the adventures of darren, the man-boy and the _______

2008-03-16T22:49:00.006+08:00

"She got me wrapped around her little finger, uh uh"

There are a few things you need to know about Fujiya & Miyagi. Firstly, contrary to what the band name suggests, they are not Japanese. Secondly, they are not a two-piece band. As of Friday night, they have expanded from three to four members to include a drummer. As I learnt from them after the show, our little Singapore had the honour of being the drummer's first ever show.

The crowd, consisting mainly 20- to 30-something sophisticated arty types, didn't have to wait long for the band to take to the stage, with spartan wolf whistles greeting their emergence. Opener Ankle Injuries immediately got the crowd bobbing their heads and tapping their feet, and the complimentary drink certainly aided in releasing their inhibitions.

The band, who got their name from the character Mr Miyagi in the 1984 film The Karate Kid and the Fujiya brand of record players, performed tunes mostly from their sophomore album Transparent Things such as Sucking Punch, Photocopier and In One Ear And Out The Other, and a handful of brand new ones like Uh and Pussy Footin'.

Togged in a Run DMC t-shirt, David Best's (Miyagi) casual singing/rapping of witty lyrics, with the occasional beatboxing and guitar solo thrown in, was a hit with the audience. With synth wizard Steve Lewis (Fujiya) churning out pumping beats and bleeps, supported by the groovy basslines of Matt Hainsby (Ampersand), they created a unique concoction both dance heads and rockers would approve of. New drummer on the block Lee didn't come onstage till the sixth number, bringing to the band a sound edgier, rawer than the usual drum loops would provide.

Fujiya

Miyagi

Miyagi and Ampersand

Lee the drummer in shades

The gig ended with a 2-song encore, the group's undoubted hit Collarbone and Knickabockor. Offstage after the show, the band were down to earth, obliging with photographs and autographs, chatting with fans and thanking them profusely for attending. They looked like any ordinary men on the street. Who would be able to tell they were the architects of such brilliant music?

The two balding members and one headful of hair. haha! But I was starstruck nonetheless

2008-03-10T23:14:00.005+08:00

"The beat will steal you."

It was a congregation of sorts. I could safely say that a vast majority of Singapore's indie music-loving people, from Home Club scenesters to leading musicians like Ginette Chittick, were there. If they're weren't at The Great Spy Experiment's acoustic show, they must've been at An Evening with Broken Social Scene. Well, I was there for the latter.

The band didn't make the crowd wait, taking to the stage 10 minutes after schedule. Vocalist and co-founder Kevin Drew showed a first glimpse of his sense of humour by naming our escaped foe Mas Selamat Kastari among the members of BSS who were missing. Jokes aside, BSS brought the anticipating crowd to its feet with opening number 7/4 (Shoreline). It helped that the ushers did not stop the crowd from venturing closer to the stage.

The collective got around the problem of missing staff by inviting guest musicians to jam with them, further illustrating the concept of a broken line-up. But broken their music certainly wasn't, enthralling the audience with through fan favourites like Fire Eye'd Boy, Cause = Time and Lover's Spit, even surprising with the seldom performed I'm Your Fag. They even invited guest musicians from other Mosaic acts to chip in completely unrehearsed solos. Ah, beautiful spontaneity at its best!

The charismatic Drew sure had the audience under his spell. Forgetting his lyrics once, he pleaded for forgiveness after overcoming his gaffe. "I'm so over it, are you?" To which the crowd gave a resounding yes. He worked the crowd further by egging them to scream "I'm alive!" and scampering into the audience to applaud raucously with them for thirty seconds before breaking into Ibi Dreams of Pavement (A Better Day).

Kevin Drew

Meanwhile, guitarist Andrew Whiteman had a sideshow of his own going on. He was clearly in a trance through the night. Demonstrating some sort of guitar taichi he cradled his guitar and lifted his pick to the air, as if harnessing the energy of the axe gods, all while seducing the crowd with his intense gaze.

The band sure enjoyed themselves as much as the crowd did. They had expected to play in a club but ended up in a 1600-seat concert hall. Drew even raved what liberal place Singapore is because customs were compromising in allowing him to bring in his own brand of Canadian ciggies, and complimenting our "No _____" signs as ART.

Before we knew it, two hours were up. The band closed the show with the epic It's All Gonna Break. And for only the second time in their career, BSS did a stage bow, capping an unforgettable night for both band and fans.

2008-03-10T23:11:00.001+08:00

wah liew it's been almost a year since my last post. but i JUST HAVE TO BLOG ABOUT MY BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE EXPERIENCE ! ! !

2007-03-29T01:58:00.000+08:00

on monday i had the shock of the month, the year perhaps. i bumped into my sec1 classmate in camp. he was dressed in civilian clothes. so that meant he was newly posted in and had yet to receive his uniform. so i went up to him and hey but he wasn't too excited like i was.

