I ...

Not sure why am I sharing this, just ran out of stuff to write about, and thought this entry might invite more comments on the blog, so ... might as well.

Met this cute little boy in my neighbourhood recently. Neh, not an Indian, despite my little mumbai neighbourhood. I am not sure how old is he, probably around the same age as me, or even younger. Its been a while since I met someone so talkative and chirpy. For a couple of times, we spoke quite a fair bit, but just recently, he started having more friends hanging out with him, so everytime when we "accidentally" meet up, I'll end up speaking to his friends more than him. Maybe its being concious about not trying to feel like I am all over him or something, I dunno, but everytime when I am around him, i just do stupid stuff.

Today we were sort of having bit of casual chat together- i was just trying to focus on speaking to his friends rather than him alone, however while I was rushing off to do some other things, he said something from behind which I over sensitively thought he MUST be talking to me, so I turned over and replied really loudly (with a bloody bitchy smile)........ only to realise that.. well, he obviously ain't speaking to me. (Ahhhhhh, honestly, even now that I am typing this out in front of my laptop, my whole face is hot and red, can't imagine how I looked like just now! ) Anyway the worst has yet to come - feeling embarresed, I stared at him for a second or two, with my bitchy smile changing into a ....... i-dunno-how-to-describe double bitchy smile, then I turned away and .................................... I ran off !!!!! I R A N O F F .

Can someone explain, what H A P P E N T O ME ?????? As I am typing now, all I can think of is what route should I take tommorrow in order to avoid seeing him forever. Should I start moving to west side of melb or something (not a bad idea to move into little Hanoi after all the curry smell I have to endure for the past six months) and never step into little mumbai forever and ever? How am I going to respond the next time I see him?

I mean seriously, W H Y D I D I R A N O F F ? No one in the right state of mind would ever do this would they? Strolling along the streets back home, all I wanted to do was to slap myself for behaving like an underage school girl. I didn't think I was very interested in him, alright maybe find him a little cute when he tells me funny stories about his house painting experiences, but thats about it really! Seriously, he wears a donald duck t-shirt! And I am 70% convince that he is a few years younger than me. So...... what is my problem ?!

Time to log on to real estate agen websites.

fryday

Still alive, still alive.

Just not much to write about yet.

Friday night. I did the greatest thing I've ever done for the last 6 months.

I had Pad Thai takeaway from my favorite restaurant and had them while watching "You've got mail" on Channel 9. Bit too oily for a dinner, but all is good for on a friday night.

Friday nights for the past few months were the usual get wasted night. Its either I got too drunk to get home or had too much dessert while gossiping with the girls or just gambling away too much money. This friday, I opted for a change. Not a very healthy one yet, considering the amount of salt and oil intake from the noodles, but ....... at least I am drinking w a t e r . Changes needs to occur slowly in order for them to last. I'll try salad next friday, I promise.

The Rise and Rise of New York.

I havent been quite dilligent in reading lately, apart from the weekly 5 minutes of catching up with bradgelina news while queing to pay for groceries in coles. Oh, and of course Border's thrashy magazine section which I hang out too much on lazy weekends. Other than that, I just watch too much telly, hung out too much, do-nothing-much too much.

Started to feel a little guilty, I walked into a second hand book store near my house few days ago. I used to be all crazy over second hand bookstores, but after a massive mission ages ago of going through all (not all-all, but those that I know off) second hand bookstores around mel in search of one book ..... I decide to stay away from them for a while - still loving the smell of old books, but too much....... makes my head spins.

Asked the same question as soon as I stepped into the store as I did during the massive search.

:" I am on a mission of finding The Australian Ugliness by Boyd, do you happen to have them?"

" Sweet heart! You are a few weeks too late! Many people are looking for it, especially the Boyd family! They were going around bookstores (its out of print) to collect them and send as gift for friends! They come here all the time to see if I have them. I had one sometime ago, and they got it off me. Too late, too late!"

Thanks to the addiction to bradgelina news. If only I had... woke up from entertainment news earlier and got back on track.

Still he walked me to the architecture section and showed me a couple of vintage pelican paper backs. They were pretty good and hard to get ones, but it still didnt excite me as much. I thought to kick away my hollywood gossip addiction, I really should search for something that facisinates me just so I can focus on getting healthy knowledge into my brains.

