multimedia project
- correspondence with parents and CAAS

But I dare say that it's the first time I didn't feel quite so screwed up. There were many blessings to count and even more pleasant surprises as I restored him to his usual state.

1. By some pre-ordained warning I actually backed up the night before, even though backing up is not a habit of mine, and the previous time I had done it was 2 months ago.
2. Turns out Ricebowl has an auto-recovery installed into his dear soul (harddrive).
   
3. Gregory's ITAs were an immense source of help. Even though I could hardly ever stick around as they were fixing my laptop, due to rehearsals, they very helpfully kept it within their possession and rotated looking after it amongst themselves, even up to the wee hours of the morning. I honestly think this wouldn't be possible in another college house. Just 'coz all the residents in Gregory know one another so well.
4. I use Thunderbird (an email client), which, after collecting email from my web email inboxes, would automatically delete them from the webmail. So I thought, shit I can't even get my documents from my emails online. Furthermore, I had only backed up my Thunderbird 2 months ago. So all the scholarship forms, project mates correspondence and shared work... all gone. Or so I thought. SOMEHOW when you restored your Thunderbird profile to a new restored system, it sourced for all your missing emails since the last backup. Which means all my emails since the last backup were found and put into my inbox. Even though I couldn't find them in my email inboxes. Strange.
5. A lot of clutter was cleared :) I just had to choose the files I needed to be working with and put them back into my desktop.
6. As I was importing everything back (pictures, music, videos) and looking at file names whiz by, I stumbled upon plenty of files I thought had gone missing because I carelessly didn't save or deleted them. For e.g, the videos the bought from iTunes, pictures from secondary school etc.

The only real loss was my internet favourites. The only real hassle this is going to cause is re-finding all the links I was planning to go back to for my urban studies project (100+ sites), and all the furniture I had bookmarked out for my new apartment. But seriously, I'm far too relieved to be depressed by this.

Anyway, the moral of the story is that I must learn to cultivate new computer habits. Save repeatedly and to an external disk space. Yup. And also create second and third portals to access all my files.

The first step to losing weight: Avoid everything Starbucks. Honestly, cakes and coffees there are just over-the-top in calorie and sugar count.The Bucks County Co. Coffee place just around the corner sells way more calorie-tame beverages and snacks.

Actually, the first step would be to avoid everything sweet. But if you must treat yourself, DON'T go ... you know where. Buy your own snacks, like a hot chocolate mix has 150 calories, compared to 560 at St. Arbucks.

 

*Disclaimer so you don't sue me: You're probably in for sugar-overload anytime you step into a cafe of any brand anyway. It's just that, down here I'm surrounded by Starbucks so the name is basically a replacement for cafe.

Philadelphia is pretty in Fall.

After a week of exams, I took a break on Saturday morning by taking a four-hour stroll around City Center.

 

 

And got aquainted with the fabric of America's fun.

 

 

Still, I much prefer fall within Penn :)

 

 

 

Yep, Fall is the best season ever!

 

 

It's so surreal whenever I watch a performance. It's the one time I am not doing anything for self-improvement or self-education, but just showing my appreciation for somebody's talents and letting that person be in his/her element. And also you kind of wonder how people can think in those patterns, to coordinate compositions and stuff. Well, tonight was an incredible night! TO SAY THE LEAST

 

I finally watched Aqualung!!!!!!! After 4 years of waiting, I finally get to see him! And in the context of a promotional cafe performance that can only happen in American =D The setting was so incredibly intimate and informal, and he just talks to you about random things. Before the performance he actually went to the toilet that was not backstage or anything, so he basically walked through the dinner crowd, then he went to the bar and got a drink, like right amidst the other people at the bar table. And it wasn't weird or anything. No one was hounding him or screaming. It was just all so cool.

Kaiser Cartel opened for Matt, and for their last song they went downstage and walked in and out of the tables and sang to the diners (us!). How cool is that?! Also, I got to witness the beginnings of a rockstar trying to make her mark. I guess for a new group like KC, they had to promote their albums themselves. Like, the girl of the duo was at the table taking questions about their music, and handling the money and freebies, very very normal. And people would just go up and talk about music to them. (p.s. it's so funny to hear of a group named Kaiser Cartel. I mean, right when I'm revising for my mid-term on the Middle Ages and learning about the Frankish Emperor Charles Martell - Charlemagne's granddad for those of you who don't know)

Here's a video of KC. Aqualung himself, aka Matt Hales, is at the piano.

 

Aqualung was amazing :) I have video clips of him performing hits, but... they're too huge to upload.

Anyway, at the end of his performance Matt went to the table at the exit and bascially stood there forever signing autographs and taking pictures, and all of us were so obediently in a line.

He was splendid; I told him that I'm from Singapore and that we probably won't get to see him there, and that I was elated that he happened to have a show in Philadelphia where I was studying. And he replied that there were people trying to get him to perform there! Then as he was signing my poster, just as he finished his first name, he paused and decided to add a lil' sumthin':

 

 

Basically the walk to the cafe took forever, but the walk back home went by in a flash! I bet people on the streets were staring at this psychotic girl with the largest smile ever on her face.

Well well... I know all of you are waiting for the grand finale, and I won't disappoint.

 

I can't wait to get my life up and running!

 

Official training starts soon. One meeting more and we'll have concrete stuff to do for Int'l Student Council. I got my first fortnightly illustration published in today's Daily Pennsylvanian (the college paper). Mid-terms start next week. I've been to the gym 4 times this week.

I have a committee dinner tomorrow. I have tickets to see Anderson Cooper on Saturday. Next Sunday I have tickets to see Aqualung. Ít's getting colder and I must do more shopping.

 

Weeee!!!

I enjoy the independence and the responsibility of getting my business done myself. And everything's been perfect except for a few things, surmountable things.

Okay, so this is how my 1.5 weeks have been:

I painstakingly set up my room myself, which might seem unfathomable to most, but oh well I like my room now.

 

Essentially the view I get: A bird's nest on close-up, you can't see it here but sometimes I see squirrels.

I thought it might be nice to leave the windows open and have some natural breeze. But the tree outside happens to be the habitat to lotsa insects. The fugly ones. Sometimes there are nice ones.

 

I moved in early, so I got to see everyone else move in on Thursday, the day I went out to run some errands (cancel phone line, make immunization appointment, get insurance card). Being a student in a school as big and as rich as Penn tends to make you feel very privileged and honoured. The first picture actually shows roads being condoned off especially for students moving in. Same thing happens for moving-out. Seriously. The rest of them minions have to detour.

We had talks, inspirational talks in a huge hall.

And in that same hall we had totally sophisticated comedians giving up stand-up on Comedy Night. (that was when I really felt special I think)

We had lotsa outdoor parties with lotsa FREE FOOD.

Actually you know what forget it you don't have to know everything. I'm way too lazy to wait for the other gedzillion pictures to load and to write about the gedmedbezillion other events.

But I did buy a new journal. The train metaphor I illustrated the cover with is quite literal I think. Could have done better. But didn't. So there.