Me: hey, what u doing here?
friend: i just enlisted this month.
Me: oh so u PES E just finished the 1-week bmt la?
friend: no im excused from bmt. pes E1L9. im a 302
Me: what's a 302?
friend: that's the term given to homosexuals and transsexuals. dunno how they found out. maybe cos last time i kena caught at changi village sucking someone's cock. or cos or my psychiatrist's reports.

i thought he was talking cock at first. but it soon dawned on me he was dead serious. he told me he was going to have a sex change op in bangkok after NS and was currently on female hormones. i just listened with eyes wide open, mouth slightly gaping. it was like wow he was damn open abt it. even when we haven't met for years. but he was telling me everything. he went on about how he was a prostitute for a while and dropped out of jc cos of the problem. and how his pastor told him to just choose the lesser of 2 evils. and he went back to our secondary sch with his cca mates last year, dressed as a woman, long hair, mini skirt and all. they were accepting of him though. he let on he's had the problem since sec2, and went to a psychiatrist. tried to have girlfriends. but just couldn't have feelings for girls.

it made me feel sad. i told him that he was really brave. everytime i see a trannie in changi village, i'll be like eeee. but now when one of them is your friend,you start to reflect. its beyond their control. their bodies are just wired that way. its no fault of theirs. when they break out of their male shell, naturally and unfairly we humans stigmatize them. well i intend to be the opposite of tt. talk to him in camp. and still be his friend.

and i've another friend with whom i had a hearty chat on the phone with for one hour last week. she has an auto-immune illness. meaning ur immune system attacks ur healthy cells (like AIDS, for example). in her case the cellls being destroyed are her hair. its a rare illness so there's no known cure to it. so she has to wear a wig around. and wait for the illness to go away by itself one fine day. she was sad for an entire year. but she has since learnt to love herself, and adopted an optimistic outlook and is sanguine abt the future.

i really feel inspired by them. in spite of having problems that are beyond their control, they still find the strength to get on with life. and there's always the danger of being stared at or worse, discriminated when their problem is revealed. i just feel lucky to be normal. and determined to achieve in life. first up...win with safsa.

2007-03-28T23:32:00.000+08:00

just came back from national team training. damn bloody shagged! well it can be called Nteam/safsa training. that's because our safsa trainer adrian, who's a national rower, has requested to allow safsa to train with the nteam. that way safsa can improve our technique/fitness and take our rowing up to a level of nirvana, as nteam guns for regional competitions, while safsa goes for only local. the nteam will have a larger pool or rowers too. so its a symbiotic thing u could say.

we'll be in good stead to reach our target of a medal in the june race, hopefully. well the process has already begun. adrian has made it compulsory for those in stay out units (like myself) to go for weekday trainings. today was only my 2nd training. and whoa it IS tough haha. no pain no gain man. so nowadays weekday nights 7-9pm its training. only free on tuesdays. that's the rest day. and probably fri cos its only a long run at macritchie. no more life man. but i have faith the sacrifice will pay off :)

had 2 competitions in 9 days. there was the MR 500m on the 17th and sdba master series on 25th. we put up a pretty bad showing in MR 500 getting like last in the heats, losing to the Peoples Association, a recreational team :( our timing was 2:30, nus was like 2:22. kena thrashed. but i felt we improved way a lot on the 25th. slashed 15s to 2:15. but we still lost to temasek poly's mixed boat. cock up. the master series is like a ranking competition. we're officially 11th in sg. but in my eyes we're fifth. cos our timing was better than tt of the 6th-10th. but its ok. we'll show our mettle in june. the problem now is our land fitness is there, but our water fitness isn't. we need to gain mileage, which can't be achieved only on the sat and sun trainings we currently have. and we aren't rowing as one. when the attachment starts (excused from going to camp, just go down to kallang and train train train), and with the nteam's expertise, hopefully everything will fall into place. we'll be unstoppable. mark my words!! come support me in june. you wont be disappointed. haha

AND...what's an entry without some pics.hehe

lower seletar reservoir. beautiful place!

weizheng: "kenny, you're gonna be our drummer!!"

hanging out

wee koh stretching that calf

camera-shy kingley and kenny

me, xuan sheng,sherwyn, ervin

our space. thats wee koh's butt occupying the left

our actual positions

visualisation and meditation. ommm

that's adrian our trainer in blue windbreaker

do i look seh? no? must be the army shorts...

focus!!

safsa...

thats us lane 5. thats me left 2nd rower!!

watch out for NUS' explosion in lane 1..

in a daze and drowning our sorrows by bingeing junk food

at bedok reservoir

ervin and xs they're marist brothers and they hate it haha

that's justin in shades

at lest managing some smiles

that's my VANS paddle haha. but its peeling off :(

2007-03-28T16:16:00.000+08:00

met juan ling at changi general hospital today for lunch..dun worry she's just there working in an admin postition. and i always manage to wear the same kinda top as her. in december we went zouk. she wore black and white stripes; so did i.

