just came back from womad. wild wild night. read sachel's blog to get an idea of it. luckily it rained after the last performance of the night ended. was a thunderstorm.


our admission wristbands

given them when you enter, only way to reenter the place once you have decided to step out of fort canning park


potato salad i made for dinner...


...and chocolate cake i made for dessert

side note here. this was one bitch of a cake. totally pissed the hell out of me and was damn difficult to make. and the recipe said "if you have 40 min...". .... . what a big, fat lie.


sachel's apple and banana flambe... yummy!

our contributions to the night's picnic dinner. shaaretha and michelle made muffins with a ganache centre. all i can say is that i had an overload of sugar and chocolate. did i mention they were chocolate muffins too?


from left: me, sachel, shaaretha and michelle

at the end of womad at the top stage near where they were holding the club set. a kind soul helped us take this group shot.

after womad, i had like 2 hours to sleep before i had to go back to camp for guard duty. 48 hours consecutive guard duty. imagine that.

Bertram awoke @ 2:51 AM with (0) flashes of inspiration

the book

reading is good. reading depressive literature is not good. "bitch: in praise of difficult women" by elizabeth wurtzel. i feel so depressed, disheartened about life. i feel what she feels at the time of writing this book. a huge amount of research has gone into this book and when i reached the chapter of the women who have fallen apart due to depression, i just felt like curling up into a ball and just cry. anne sexton, sylvia plath, edie sedgwick, zelda fitzgerald, frances farmer, margaux hemingway. when i read about margaux hemingway it struck me because she did get her life in order, made appointments, moved house. however, it was a facade, an order to cover despair, appointments she will never go to, in a new house with things still neatly packed in boxes she committed suicide. those who are serious about ending their lives will do all they can to conceal their intentions from anyone who might get in the way and not cause a whole fuss about it. as wurtzel wrote, "depression, the disease of not feeling, starts to manifest itself as tantrums, hysteria, excess --- the disease of feeling too much ..... behaviour that is mistaken for any number of things --- lasciviousness, insanity, bitchiness above all --- is rarely mistaken for what it actually is, for one of the oft-forgotten sins against society, the illness at the centre of so many ills: despair." are you scared yet? i bloody hell am.

on to other things. i cleared out my drawer, and found a whole bunch of letters i used to write and receive from others back in the early jc days. before i had a phone, before i used email and icq often, before everything that happened that lead me up to keeping an online public diary of sorts called a blog. always loved putting pen/pencil to paper. it felt good to write on good paper with a good pen. i love the smell of fresh paper, the crisp, smooth and unblemished texture of it. it made me come alive. now that i type more than i write, i press phone buttons more than i write, i don't feel the life i get when i write, the fluidity, the grace, the elegant dance of paper on pen, in english exams the mad rush to put thoughts to paper, the slashing and slicing like a sabre of a british calvary officer in the air during swordsmanship practice. despite sporadic attempts to revive this life, i have not been able to regain the life i had released. oh to feel that vigour once more! i do not keep a diary, commiting most thoughts and experiences to memory. in my childhood i was too lazy to write. now, in my young adulthood i am too inept. using a weblog to communicate with others as they visit at their own convenient times. helps with long distance relationships i suppose, and with friends you are not really close too.

gone down to bellagio (a gelato outlet) today. it was introduced by ruijie, one of my campmates. 72 flavours can you believe?! indulgence. sheer indulgence. tried black sesame (hit), chocolate fudge (hit), yam (hit), rose (so-so), banana (so-so), wattle seed (so-so), grand marnier (miss), tia maria (miss) and bailey's (miss). 9 flavours. 3 triple flavour cups. $6.50 a cup. expensive ice cream. coincidentally, it was the place shulin's friend went to and described in her blog. did not give it much thought till it hit me like an oncoming train. however, having studied in the bukit timah area for 6 consecutive years (the chinese high school, then national junior college), i still prefer the gelato at 6th avenue. venezia at guthrie house, you know, the one with the cold storage and coffee bean and across the main road is a 7-11? much fewer flavours but smoother texture. can't believe i actually binged today. even the staff at bellagio were looking at me and seem to be thinking "sure or not?". ah well... as long as i am satisfied. haha. go for what i want. that applies to everyone of us too. go for what we want and don't hold back.