Manourve through stacks of books to the 'travel' section. Not too bad I thought. Even getting a lonely planet of any country to read will increase the status of my general knowledge as compared to knowing what Shiloh and Maddox had for breakfast last monday.

Was deciding to get a book about Tuscan ( I don't know where its that). but after 20 minutes of browsing through the travel novel section a book tucked right at top corner of the shelve caught my eyes.

Imperial City. I miss reading about china. Climbed up the stool to grab it. As soon as I see the cover page - Imperial City - The Rise and Rise of New York.

Now, this is fun. I have read any bits of it yet, but gut feelings says I'll love it.

I sat myself among stacks of old stained books for some time reading the first few pages Imperial City.

By the end of first chapter - The view from the Bridge, even though i was still wondering if Brad is going to bring Maddox for the game this weekend, ..... I know the addiction will be gone soon. I should be back on track if I bring this book home.

Geoffrey Moorhouse is the author of this book. I haven quite heard from him before, pardon my ignorance, but after googling him, it seems like he is quite a well known english travel writer and his book Calcutta has won numerous award. Before I googled him, I thought he must be an architect or something with the way he describe New York, but I guess he is just a really good writer ba.

I am still at the front bits of the book, but the image of New York is slowly developing in my mind, with help from google earth, its going very well, and I am loving everybit of it. Its funny how this book is meant to be like a travelogue but every bits of his decription relies upon the buildings and street thoroughfare to create the image. My impatience nature got me to quickly flipped through all the chapters and I saw quite a bit of names dropping going on in the book, can't wait to get there.

I haven been to New York before, but I have heard many people who has been there and living in Melbourne says that they are quite similar, only Melbourne is a lot smaller version and not-as-exciting as New York. Because of all the pre-conception, everytime I try to imagine New York through Moorhouse's words, images of melb in some ways comes in, and everytime he tries to explain a certain sub-culture, I tend to relate it back to Melbourne. Its kind of interesting too because I am very concious of what my mind is doing, so everytime when that happens, I will go into google earth to see if my imagination is correct.

The subconsiousness of comparing this two city is really helping me to recover from my extreme addiction to entertainment news. I hope by the time I go back to the trashy magazine section in borders, I won't be too far back with lastest gossip. Od course I hope Angelina will recover from her depression by then.

It was never on my mind to travel in America despite being a hollywood gossip fan. But lately, I keep having people telling me stories about their Americana adventures and moi is starting to be intrigue by it.

Imperial City, The Rise and Rise of New York seems to be a good start.

dead fish slipping

I meant to write something that would inspire after all the ranting weeks ago, but am feeling like a dead fish. Tired.

What does not kill you makes you stronger.

I nearly slipped and fell on a very steep slope on site this afternoon (Spring is coming, Melbourne is raining). Despite client's offer to help with stuff, my ever loving boss thinks that I should be doing everything on my own, if not no one will respect me on site in the future. I watched my my entire pair of Lacoste maryjanes sunk into the mud. All they did was laughed and said :" You need a pair of gum boots".

I have been wandering in and out Wittner a few times,deciding if I should grab that pointy black leather boots (i really want it to match my spring dress).

But looks like plans have to change if I plan to get some respect on site, or at least, not fall on ass ever.

sick.

sick and miss home really badly. badly. badly. badly. badly.

I always get this kind of feeling at least once a month - inconjunction with hormones, auntie-visit (is it still hip to use this term?) etc.

This time around, there is hormones, auntie visit (still thinking if it is hip to use this term) and severe tooth,gum, ulcers ache. It is sending massive, really massive pain to my nerves, brain and neck.

All these just makes me miss the folks at home ( don't get me wrong, i miss them most of the time, but during these period, I just want to grab a ticket and fly home). Seeing a doctor is very troublesome here, and going to a dentist means half a month of my salary gone. I really hope the pain will go away soon.

Chrissy and I was just chatting about how we always have a few days in a month where we feel really shit and bad, and we keep wondering is it just us or everyone eles? We both felt redundant, missing-something, ugly (thats just me), not capable enough, wrong time, wrong place, everything is wrong. I actually told her that..... I miss Singapore. Despite everything eles, I miss the time I was working in Singapore (but seriously, if I am working now in Singapore, i am pretty sure I will hate it).