check out the monstrous legs on the right of the pic LOL

and today she wore a black v neck; so did i. haha

2007-03-28T09:58:00.001+08:00

finally the damned parades are over! and all of us got THREE days off! quite worth it. and im using one today. heh. the COA parade was a farce in my opinion. the venue is tiny and the visitors were mostly army(meaning no big shots and no members of the public). so the world doesn't really know. and the parade ended with us lining the road from the parade square to the exit, cheering and clapping as the outgoing chief leaves on the Armour Bionix tank waving back at us hoho. and the incoming chief enters the camp on a Guards light strike vehicle. what a way to end the parade in army trademark WAYANG fashion.

the CDF one was on a grander scale. many foreigners. many civilians. there were japanese women, one of which wore a dress with a hat, those kind englishwomen wear to horseraces..you get the idea haha. and there were many NSF spectators. overall i enjoyed the experience and bonded with the guys there. YAY and i thank my spf 50 sunbloack again lol

pang the cockster we love

a sian looking dezheng with bad tanline

gross chinese Seventeen LOL

another gross jap/cheena-inspired locker

ngu with his JJ snacks

pictures for lecherous deprived regulars

crappy fooood. i'll only eat the eggs

uuhhh

thats a radio

WAYANG!!!

2007-03-19T16:47:00.001+08:00

oh how time flies.

my brother will be back from the US and A on 29th april 1.25am, because he chooses to do his spring term the next academic year. so wow he is about to conclude one academic year there. he left in august but it doesn't feel like 8months..maybe cos we've been in constant contact with the help of modern technology

the last time i posted was 21st october?! sorry man my com was down for the longest time ever. hard disk corrupted. so now with a new hard disk im on a downloading spreee. hehe.

some updates on my life. been rotting and doing nothing in my vocation as a tank technician. life in camp is slack unproductive and mundane. plus we receive a paltry allowance which doesn't motivate us to work on the tanks... but i've found a new found life in NS. justin invited me to join safsa dragon boat in november. and i've really been enjoying it. regret not joining earlier. well the timing was good 'cos tt period i was starting to do some running and other training for the fun of it. so i was up for it. it's good to channel my energies into something i enjoy and am passionate abt in my NS life. becoming fitter than a fiddle and getting a great healthy bod are a bonus too :p

speaking of being healthy. my former superior for 2months in sungei gedong camp during my on-job-training had a heart problem and both his legs turned gangrenous. as a result both had to be amputated. it was really shocking. but come to think of it, it should be no surprise as he had a pot belly, drinked and smoked heavily. he even tasked me to buy ciggies once. oh well tt's how fragile life can be. so i believe in keepin' fit and staying away from smoking n alcohol.

and i'm newly single. :/ sarah and I just feel we can't be together. but we are still on talking terms. and that's sth not many former couples can do. so tt's good.

been staying in for the past week. because i've been "kena arrow" to march in the chief of army (20th) and chief of defence (23rd) change of command parades. i really do not see the point in wasting manpower, money, food and water for such parades. and rehearsal upon rehearsal of footdrill under the hot sun. i'm the only guy not to be sunburnt so i've my SPF50 water resistant Nivea sunblock to thank. almost everyone has really ugly tan lines LOL. but i still suffered an ulcer on my lower lip. yes, lower lip. how weird. fortunately i've the company of pang, ngu, dezheng and hu. it lessens the dread. and we can bitch abt unpleasant characters together. haha. but a good memory i have is of an Apache chopper landing in the pasir laba camp parade square, to be used as a static display. the sight was one to behold, but only if you manage to. that's because the resulting wind was a freaking torrent, throwing up sand and dust. so everyone was shielding his face and trying to take in the sight at the same time. so it was quite ironic. good memory. and its finally turning out to be a lobang i expected it to be. we were released before 12noon today. and was home at 3. HA. and looking forward to the many off days given when the whole thing is over.

booking out in my new super skinnies and loads of baggage

this is pang

three cocksters..

thats DZ in black and hu in brown

home ahead

2006-10-21T22:15:00.000+08:00

sarah gloopie gave me 3 presents. "last year i gave you one. this year three. so next year it'll be seven!" she professes. okay

thank you sarah bee! read the card if you can heh. yes those are my snoopy bedsheets. i'm still a child at heart

many thanks to all my friends who wished me. many surprises like lydia to whom i've not spoken to since A level results, and joshua my bud who just came back from taiwan. he still remembered! quite glad i can still be in contact with so many friends even when i'm in the army. cos u supposedly lose your social life. not when you're a technician, i guess. ha

i readily admit to being a complete sneaker whore. mum got me a Vans native american pair on wednesday for bday. i later learned it's a limited edition Vans Vault shoe. oooh. and today i got 2 more pairs at the converse warehouse sale. but it's not my fault, how would i know the converse sale would be so soon?? i thought it'd be in december. but it came earlier.

the white kappa ones look like school shoes haha. the Vans native american in the centre. and the classic black ones are converse. notice the colourful stripes inside :)

so now this is my legion of sneakers. they're my bosom buddies.

damian went to the sale too. but he has made a resolution not to get converse shoes cos converse were taken over by corporate giants Nike. haha. and he swears by Vans for the rest of his life.
vans poseurs!

