of Ballarat and the trip that was...

seeing as how i have to catch America's Next Top Model finale in 30 minutes and am reading about the liver at the same time, shall make this a picture post with the least bit of explanations.
so, 1 week of holidays did not allow any mega excursions or road trips that i am dying to have. instead, me, PJ, Kelvin and Jenna packed our overnight bags for a small wee trip to Ballarat.

PJ's signature look for the trip: pimp-ey whenever surrounded by girls

the guys with the bottle of sparkling wine we finished which had no effect on my rationale which was really surprising, given the low low low tolerance for alcohol i have.. still, a yummy drink!!
the three med amigos who went a-wandering to Ballarat with 3 changes of clothings in their bags

always wanted to try the kissy kissy pose but in this case, didn't work out well... proves that I can never the camwhore type...

and Kelvin woke up the next morning feeling a chill in the air despite being in his Mr Lazy jammies and decided to do some gymnastics to warm up..

Jenna and me having a girly moment together..

okay, we had a few girly moments together...

and the guys too have their bonding moment over games of English Bagatelle....

and they too needed their vanity moment...

and nolstalgia sets in complete with black and white photos and emo poses as the trip comes to an end and as we look down the path of uni starting again...and one last back glance at the trip that was Ballarat....

of Sunday night rituals and old-fashioned arcade games...

oooh, can i just say that the Gold Class Cinema in Crown is just to-die-for??!! they have these cool seats that u can recline into this flat bed and they even give u pillows and blankies if you are cold. and get this, u can order food and drinks all from your seat. awesome stuff!!

and today, i suddenly realize that i have been suppressing my inner child for way way way way too long. i have deprived her of ice creams, lollies, stuffed animals, arcade games and basically just spontaneity. so when we got to Crown's arcade games centre, it was like my childhood once again.

when i was a kid, back in the past, every Sunday, dad used to bring me and my brother to the Arcade Game Centre in Plaza Pelangi on 5th floor and he would give us 10 dollars worth of tokens to play as we wish. and let me tell you that this was the time my brother enjoy the most, before there were playstations and Xboxes. it was plain old arcade games. and boy, was that fun!! dad would just accompany us on our little rounds, acting like a kid again. i think that was always his excuse of going all 5-year-old on us. and we would diligently and painstakingly collect all the tickets that we won from those smarmy games designed to cheat little kids' money, hoping one day that we would be the proud owner of some really cool present that we saw in the store exhange window. until now, i never did remember whether we changed anything for those bundles of tickets we won. i only remembered til this very day what games me, my brother, my dad and my mum would play.

the basketball one with hoops higher than my dad....
the game with the scary girl where you had to knock out all her teeth with balls....
the Daytona racing game where my dad always challenged my brother to it and thrashed him at it. i remember that was when dad taught my brother everything he knew about the gear shifts to thrash any opponent in Daytona.... and in return, in some vicious cycle, my brother thrashed me....
the flat table game like ping pong....
those cheesy shooting zombies games that my brother loves....

it was always our family's Sunday night ritual after dinner.



recalling all these brings bittersweet tears.

MUD and HEELS do not mix

so Med Ball is coming up and contradictory to societal beliefs that meddies are not party animals, this Med Ball boasts a private train to the venue and then two more private trains from the said venue to the after party at this cool club in Melb, GPO!!

but there is the shadow of debate on whether the venue for the ball is a cool thing because of some grand idea, we are having it in the middle of a race course, the Flemington Racecourse.

yes, it's the place where they race horses and they take bets and where the latest equine flu took place.

geez. of all places to choose, they chose a freaking racecourse.

so where are we gonna sit, mister and missus smarty pants who came out with this brilliant idea??

on the field?? in the mud??

in my freaking high heels that i still haven't mastered on solid concrete ground, let alone soft squishy mud...

and hello?? even though it says SPRING in Melb on the calendar, it is NOT spring on my calendar and thermostat!! it drops to freaking 12 degress at night!! and in the middle of the racecourse with no solid concrete walls around me, it will be the Artic Circle all over again.

and call me a romanticist (is there such a word?? ergo realist), but i imagine a ball to be ala Cinderella's... soft lights, tinkling china, hush of voices, music, WARMTH, SOLID SAFE GROUND FOR HEELS.....

but hey, i shall not spoil the romantic notion that is the Med Ball. i shall soldier on with whatever perceptions i have and arrive at the racecourse with a shimmering facade, and pray that my heels do not go quick-sand on me and leave me floundering armpit-high in mud.

of Andrew's curiosity and spider pigs

i just love The Half Pipe, don't you?

the comfy squishy beanbags and the Mcker's fries were oh-so-good...
and Homer Simpson was just so stupidly funny.