Bertram awoke @ 2:12 AM with (0) flashes of inspiration

went out to dinner with rach and esther on friday night at swiss culture at suntec. like esther said, "stuffed full of swiss sausage and chocolate fondue - cheesy, i blame thee" were her exact words. went to evita peroni after dinner. not that i am into wearing hairbands, clips and scrungies but just browsing is fun. i like to shop. they have lots of nice clips and hairbands, and for ladies who like to have their hair pinned and tied up there are many accessories too.


that's rachel on the left and esther on the right

last night i went to rachel's house for dinner. they had this really large dog who is can be described at best as silent and amorous. labrador retriever, big, huge, cute and absolutely cuddly! when i say silent and amorous i meant he doesn't bark, and the moment you pet or scratch him he just jumps on you, though when he did that when i arrived i had to drag myself and him to the door. he doesn't drool or slobber, though when i left i had to hunt for my sandal. one was at the door and another near the dog dish... *hmm* dinner was great. popiah and mee siam, but what was even better was the pre and post dinner entertainment. we had rachel and wang yun dance to david tao's music like they had smoked pot or eaten ecstasy, and all esther and i did were sitting there being highly amused and entertained. a camcorder, a camcorder, my kingdom for a camcorder. for all the humiliating moments to capture and view again 5 or even 10 years down the road. wang yun is very talented at music. plays the guitar well, and piano very well. entertaining us enthralled devotees with "wang yun unplugged" last night.

helped sachel prepare her hostel room. learned that when i finally enter university and live in the hostel i have to do a whole lot of cleaning. the floor had loads of dust, hairs, and the dust at the top of the cupboard was so thick i could write my name in it and have enough dust on my fingers to use as seasoning salt for instant noodles. i can't believe the previous occupants of the room were female. anyway we got down to cleaning the room, setting up her computer and doing a little decoration. nice looking hall on the outside hall 9 but the room is smaller than her previous one at hall 5.

now it's sunday and the weekend has come and gone. time to go back to camp tonight, burn away time and await the day i am finally able to have full control of my free time once more instead of being confined in a camp.

now listening to here without you by 3 doors down

"A hundred days have made me older
Since the last time that I saw your pretty face
A thousand lies have made me colder
And I don't think I can look at this the same

All the miles that separate
Disappear now when I'm dreamin' of your face
I'm here without you baby
But you're still on my lonely mind

I think about you baby and I dream about you all the time
I'm here without you baby
But you're still with me in my dreams
And tonight, there's only you and me...."

this song just causes emotions to surface... listening to this on a rainy day looking out the window makes my heart hurt inexplicably.

Bertram awoke @ 1:09 PM with (0) flashes of inspiration

made tiramisu for my platoon bbq yesterday. i like to make desserts. i shall try to find time one day to make chocolate cake and strawberry trifle. just pardon my amateur efforts.


the whole cake


one serving

if you would like me to make you one, please tell me in advance, 'kay? no promises though~ >_<

the bbq was quite fun haha. we saw quite a few people getting drunk including the guy who stayed at the condo we help the bbq at. they were all trying to ko my platoon sergeant too. their faces were all like super red man... this was at one person's house so still quite controlled. can't imagine what would happen at a chalet man. let the gates to hades open and all hell break loose, or something to that effect eh?

Bertram awoke @ 9:58 AM with (0) flashes of inspiration

define weird. i just awoke from this really weird dream.