2006-10-15T23:35:00.000+08:00

i roamed chinatown with hu and bjorn. i really like the place for its cultural value. the brightly coloured conserved shophouses are so quaint and beautiful.

we went to the flea market at china square central. the flea mart was really cool. it sold an various nonsense. from toys to old airline bags to gramophones. yes gramophones!! ans this was outside the mall. bullshit!

like intrepid explorers, we then ventured to ann siang road, the capital of high end indie stuff.

we came across this wall embellished with graffiti. oooh

reflections

they insisted on doing this...wayang!!

our actual destination was the red dot museum. to check out the MAAD flea market. it was cool. hidden in a corner of sg. budding creative designers peddling their all-original wares.

the taps were fun to use. you could rotate the mouth up and down. squirt!

2006-10-12T22:11:00.000+08:00

sweetsarah and i went cycling today..but i'm too lazy to blog my own version of events. so here's her entry. besides she writes better than i do ha. her entry is hilarious.

2006-10-11T23:49:00.000+08:00

Hu and i went to check out the final instalment of Stomp Rocks the Library series of gigs today. i'd been wanting to check it out for weeks and have had gig withdrawal symptoms for some time. and wow it was great. the love experiment cracked really lame jokes. and lunarin was awesome acoustic. i finally got lunarin to autograph my CD. they were really nice people, esp mr drummer eng teck. when he autograph, he couldn't recall the year we're living in..funny guy.

the love experiment. they're all experiments of their parents' love. thus the band name, serious

kah wye

eng teck

linda

there's the violinist from Serenaide on the left

and as usual i got filmed some videos. this is Silverpiece

Dry

yay

as usual darren cheapskate takes the Stomp goodie bag

2006-09-23T18:21:00.000+08:00

i stumbled upon this on this boring lazy saturday afternoon. its JACKASS the movie 2! well there isn't really a plot to jackass the movie. Johnny Knoxville and his team of professional stuntmen find dangerous, silly and often painful stunts to pull of, and compile it into a movie. there was also a weekly show on mtv. sounds daft? well it's a hit, not only among guys. it's rather astonishing to know the extent of the degeneration of our minds and culture. its classified under humour; we actually find people inflicting pain on and laughing at themselves like total ass holes entertaining... and i'm no exception LOL.

2006-09-13T00:28:00.000+08:00

saturday was a great day. first off i met damian my poseur bro to catch the launch of the Cancer Warriors Project. at the mrt station i bumped into VICTOR LUM. his hair had grown long. he looked comical. he was lugging his bass and on the way to city hall to jam. whoa whoa whoa.

lum with his instrument

OP (Oh, poseur!) that's our new catchphrase

stella the editor of Lime magazine was there at the gig. she told the story of a boy who was stricken with many tumours and whose head had swollen up. it was quite heart-rending. the boy was there but i could see he could not stand properly as his muscles weren't as developed as much as they should be. i was quite concerned if he had recovered completely and if the thumping music would give him headaches.. but well the gig was fairly good. bummer that electrico didn't perform.

this is THE Project Superband! consisting a newcomer Elsa, desmond Electrico, Sean Ronin & Wayne Thunder of The Suns! Fuck off Milu Bing!!!

west grand boulevard

david and daniel were absent. one of them had in-camp training LOL

ronin gave a "lazy" performance. only four songs :(

caught a glimpse of the singapore idols. surprised the crowd wasn't hysterical..

met my class after that for dinner! it was to celebrate grace the hobbit's belated birthday. it was unusual because one, jun wei and juan ling came! and two, adeline didn't wear any OP clothes.
intellectual

emokid only eats veges

the hobbits

the candy floss was on the house

greedy girl!

this girl was amusing

her eyes are bright but my teeth are brighter!

goodbye!

but here's a bo liao retarded video i made.

2006-09-12T22:20:00.000+08:00

friday i attended THE DINNER. since the army disallows servicemen from naming specific events and uploading photos where the unit's name is displayed, i shall refrain from doing just that.

Well THE DINNER served quite good food. but we had to wait long for it to arrive. and i missed out on some because i was helping my friend noel with some gay fancy dress shit. but i got to know him better in the process of designing his outfit. heh.

we were pissed off waiting for the food

hurhur

our table

i designed this shit!

what in the fuck is this??

me and jason tan the best senior!

