18th May 2009 - 17th July 2009

PTS. Finally the long awaited PTS is finally over! I am grateful to have such thoughtful colleagues to treat me to a simple yet meaningful farewell lunch:)

Lots of heartfelt gratitude to them and I have expressed them in the form of letters:) Hope they like it:) It's handwritten and customized - not the standardized form okie:)
During this internship period, I also had a number of small yet meaningful accomplishments during this period.

Scholarship. Gone through rounds and rounds of interviews and gotten the BCA Industry Scholarship with CPG.

The giant awakes. Completed reading “Awaken The Giant Within” by Anthony Robbins – a very inspiring and surprisingly practical and insightful personal development book. It’s definitely worth the time spent reading it on my journey to and fro work. Trust me – it’s not like any other personal development book.

Contribution. As inspired by the book, I have also signed up as a member of SG Cares under NVPC. Heeding the advice: “Decisions to be followed by actions”, I have attended the Volunteer Orientation on Thurs. I applaud myself for taking this small but crucial beginning step. Next step is to sign up and attend volunteering activities.

Tuitions. First time attempting to juggle work with tuitions and 4 tuitions to be exact. Tuition after a long day of work is really physically draining. It not only robs away my leisure and rest time, my proper dinnertime is also compromised.

However, it’s such a joy to see my students learning well. Knowing that all the time and effort I have put in directly equates to them learning more and being better prepared for exams – this is one of the main motivations that keep me going.

Teaching secondary school students have also allowed me to build a stronger bond with them without worrying about instilling discipline. So it’s more friend-friend relationship rather than tutor-student.

Big Plan. And what’s more fun than working on A BIG PLAN with CHAOS! It’s going to be our BIG baby, mothered by 5 ladies. After so many years, CHAOS is finally geared up once more to put up a performance, a performance off stage but online.

879. Our 1-year anniversary! We celebrated twice. A homely Saturday carrying out our celebration protocol. And another one on the actual day, it’s actually our usual weekly after-work dinner but with greater significance (and budget too!).

Specially (cum randomly) prepared a healthy lunch for him @ my house!:D

Menu for the day was only confirmed when the shopping was done. So it's a shop and get inspired kind of menu but with one criteria - healthy:)

So presenting chicket fillet salad, egg cum black pepper ham cum salmon spread sandwich and my proudest "invention" - watermelon cum nata de coco yogurt! :D

After lunch, we went to collect our huge collection of photos! We have much difficult selecting them as we really took alot of photos!:) But the process was really nice as we get to browse through what we have gone through for the past 1 year:D

Then off we went to his house to start on our 878-879 photo album :D Anyway, it's still in the process of making as there are really alot of photos and I have to admit I am really busy with other activities since internship ended. But will definitely work on it as I can't wait to admire the final produce:)

Our actual 879! ShaX2 bought me to buy a really pretty necklace. It's customized, so it's still in the process of making. Can't wait can't wait:D

And the best way to deal with my cup-corn craving is to have it homemade, by ShaX2 of course!:D

Happy 1 year!:D May we have many many more 87- years to come:D

Javelin. Or BB Curve which I personally prefer. If there’s only one application that I can keep, it will be my Pocket Informant (PI). It’s now my portable 24/7 organizer which allows me to plan my schedule whenever I want to without having to sit down and note it down manually.

This is especially important for me, as I don’t usually record down trivial tasks and tentative events in my book organizer. Hence these tasks (though small but as important) tend to slip my mind. And it makes changing of tuitions and appointments so much faster and liquid paper-free.

Anyway, for the purpose of showing my BB again haha, here's photos taken when we had Swensens 1-for-1 at United Square during ShaX2's lunchtime as I was at CPG for deed signing. Love taking photos of him:D

On a side note: I have actually almost stopped using “as such” totally, even in my PTS report! That’s so scary. I must have linked much pain towards using this phrase that I’m actually avoiding it altogether. I’m sure my facilities planning group will be so glad.

Deeper thoughts. 2 of my recent tweets are the results of observations I got during this internship period.

“What we cannot really see tends to be of greater importance. Love vs Money. Life vs Body. Character vs Looks.” Seeing many people, especially working adults, they don on nice suits and trendy formal wear with branded bags, pens, handheld set and even a glittery bluetooth. Inevitably, they must have certain career positions and financial status. At first instance, I thought how I wish I could be like them.

However, on deeper thoughts and closer observations, do they look happy? I may not know, but apparently they don’t appear to be. To me, most of them, if not all of them, portray signs of weariness, dullness and boredom. Why is it so?

Can it be due to the pursue of nothingness? People work hard to earn better income and to gain better status. But many a times, when this goal is met, they don’t feel much happiness. Even if there is, more often than not this source of happiness is never permanent. Of course, nothing is permanent. So maybe that is why humans are never satisfied, they keep chasing. Keep chasing for that permanent thing known as nothing.

Then is it because people have the misconception about money and status? It appears that with money, we can achieve much material luxury, so people sub-consciously equate them to happiness.

I guess it’s actually not the physical coins and cash that make us happy, rather it’s what they can do for us that create happiness. More money means we can pamper ourselves, eat what we crave for and get anything that we can exchange money for happiness. So it’s the things that we derive from money that make us happy – money itself can be a source of happiness but it’s definitely not happiness. But somehow, there are people who thought otherwise.

Happiness is not just about we earning more. Happiness is about feeling loved and having the ability to love others. Essentially, I think that happiness is about you feeling good right from your heart.

Money is not the only thing that can make us feel good. Knowing that we have self worth, knowing that we can make a difference to people around us, knowing that you have truly live your life and knowing that your presence on Earth is significant make us feel good, for a very long time. Not permanent still, but definitely much more long lasting effect I supposed.

So don’t just work for the money. Don’t just focus on work. And don’t just study for the career. “There is so much more to life than work and study.” I believe the world will be a better place to live in or at the very least, you yourself will feel better, if people focus more on doing good and spreading love. We are humans with emotions but are we working ourselves too hard as though we are robots? And are we so task-oriented that we treat each other as working robots as well?

I’m definitely guilty of working like a robot, especially with all the deadlines. However, we are different from robots as we have the ability to make the right decisions and choose how we want to live our life. So make everyday a happy day knowing that you have truly live your life. I’m really glad that this year I have decided to focus on things other than study and work.

I re-ignite my passion for dance and my desire to perform on stage as a different person.

I devote more time to reading personal development books and reading on the dharma.

I dare to believe that CHAOS Big Plan will work and am committed to making it a reality and not just one of my daydreams.

I focus more on the strengths of others instead of picking on their weaknesses.

I have decided to contribute.

I have decided to love, learn and live my life as a legacy.

It is definitely easier to go with the flow and be stuck in the cycle of everyday life. However, I know that the fact that I am becoming more aware and that I have made the decisions to change for the better, I am on good ground to level up.

To end off, “Nobody is perfect, there are bound to be hits and misses. Just don’t let any misses negate your hits.” Be fair. So be kind to yourself and be even kinder to your loved ones for they are the ones who will enrich you.

Wow! I didn’t expect myself to have such a long write-up on my deep thoughts. Perhaps my head is bigger for a reason. Just trying to capture what’s in my mind. I rarely have the opportunity to find the time to note down my deep thoughts, so I’m glad I did this time. My head somehow feels lighter now. Or maybe, it’s me who is feeling lighter!

Anyway, this post was typed a few days ago:) More to come with lots of photos!:D Hope everyone is enjoying this holidays as much as I do, esp for those who just ended internship!:D