first i was like at this bus stop and waiting to take a bus. then i flashed into a girl's room and flashed out again to the bus stop. the bus came and i got up and i saw two aunties talking. then one of them turned into my mom and the other had a daughter standing with her suddenly, the same girl whose room i was teleported into. they were talking and talking and i just well, hmmm this part gets fuzzy, i somehow got to know the girl. oh yeah i was packing stuff in my room and she was at the corridor outside peeking in. (i know my dream is really weird but bear with me) there was this guy standing next to me on the bus who was a lieutenant-colonel from the navy. he readjusted my shirt collar with this irritated expression and suddenly my clothes turned into my army uniform, all jungle stripe camouflage and lowly corporal rank. i ended up talking to the guy and we were talking about stuff that i forgot most about except army cooks and food. the girl from the bus was cooking food and somehow kwang boon appeared as one sailor waiting for the cook to finish making chips for him. in our conversation about the goodness of naval galley cooks as compared to army cooks the girl dropped the food she was making which was almost done. kwang boon said never mind and ate the food off the floor amidst her apologies. then we (the girl and me) somehow ended up walking on the deck of the ship, jumped across to another ship with really huge rusty guns, then with one more step we walking into the water and the ship was somehow moving away. a boatman on this skiff was dumping this red dye into the water and then sailed away ignoring our calls for help after looking at us. then we saw this tiny shore where many people were crowded there and we swam towards it. on that shore it was crowded with a lot of illegal immigrants, and the girl and me were the only chinese there. i was checking my phone to see if the water had damaged it when suddenly a military vehicle pulled up and one soldier stepped down asking for all people of my country to step forward. i stepped forward, found i had no identification papers or cards on me and the guy just carried on walking and asking others. i took out my military ez-link card as a last resort and asked the guy if that could suffice. he said yes and gave me this card which was supposed to me my war id but turned out to be a fill-in-yourself id card with a servicing checklist incorporated into it. i realised it was a servicing section when the place changed into this big multi storey car park with this technician sitting on the ground next to me repairing a vehicle. what was special about the card was you either fill in one section or two other sections. mine was half filled for some reason. so now my country was at war with someone and i am going off to war with that girl. we asked for a lift and were asked to get on the vehicle which transformed from a jeep to a bronco. no space in front so we went to the back (the vehicle had mannequins wearing army uniform and strapped into every available seat) but i had to go pee first so i went to near another vehicle in the car park to pee. then it so happeed i was in front of this old version army truck with anti air missile/artillery rocket tubes mounted on it. this guy wearing something like an NBC suit then got down from the driver's cabin and i went behind another vehicle to hide and observe. another similar truck appeared behind me and its driver got off to so i went back to my original place and pee-ed cos i can't take it anymore. the girl was waiting at one side with me when suddenly the bronco drove off leaving us behind. we shouted after it but it didn't stop and when we chased it, that's when i woke up.

really weird dream, totally out of this world and completely strange. now to find out what this whole entire choc-a-bloc means.

Bertram awoke @ 7:35 AM with (0) flashes of inspiration

back from my misadventures in the lim chu kang area, and to think that this is the seventh month (lunar calender) and the hungry ghost festival. well i didn't get dripped which is good, but that is because i didn't see front line action. however, worse stuff happened. given i am in a vehicle which was designed in 1954 by the french as a light tank for patrol/reconnaissance duties, it's really old and breaks down quite easily. maintenance is a killer.


this is my tank, a modified amx-13

on the first day of atec it already rained which is a really bad omen. i hate outfield when it rains. ground gets muddy, which makes vehicles muddy and our boots muddy when we dismount and makes the inside of the tank muddy when we get back in. heck of a mess to clean. then we get wet too since the hatches don't seal properly, and since air circulation is through the large engine fan, night rain feels like i am taking a shower in a refrigerator.

my tank broke down as it reached the lager location. rough terrain cause the right road wheel arm to break and we had to spend the whole night replacing the arm. what made it dificult was that the track was already half thrown and out of alignment with the sprocket wheel so the teeth were just slipping on the inner part of the track. uneven ground meant the track was super tight and we could not release the track tension to break it, realign it and change the road wheel arm. so we did quite a few stunts like placing rocks between the track and sprocket wheel and reversing to use the rock to raise the track. well the rock shattered to dust. but eventually we managed to strip the track and get down to changing the arm. spent the whole night and did not get much rest before we had to wake and chop plants to camouflage the tank for the first mission.