2006-08-27T16:32:00.000+08:00

today was the army half marathon! but alas i was banned from running cos of my pes status. no 1-day off*wails* only half day. all i had to do was sai gang at the padang. supposed to guard bags but i walked away to soc (slack one corner) with damian. heh. guess i'll just have to join runs on my own next time. the experience of running thru the city taking in the sights and sounds should be fun.

we were fucking sian

this is Hu. Who? ya, hu

my brother left for the university of michigan on wednesday..but oh well with the wonders of technology i've talked to him face to face twice using the WEBCAM he bought before he left. it feels like he lives just next door hurhur.

met up with damian my poseur bro yesterday too. he brought me to a factory outlet kinda shop somewhere in orchard. i'm not gonna say where, that's how i keep it secret! i found myself this $5 vintage tee. and it fits like a glove.yay i love budget deals :)

met sarah at my favourite place near her house. simpang bedok! had our usual gloopus fare of roti john+kambing soup. yum. and we sat at our favourite bench at the nearby park and started making super-retarded-act-cute videos using her phone.

i'm such a gentleman carrying her handbag!

heh i love sarah gloop!

rock is for all ages

2006-08-27T14:40:00.000+08:00

i've been wanting to show this for a long time..it's OK GO! ok go are famed for their dances on YouTube and at gigs. fans are inspired to put up their own dances too.they're certainly have more diverse talents than normal bands. and the songs are catchy to boot! can they be invited to perform at Baybeats?

watch these you won't regret!
A MILLION WAYS. in a garden

HERE IT GOES AGAIN. unbelievable treadmill dance!its better than the first

i love the skinny pants in the 2nd vid. i've only 1 pair now. i feel like altering all my pants to skinny!

kill hannah

2006-08-25T19:32:00.000+08:00

let me introduce you to a quirky friend of mine. for confidentiality's sake (he requested his true name be altered), i'll call him Oug. Oug is one of a kind. he is really stuffed. his sense of humour makes his victim hopping mad. for example,
1)me: (asking to repeat) What?
Oug: What is the unit for power
2)me: say again?
Oug: again
3)me: u asked me?
oug: not mee, bee hoon...

he likes to make ham it up for the camera with his funny faces. he professes to coming from telok kurau secondary and ite college east. but he is gonna study chem engin and business in NUS. whoa..

OUG

well we went cycling last week with noel and jianhao..oug is a proficient cyclist. do not be fooled by his size. he's swift on a bike you know...and he looks really whimsical when he's riding fast LOL
noel acting cute...

hahabuddah

you know who you are...dun mess with us

noel's slipper tore so Oug had to lend him his..such humility right?

after that we proceeded to marina sq for sakae sushi YUM

silenced by seaweed

we had big appetites

OMG OUG!

2006-07-22T14:52:00.000+08:00

chelsea have revealed their new adidas kit! alright just when u people out there are just gonna say "YUCK!" in disgust, let me clarify i was a supporter way before the Russian revolution, since the era of Vialli, Zola, Poyet, Wise Flo and Petrescu, the 97-98 season.

arjen robben

frank lampard

2006-07-21T23:04:00.000+08:00

my brother will be leaving sg for the university of michigan in a month's time. on 23rd august 6am to be exact. that's pretty soon. i can just visualise the scene that morning. it'll be sad :(

one of the regulars went to genting and won loads of money. so he treated us to canadian and pizza hut! plus goats' milk bought from the nearby Lim Chu Kang farm. it sure tastes weird, but nice cos its $2 per 250ml bottle!! i drank 2 bottles, one plain one choc. my friend told me its super high in fat. oops. i kept the bottles 'cos they're cute. you can take a look. and of course i washed them, if not there'll be cheese in it tmr.

2006-07-21T22:12:00.000+08:00

yesterday the 20th of july was the 6-month anniversary... of my enlistment in the army!! ah fucking retarded life man. slack and get paid. well it's one quarter down, another 3 to go. girls out there are living the life having fun, travelling, making good money for the past 6months while we guys have our soul and freedom stolen, all for the sake of "defending" singapore.

i can tell you if singapore ever fights a war, we'll surely lose. i think there's too much red tape to pass before they can actually declare a war. even reporting sick is damn difficult and tedious. must seek permission from here and there. saf is damn F-ed up, esp how they spend their funds. regulars are given big fat pay. officer cadets are paid like $750++. while a technician like me is still a private (girls, that's 1 rank above Recruit) 6months after enlistment. and my pay is that of a recruit, $349.20. 80 cents is used for subscription of Pioneer magazine against your will. what the sole purpose of the mag? to support the useless regulars obviously... and daily i breathe in fumes of various types of oils. they ought to compensate me for damaging my brain..don't be surprised i'm brain-dead in 50 years' time...

well i can't exactly say i'm not enjoying life now..it's damn slack and when else can you not worry about anything except what to do this weekend and how to beat that level in the ps2 game at night.

2006-07-19T22:53:00.001+08:00

i love ginette chittick!

BAYBEATS was an absolute blast. Life! reported it attracted 94,000 people. and it just keeps increasing by the year.

this year The Great Spy Experiment and Tiramisu caught my attention. TGSE is pretty Britrock-influenced and they have a BALD girl keyboardist. so un-electrico. ha. and they dress pretty well too. with scarves, jackets. Tiramisu always appear in different costumes for every set. friday night they were in drag. and the vocalist was a livewire. singing was funny too. i liked his falsetto and antics.

ken stringfellow of the Posies put up a great intimate solo performance. the ol' rocker had a slight beer belly. but there was no questioning his talent. his banter between songs was funny.

electrico managed to draw a HUGE crowd. i was standing way at the back so only managed to get this shot

lunarin rocked too. their gig was the last of the year as they're "gonna take a break". that sucks. just when i start liking them, they stop gigging! i truly regretted not bringing their CD for them to autograph.

here's a video of "Dry"

now for the main topic of this entry. ginette chittick! she is the singer-bassist of Astreal, singapore's premier shoegazing-noise-pop band. she's a lecturer at la-selle college of the arts and all of 27 years old (i think) but who cares, i've a crush on her! her legs are the best flawless ever! looks like stockings but on closer look, there aren't any. and such a sweet demeanour:)

look at her legs!

such emotion!

astreal!!

nick chan the guitarist in his rather gay tee

true rockers

i got a video of "This Is Dormant". Enjoy!