I miss those times when she visit me in my office late at night when I am trying to finish up drawings. I miss those times when we pay 10 bucks to watch really, bloody stupid movies at cineileisure (ie. dead and breakfast - I don't think many people know about it anyway.) I miss those times when we walk the causeway together on friday nights. I miss those times when we day dream about touring around the world on long bus journeys.

I miss hanging out with my parents on weekends. We really hung out, alot. I walk with dad to grab morning newspaper, make us coffee while reading papers and waiting for the rest to get ready for breakfast. On good days when the boys are up early we will all head off for breakfast together, if not it will usually be the folks and me. The it will be marketing time - which is the favorite part of my day. I love markets, esp. the really locals and neighbourhood ones. Mum will usually be the one bargaining with the stall owners, while dad and me will stand aside chatting and joking away. I love hanging out with them.

I miss late night mamak with the girls. Sometimes they will be at my place playing mahjong, or just chatting and nibbling away - mum never fails to store up chips and snacks for emergency purposes. I miss having eve to drive me around jb, trying hard to not look like singaporeans, in case we get robbed.

I think .... at the end of the day. It really is the people that matters. If only everyone can move here. If only dentist fees are cheaper. If only ......

flowersdale

01 black burnt trees, green leaves.
02 chimney leftovers.

flowersdale.

We went on a trip to flowersdale today, one of the bushfire affected zone, prolly around 20 km away from kingslake.

The journey along the road was very surreal. Green leaves growing out of black burnt trees. Not much of civilisation going on there, except for occasionally a fortunate brick house that has managed to escape from the bushfire.

Our first site was along the main road on a sloping site. It was totally bare, with only bits of furniture left crushed on the ground. The original house sits on a slope overlooking to vast land and mountains. View of it reminds me heaps of Tasmania, except where this place has gone through much more than the peacefulness Tassie had.The client was very positive and was really looking forward to re-build his dream house. I walked around huge vacant land with my leather boots that was worth 2 days of my wages, wishing that I had wore sneakers instead. While I was carried away taking pictures and mumbling to the client that we had sent him some images of our previous projects to his email, his reply was:" well, I wish I could check them, but this was where my computer was.", pointing to where I was standing. How sad, how surreal, to be standing at a place where you once lived for ages, and now suddenly turned into all flat land and burnt down trees.

After the first site visit, we went down to a local pub where the owner is our second client. It was pretty relax at the pub, just everyone sitting around dirty old tables drinking and talking about architecture (note: not capitol A). There was no great philosophies, no jargons, no concept, no folding or testing of materials spoken of. Only humble ideas, simple construction methods, creative passive energy efficient theories discussed.

Drinks went on forever with aussies as usual. By the time we decide to walk into the bush to the second site, the sky was turning dark, light drizzle coming down. We still walked on. It was freezing, my tummy was trembling, but I took extra effort on looking out for traps in case my boots get stuck in the muds.

The second site was amazing. Its much more messier than the first, alot more rubbish left uncleared. Everything was nearly gone except for a brick chimney standing still. The clients say they are planning to get rid of everything, but our first respond was really to keep the chimney. I didnt dare to do the architectural talk to them, warren did. He spoke of how the chimney feels really nostalgic and should remain as part of a memorial to the bush fire and further on to explain how the planning of the house should line on an axis towards the creek, mountain and chimney .... (architecture story goes on). The whole conversation suddenly became really poetic and architectural, it wasn't a cliche though, i didn't think it was a trying-too-hard conversation, just that it was a sudden change of frequency and I really didnt expect someone like warren to say such things. I was completely taken away. So did the client. They bought his story.

The day ended easily with more drinks in the pub. It was a very surreal and beautiful day for me.

For once I felt what I did was really right, even when my bank account doesnt shares the same thoughts. Many times I thought of taking the easy way out. There has been a few offering of jobs lately by friends and tutors, but gut feelings told me to stay on. I wake up everyday thinking if I made the right decision, great battle between love and money, especially when every single one around you is doing so well. I still do not know how to balance love and money just yet, i am sitting down here eating instant noodles but my entire mind is about Flowersdale.

If only leather boots are cheaper ..... if only architecture can afford more leather boots.