*...spider pig, spider pig, does whatever a spider pig does. can he swing from a web? no, he can't, he's a pig. look out, it's spider pig..."

and then on to dinner at Garage with the meds for Andrew's pre-birthday dinner. Happy early 18th birthday, dude!! you so need to come up with a list of things to do since you are L-E-G-A-L. me and Frida will take care of it once you are done. but like Frida says, anything other than the live female anatomy is in the limits of what we can do for you. just keep that in mind when you write the list. we so drew the lines of limits for you already, birthday boy.

hope you enjoyed the Blackforest Gateau that we bought you ya? coz me and Kelvin had a debate in the middle of the Crown Bakery on what to get you. but too bad taro cake was sooo not on our list. next year, that'll be your birthday cake alright? and for heaven's sake, do not go around being a curious cat alright? you just spoil all the good surprises that were meant for you!!

of wimps and alcohol

this week's PBL is enough to put me off alcohol for the rest of my life. well, not really. but still, makes me wanna think twice about that vodka shot that i'll down the next time i club.

alcohol causes cirrhosis
alcohol causes hepatitis (bet you didn't know that)
and makes your liver go all funny shape on you and when you're dead and they do a post mortem on you and dig out your liver, it will be so shrunken like a starving minute little pathetic thing taht you wonder from up above why the heck in the first place did you drink that extra can of light beer??!!

but still the alcohol industry makes damn a lot of money from that transient high that you get from downing a bottle of Bacardi and for some, the sense of cool-ness, in-crowd-ness you get from just nonchalantly holding that said bottle in a club, all in the name of blending in.

but heck, this PBL is not going to reform me into some wheatgrass-drinking, alcohol-abstaining saint coz i'm a teenager, for goodness sake. it is not good for my mental well-being and my growing up. call it a balanced diet with the presence of small amounts of alcohol.

after all, what am i gonna drink in clubs?? wheatgrass juice?? apple juice??
i'll look like a wimp.

happy 19th, jinsern!! hope u had a great time with us being the chefs and serving u food all the time and all the cute little cupcakes that *she* made... better say thank you real real nice ya??
but anyways, we all love u, hence the full-blown party that we had.
getting smoked out with BBQ sausages smell is sooo not my scent but still, it was great to hangout with the albert house girls once again, just like old times, pre-med-school-ish, which frankly, was so refreshing. you just digress back to where everything was just all about uncle andrew's dinners and midnight indo mee sessions. and trinity studies was just that, trinity studies, nothing much to moan and groan about, muss out my hair about.

but oh well, we all have to grow up, thus happy growing up, dude!! enjoy every second of it... it totally rocks ur socks when you suddenly find yourself old and grey...

p.s. it hurts when you yell like that...

of cravings and osmosis

oh geez... my head is reeling from all the citric acid cycle metabolites that i'm inhaling like nobody's business...

it's not amusing at all.

this tues exam will be terrible, i predict.

everyone else says so.

i shall not be any different.

on a different note, my internet is back online and i am freaking happy, except that it is very much dampened by the fact that the exam is sucking my soul out.

it's only 30 MCQ questions.

that's the darndest part of it all.

p.s. i hava a sudden craving to eat something spicy!! so utterly weird. must be the super cold weather. i have a craving to wear shorts and skirts and short sleeves and thongs and go out dancing in the sunshine with my sunnies on. but melb's sucky weather stops my fantasy in its tracks with a screeching halt. and i have a sudden craving to hop on to the train and stop at every stop on the track and get down and take pretty pictures and explore the place on foot. and i have a craving too of getting a dog, preferably a Golden Retriever. i miss the presence of a dog. and goodness knows how many years before i actually settle down in one place after years and years of studying and travelling to get the company of a dog. but i do want one soo soo soo much.

but most of all, i crave the ability to be able to absorb knowledge thru osmosis. that way, i can sleep on my med textbook and wake up the next morning with everything in my brain due to the info concentration gradient. blah..