Thursday, December 31, 2009

Visiting Tampines again brings back so many old memories; memories of going to my old market, buying lanterns, of rickety school buses traipsing through tampines st 81, of the swimming pool with its large holes, of long rides visiting the piano teacher; i was young then, and earnest about the world; it was a nice kampung, it was home.

nostalgia brought me to go back towards the west (where i now live) using pretty much the whole stretch of east coast road. i remember my parents having plenty of friends who stayed in nice little houses along upper east coast road, all the church friends who owned houses there; i remember nice little family outings to katong to eat. or travelling in the car along the ECP; in fact i can still recall it very clearly: tanjong katong road, marine parade, marine vista, siglap road, bedok, bayshore, tampines! home!
oh well.

those days are gone i guess.

the west is very different. less neat. it's not quaint like the east is. everything is sprawling and vast and the roads curve here and there and there's plenty of forests and trees. the houses are much bigger. there are hills everywhere. it's great. but it's not like the east is.

i tried the most yummilicious cheng tng at bedok corner (ye lai xiang) which i will post about in my food blog, but it is really the works. absolutely amazing.

maybe we shouldn't have moved over to the west; we were happy in the east. sigh. my parents had real friends who treated them as friends. relocating, trying to find their roots again in the west, isnt' so easy. it just isn't the same.

sometimes when they say family lasts but friends don't, i'm not so sure; family is important, yes, but how can you say that long term friends aren't really like your family? isn't there just e same bond?

anyway the remaining of this post is going to be very technical but since blogging iz just for fun i will shout it out anyways;
many people ask me "how do you get so good at directions" and all that, and i explain to them that it's really quite simple. so i'll share with you a little secret.

singapore is a ridiculously easy city to navigate, really. because, just like all the other cities, the roads are all either north-south (longtitudes) or east-west (latitudes). so if you know how the roads are ordered, you can pretty much travel anywhere.

North-south roads (they travel from the NORTH to the south). so here's how they are ordered, starting from West moving towards East.
(Jurong)
Lim Chu Kang Road - Jln Bahar
Jurong Town Hall Road - Bukit Batok Road
Clementi Ave 6 (connecting the two highways)
Clementi Road - Upper Bukit Timah Road - Woodlands Road (to the causeway)
Buona Vista Road (in e south); BKE (in the north)
Farrer Road - Lornie Road - Upper Thomson Road - Sembawang Road
Thomson Road - Marymount Road - AMK Ave 6 - Lentor Avenue
CTE
(In the city):
Eu Tong Sen Street / New Bridge Road moving upwards: Hill Street / Victoria St;
(In the east)
Tanjong Katong Road - Paya Lebar Road - Upper Paya Lebar Road
Jln Eunos - Eunos Link - moving upwards to Hougang

(EAST WEST ROADS)
Moving from SOUTH to NORTH:
[in the West]
West Coast Highway - ECP
AYE - ECP
Jln Bukit Merah (not that long)
Commonwealth Avenue West - Leng Kee Road
Holland Road
Bukit Timah Road [links to Clementi Rd - upper bukit timah rd] - Rochor Road
PIE
SLE
(In the East)
(from the ECP)
Mountbatten Road - East Coast Road - Upp East Coast Rd
Sims Avenue - New Upper Changi Road - Upp Changi Road East
PIE
TPE

[moving north]:
Braddell Road - Bartley Road
AMK Avenue 1 - Boundary Road
AMK Avenue 3 - Houngang Ave 2


In fact, there are even diagonal roads: the most prominent being:
Upper Serangoon Road, moving diagonally from serangoon up till pongoll.

And there are ring roads:
the most famous and important being Queensway - Farrer Road - Braddell Road - Bartley Road - TPE

so if u know all this, you can find ur way around singapore+)
guaranteed.

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

It's been so long since I've posted.
Hie guys.

Merry Christmas and celebrate Jesus's birthday. how cool is that.
Say Happy Birthday to Jesus if u haven't.

NYE is coming.

actually im not here to blog about serious stuff.

im just going to share some cool songs.

the first is:
liza minnelli - maybe this time
it's been on repeat for the longest time.
it's super cool.

and the other is
kristin chenoweth - taylor e latte boy.

and let me post the chords here. since u can't find them anywhere, i've attempted to decipher them.
haha
here goes:

A A#5
Maybe this time, I'll be lucky
A6 A7
Maybe this time, he'll stay
(riff - E-D#-E-F-E-F-F#-F-F#-G)
D
Maybe this time
D#5
For the first time
D6 D#dim
Love won't hurry away
(F#-F-F#-G-F#-G-G#-G-G#-G)
E E/D C#m F#7
He will hold me fast
B B E7
I'll be home at last
A7 D7 G
Not a loser anymore
A
Like the last time
F# B E
And the time before

(Riff)
A A#5
Everybody loves a winner
A6 A7
So nobody loved me;
D D#5
'Lady Peaceful,' 'Lady Happy,'
D6 D#dim
That's what I long to be
E E/D
All the odds are in my favor
A/C# F#m B7
Something's bound to begin
A/E A#5/E
It's got to happen, happen sometime
A6/E A
Maybe this time I'll win
F
Bb [repeat it in Bb]
Everybody loves a winner
So nobody loved me;
'Lady Peaceful,' 'Lady Happy,'
That's what I long to be
All the odds are in my favor
Something's bound to begin
It's got to happen, happen sometime
Maybe this time
Maybe this time I'll win