before we even started the mission i accidentally crushed my vehicle commander's foot. well his foot was in a danger area i couldn't see so when i elevated the turret it crushed his foot. there was even this visible dent in his foot. initial diagnosis at NUH was a fracture but after the second checkup at a specialist it was found that his entire toe bone is broken. end result he is out of action till 2nd of september. can't believe this.

then the third day passed quite uneventfully, waited like 12 hours at the line for the enemy to come during the second mission. torturous wait that. and on the last day when we moved out to do the final mission, my vehicle broke down again. radiator pipe was cut by the alternator belt and all the coolant leaked out. engine overheated, smoke streamed out through the fan cover, and it was like minutes after contact with an enemy vehicle. after the recovery team came and we slave started the vehicle to move it to one side of the axis, the engine got damaged and engine oil spurted all over the engine compartment. other oils and water got mixed with the engine oil i think so the engine is now really screwed. have to change the entire engine. what made it more interesting was then we broke down at a junction, the only junction in the training area with a grave there. someone said the guy was lonely and wanted some company so he caused our tank to break down there. all i could do was sigh...

oh did i mention it rained every single day? really killed the mood man. it actually rained 3 times on the second day, and really heavily on the last day as we waited at the admin area for the ride back to camp. all our weapons were covered in mud and water making it a real bitch to clean. it's like caked in mud whereas if it didn't rain it would be just sandy. the best one was that one of my weapons jammed. had a cartridge wedged between the recoil mechanism and the body acting like a door wedge, hence i could not fire, cock or strip my weapon. we used methods ranging from sticking in a track pin to hammer the recoil mechanism out and whacking the cocking handle on the hull of the tank, but to no avail. my platoon commander insisted it was just that the firing pin was bent and kept hitting the pin from the top to "realign" it. although i said it was due to a stuck cartridge he ignored me. well my whole platoon doesn't like him. we call him "cha tau", which is blockhead in hokkien i think.

and there you have it, the summary of my (mis)adventure outfield. the last one i will ever go to in my full time NS life. next one would be when i go for reservist after i ORD. "ORD loh!" *cheers* really long update this. will have more after i go for a whole slew of outings this coming week which is mostly block leave. *cheers again* it's my 4th consecutive long weekend that starts from a wednesday or earlier yay~

Bertram awoke @ 12:07 PM with (0) flashes of inspiration

a friend told me that i think i am a nice guy. that opened my eyes somewhat. thinking you are nice makes you blind to your faults which eventually leads to a singular sucidal implosion of self destruction. however i do try to be nice to everyone, until i cannot take it anymore when people start walking all over me. then i explode. that or just brood. that is not healthy; that's me. i can change, but do i want to make the effort to? think shall no longer try to please people. being *always* helpful, available and saying yes causes others to overlook you and take you for granted.

side note here about alcohol. why do people like to torture themselves so? in elaboration, they drink copious amounts of the stuff only to puke it out later accompanied with great agony as their body tries to expel the amount unable to be broken down. the sequence is as follows:
1. drink
2. get drunk
3a. dance like a madman (or woman)
b. talk rapidly on hyper mode, sometimes incoherently
c. cry, laugh, or sing uncontrollably, inexplicably and/or incessantly
4a. go to toilet and puke and end up hugging the commode and sleeping
b. stagger out of the joint and puke by the road
c. somehow find a way to get home and puke in your own toilet
5. get home (yours or otherwise) and sleep
6. wake up with a pounding headache and a bad mood
7. repeat steps 1 to 6 the next day/weekend
why do people like to hurt their own bodies? granted dutch courage allows you to do things you would not normally do and display pent up emotions but doesn't this hint at a deeper problem? mental, physical and spiritual are all linked in an interdependent relationship. is this a way at filling up the emptiness in their lives, suppressing the pain in their hearts or forgetting the problems they face? why run when you can just face up to it and get it over and done with? however hard you run, some day it will catch up with you and you end up facing it eventually.

to brian, i wish your grandmother good health and hope she recovers to full health asap.

to ruijie, just be yourself. to keep changing is to not be settled. people's impressions of a person run deep and are hard to change so instead of changing yourself to fit what they think is acceptable, accept yourself, your traits, and your limits.

eh singwei just relax on the design. the content matters more man.