2006-07-13T23:14:00.000+08:00

it's been ages since i last blogged (i seem to be starting each entry this way nowadays heh).

well the world cup is over:( it was an enjoyable one overall. the staying up on weekend nights, the betting (the best was my pick for france to beat brazil and portugal to draw with the pathetic english!), and all the good bad and ugly incidents served to make it an eventful one. and i still wonder why zidane did that.

being one to look ahead i've already prepared something to look forward to each mundane work day: playing my ps2! more specifically Hitman: Blood Money
http://www.hitman.com

just when i barely got over the world cup, here's BAYBEATS 2006! THE indie music fest of the year. here's it http://www.baybeats.com.sg it's from 14th to 16th. means today till sunday.this year there'll be electrico, astreal, lunarin (gotta get a photo with ginnette and linda :p), concave scream and malaysia's screamo band lovemebutch!

this is a vid of lovemebutch performing LAST year. they were awesome. they'll be the highlight of the first day. be sure to troop down to the esplanade in ur mosh wear! see ya there man

2006-06-25T22:42:00.000+08:00

Youth Gone Wild on friday was a blast! had lots of fun moshing. levan wore a convent uniform. he reminded me of those 70's glam rock acts like new york dolls who dressed up as females. gross in a nice way. anyway this gig was Ronin's last this year. they're gonna embark on a period of radical change. what is that? i dunno. haha. they gave a long and energetic set as usual. i captured 3 songs on video!

you got mojo / take it off

revolution

updates on my life... i've just been posted to Sungei Gedong Camp, saf's armour centre. man it's a freaking huge place in the middle of the nowhere that is the rural west, deep in the lim chu kang bush! the camp is larger than suntec city i dare say. my unit is the Forward Maintenance Depot. what the hell is that? don't ask me. all i do there is practise maintaining tanks, getting my hands dirty with a shit called GREASE for 2months as part of my on-the-job training as a technician. the place is ulu, dusty, armour trainees shouting and marching and tanks rumbling on their road tests all day long. it sure lives up to the military camp stereotype. the camp security is quite slack, all the regulars there use handphone cameras! whenever the military police come, they'll hide the stuff in the tanks. every morning i've to wake up at 5 to catch the first train to boon lay. plus i've been watching world cup non-stop. so every night i've only 3 to 4 hours of sleep. as a result i'm down with flu now. help!! report sick tmr HEH.

2006-06-11T16:53:00.000+08:00

world cup has started! its time for the nocturnal lifestyle, exercise-free days and taking MCs. hehe

2006-06-04T00:32:00.000+08:00

steeplechase on thursday was fun! i arrived late cos we could not find the bloody place called changi naval base stadium. but the place is beautiful i must say. quiet and the there is a perpetual breeze. and cosy too.

so. i arrived at 8.30am. when i reached i quickly changed and without warming up started the run. i had no practice before, and being the sports-retarded person i am, i couldn't learn on the spot, and i didnt dare jump over the steeple. so i ended up CLIMBING with my HANDS, a total of 35 times! haha. everyone laughed and cheered. but i must say i had fun running. not everyone can talk of running the the 3km steeplechase, and it was fun getting drenched at the water jump at the bend.

this is the water jump. looks fun? (its not my pic)

ok its YouTube time! if u're thinking of skipping this, don't! they're hilarious!!

An Arnie spoof, it kept me laughing like hell till i teared!!

Neo vs Robocop. my bro showed me this. it's quite cool how the person put them together. there's a guest star too! the video's supposed to be cool but it's damn cheesy!

here's a snippet of Scary Movie 4. you have LISTEN to their "japanese". bloody funny

2006-05-22T23:09:00.000+08:00

today was the army logistics sports meet heats. but it was the 10,000m finals - my event. finished 7th of 9, timing abt 50min flat. felt like slowing down and walking so many times, but the pressure of my friend qingyuan chasing me and wanting to overtake the regimental police guy in front of me was too overwhelming! quite an achievement, i've never ran 10km before! the pain of running a marathon must be more than 4 times as bad!i was soaked after the race and bloody tired. but i felt high..must be the endorphins. and right now my legs are damn sore, esp the calves. ouch..

looking forward to thursday's 5,000m event hehe.