to sachel and cheryl, finally it's been done and settled. no more problems regarding that issue anymore okay? my bad but i'm doing something about it.

and to my friends who study overseas, yes that means you esther, rachel, yingwen, wenqi, sarah, elaine, hanrong, vanessa and melissa, hope you all enjoy the overseas experience and liberation endowed by breaking free of the rigid mould termed the singapore education system. independence in a woman is a virtue most conservative men and MCPs can't see. hopefully it will also turn the kitchen disasters into competent chefs.

until i can reach a scanner or have one appear in front my me by eye power now, i will not be able to add more pictures to my online album till much later when i come back from the jungle in a week's time. till then i will be keeping radio silence in a forested area surrounded by people who would just love to issue me a casualty card and get me dripped by a novice medic who takes multiple jabs at my arm with the long thick needle of a saline bag in an attempt to find a major blood vessel.

Bertram awoke @ 1:31 PM with (0) flashes of inspiration

this is a simply beautiful song. there is no other way i can find to describe it. for everyone and anyone who has loved, been loved or fallen out of love, this is a song that would appeal to your heart and soul.

"The Difference" by Matchbox 20

Slow dancing
On the boulevard
In the quiet moments
While the city's still dark

Sleepwalking through the summer rain
In the tired spaces
You could hear her name

When she was warm and tender and you
Pulled her arms around you
There was nothing but her
Love and affection she was
Crazy for you now she's
Part of something that you lost

(chorus)
And for all you know
This could be
The difference between what you need
And what you want to be

Night swimming
In her diamond dress
Making small circles
Move across the surface

Stand watching
From the steady shore
Laying wide open
And waiting for

Something warm and tender while she's
Moving further from you
There was nothing that could
Make it easy on you
Every step you take reminds you
That she's walking on

(chorus)

Every word you never said
Echoes down your empty hallway
Everything that was your world
Just came down
It just came down

Day break on the boulevard
Feel the
Sun warming up your secondhand heart
Light swimming right across your face
You think
Maybe someday
Maybe someday

(chorus)

Bertram awoke @ 10:56 PM with (0) flashes of inspiration

stayed over at singwei's house last night. however, we didn't exactly sleep much.

went out to embargo at like 12+ am and it was like whoa man so last minute. candice was there with her sister and her friend sally, and to my surprise so was guo zhong and two other friends of his. it seemed so arranged...

so there we were talking and drinking a cocktail or two. talking about things i never expect to talk about with a person i've only met for the second time in my life (candice) or the first time (sally). any guesses? we were actually talking about lots of biology. gah whatever. we were actually talking about sex of all things. then it moved on to relationships and about differences between men and women.

something they said i couldn't really agree with personally but seems so in reality. nan2 ren2 bu4 huai4, nu3 ren2 bu4 ai4. or close to that. in english, the more "bad boy" personality the guy is, the more a girl likes him. why is this so? because she sees him as a challenge? as something for her to reform and when she succeeds, have as a trophy or crowning achievement? why would there be girls who want to keep getting hurt? secret masochistic fantasies? then what would happen to guys who are always nice to others, who are sensitive a.k.a. SNAG? or is the term "sensitive guy" an oxymoron?

is there a logical reason to this? or is it because that i am male, thus i require logic to organise and explain occurances? am i right to say that females would accept plausible reasons without second question based on mutual trust? too many questions to ask, too many answers to desire, yet would these answers make the world any better? would it be of any use except satisfying curiousity? or must everything have a use for it, or has to be productive? to engage in such rhetoric would tease and tickle the mind but to what end?

now for some really bhb words. candice and sally said i am a charmer but i've always seen myself as a bum and clumsy. sigh... what did i ever do to give them that idea. me, a ladies' man, but reality bites. i am such a human relations disaster. bad reputation everywhere. like what my details say, a lot of people hate my guts out.

anyways i have to go back to camp tonight. fyi, i've added more photos to my photo archive so go check it out. thank you for spending your valuable time reading.

bertram
"facta non verba" (deeds not words) --- unknown

Bertram awoke @ 12:46 PM with (0) flashes of inspiration