2006-05-21T15:58:00.000+08:00

Bobby the sheep

this is retarded/irritating/cute whichever u think it is. Levan keeps a soft toy sheep he calls Bobby and kept for 17 years. now he's made a friendster profile of it
http://www.friendster.com/user.php?uid=28698099

and made videos too. here's him
ORDERING BANDUNG (probably at simpang bedok)....

AND DANCING to No Doubt's "Hella Good".

hilarious! i guess it's levan making that voice. Bobby talks in singlish with lots of "you knows". he's a friend of president Nathan and likes the PAP. i think bobby can be the next icon of singapore, a celebrity. haha

here's his blog http://bobbysheep.blogs.friendster.com/my_blog/

some funny pics from the friendster

WE MAKE EYE CONTACT, PRESIDENT AND I GOOD FRIENDS
ME AND THE PRESIDENT OF SINGAPORE - MY FRIEND NATHAN. NOT BAD RIGHT? - IGNORE THE OTHER MAN!

watch out for bobby!!

2006-05-19T22:03:00.000+08:00

glummy bear and I went to the ZOO on thursday! well it was my 2nd time at the zoo in 2 years. so i kinda seen everything. but sarah hasn't been there since primary school. the children's world brought back memories of my childhood. it hasn't changed much since last time.

at the entrance

first the polar bears! they lead a nice life. eat lotsa food.

there were tonnes of kindergarten and primary school kids around. i always wonder how the teachers keep them in line. so noisy and so small.

at the animal show!

sealion

monkey runnin' around

apeing Ah Meng

i worship the elephant gods

elephant show

red-assed baboon

i fit right in!

penguins

feeding the kid

oink. this is sarah's cousin

my fav pic :)

being a civic minded citizen

the unglamorous lioness

sarah's favourite animal!

zebra

rhino grrrr

flamingo

i was petrified

all the animals there are super lazy

hippo

ending the day with ben & jerry's. yum

2006-05-16T21:40:00.000+08:00

my neighbour's gone overseas so they asked my mum to take care of their doggie. isn't it cute!! its called BoyBoy lol. and i love dogs. so i take it out for walks whenever i can and it's always nice to see it roaming potong pasir smelling the grass and flowers (then peeing on that spot). haha. but i'm always sad when i've to lock it up in the neighbour's house till the next walk.

peek-a-boo!

the noble dog

boyboy licks his paws

smiles

he's like gene simmons of KISS

talk to me!

the dao dog

pitter patter

the two legged dog

now here's the video for the day!!! a live video of Trivium's Pull Harder On The Strings of your Martyr. the mosh pit's really cool. like when Slipknot was in sg. the raw energy is cool

trivium's my fav metal band. their songs have the right balance of heaviness and melody. it's the perfect to wake yourself up if ur sleepy in the morning. and to headbang to. solos are great too. and matt heafy is a bloody awesome guitarist-vocalist. we need such straight-up metal with all the emo-pop punk crap flying around. \m/

2006-05-14T22:30:00.000+08:00

i've got into NTU SOCIOLOGY!!! received the letter on wednesday. think i'll choose ntu even if nus accepts me. NTU is direct honours and the class size is smaller, meaning quality of friends! while in nus i'll have to bid for my course (that means i'm not assured of a place in socio) and its immensely hard to have long term friends as sarah experienced. smu has already rejected me. YAY now sarah and I can be social sciences graduates!

it was one of the happiest moments in my life to receive the letter. after all the hardships my mum has experienced, i really wanna make her proud her son is going to uni:)

friday was vesak day and i had GUARD DUTY. it was boredom boredom boredom. but i learnt something shocking. the orderly seargent there was a regular, and he told us he frequents massage parlours for their FULL services. the half service is just the massage. the full one is you-know-what. he started mentioning all the places that had and even offered to bring us haha wtf. and he amused us with funny tales and jokes, like how one of his friends suffered a slip disc while in some funny "Jap helicopter" position HAHAHA (how that looks like i dunno), and ur "little head taking over ur big head". i knew its common for regulars in the army to participate in the flesh trade, but it was the first time hearing it from a person who does it.

saturday went with damian to find an acoustic guitar. he's serious about being a musician next time haha. he bought it from swee lee for around $100. for those about to rock, we salute you!!! i bought a hilarious tee from peninsular for 26 bucks here it is.

it says Who killed Bambi? SEX PISTOLS!!!! makes no sense but i like it haha.

junhong and i met impromtu to go to BROADCAST at the substation.
i signed up to be volunteer at Music For Good. wanted to for a long time. not only will i get experience in organising gigs, it'll be good for my resume next time:) also bought the For Good! cd. it's a compilation of local bands' unreleased material. got it for only $10, luckily i waited and didnt get ripped of by hmv/sembawang's $16.95!!

this is the CD. support local music, buy it!

lunarin and astreal were great!!! not only cos of their bassist-vocalist babes:) as i listen to lunarin's CD now, it kind of grows on me. lunarin plays progressive hard rock, kinda like A Perfect Circle with a female voice. first let me introduce LINDA ONG: litigant by day, rocker by night. and next GINETTE CHITTICK (wow exotic name!): communication design lecturer at la-selle-SIA college of the arts, fashion designer, actress, (i think many more) and of course rocker.
they held auctions for dinner dates with them and linda got $75 and ginette got $88. if i had the money and older i'd bid too LOL

she looks better with her bass!

isn't she cute with her flying V?

the only bad part about the gig was the theatre. once everyone stood up those at the back could not see the act. so maybe they should elevate the stage.

before i leave watch linda rock here!

2006-05-05T23:36:00.000+08:00

this week was great simply because i got the call from NTU sociology!! but it was kinda ironic cos i received the call and the next moment i was in the warrant officer's office to sign for a confinement.

written test and interview was today. the written test was bloody tough! they gave a 2 page passage of cheem english on multiculturalism. some parts i couldn't understand. hope others find it difficult too ha. they gave 2 questions with no marks or word limit allocated, so that made it worse. i did ok for the interview, the interviewer said "good". well now can only hope for the best! really thanks to sarah for helping me with the interview:)

my latest hobby YouTube!!
the zutons are damn cool. this is their video Why Won't You Give Me Your Love? its cuban style dancing and stuff.

i absolutely lurve the red hot chili peppers!! i can't get enough of Dani California now. their vid is a spoof of all the classic rock bands. can't really name all though. there's Elvis swiveling his hips and elbows, bouncing Beatles, jimi hendrix, new york dolls (i think), the clash? sex pistols?, misfits, alice cooper?, nirvana

2006-04-24T20:19:00.000+08:00

check this out!

http://www.roninriot.com/journal-ronin.htm

levan posted my video and photos on the ronin blog. cool i'm feeling like a mini-celeb lol. levan thinks the vid is damn cool :) not bad for this amateur videoman. and i got a mention as a "friend who's supported them from the start". ha. i didn't know i'm such a hardcore supporter.

i first got to know of them at the later part of 2004. my brother had their song Crazy Son. i took a listen and thought it was a great song, and i had no idea it was a local band till he told me. a few days later there was a feature in the old Life! This Weekend on the rising band scene in Sg. ronin was featured and the article said the band met when they were in VICTORIA SCHOOL. that made me even more interested. so i checked out their 5-song EP at gramophone, and bought a paper version of it from Tower cos it was cheaper compared to the jewel case vers :) (levan tells me this unmastered vers is super rare now, only 20 copies were sold of 50 printed, perhaps it'll fetch a couple of hundred in the future haha). and my first ronin gig was at Youth Park and they blew me away. my conversion was complete. they gave their EP out for free too and i got em to autograph it. and from there i was addicted to ronin's brand of hard rock n roll.

and there was the super ulu gig at marina south, where junhong and i were the only 5 people that formed the crowd hahaha. that's where we got to know the band.

2006-04-23T15:39:00.000+08:00

i go dancing dancing dancing...with TPJC!

i took a cab just to reach tpjc at 12noon, the time RONIN were slated to perform. and boy i was not to be disappointed. but first about the event. as part of tpjc's "2oth anniversary celebrations", they organised this carnival. the stalls had to have an educational purpose, they were great and best of all FREE. but the most important thing was missing in the puzzle: PEOPLE to enjoy it. everyone there were tpjcians themselves or secondary school kids from neighbouring schools. sad case all cos of the PUBLICITY commitee. its really a tragedy, no matter how hard the students try to enhance the school's reputation, they had to be let down by the publicity cock-up.

enough of weepies. i met up with some of my juniors :)

weiming. i like his emo specs HAHA

junhe

cheryl SUMO!

RONIN totally brought the roof down with their balls-to-walls performance. the 45-min set included Jumping Jack Flash, Sweet Child O Mine, Hail to the God of Rock N' Roll, Crazy Son, Black Maria and You Got Mojo (encore). the students really enjoyed themselves.

my call for ronin to perform at last year's prom was totally vindicated today. according to Levan, the teachers were asking them to perform again HAHA. but most of my batch sucked, cheena and misinformed (but thanks to those who supported me). they were against ronin performing for our prom..well i can only say they missed out. and Simon Reynolds (the idiot who organised the poll) - you're Just Another Motherfucker before the ronin riot brushes you aside! *evil laughter*

i've got a new interest...filming rock videos! haha

some pics

soundcheck!

the disapproving teachers behind the glass panels ha

sean on lead. like his tee!

BANG! BANG! BANG! bang in action. and i found out he likes chinese comics haha
waaaails!!!

in sync

why's levan in stitches!

what note is that??

my nicest pic

thats what i call on the ball!

let me hear you scream!!

tpjc the coolest jc in the east!

levan serenading the ladies

axemasters

i finally got to meet up with michelle after countless cancels hah

derryn and simon having a ball of a time

Sean and Levan gave me a lift to the interchange to te the tunes of Led Zep. hah. i caused em much inconvenience when i lost my phone in the van. they had to ransack the whole place before i found it myself. sorry again guys. haha

2006-04-21T19:26:00.000+08:00

i'd like to dedicate this post to my two buddies Victor "i-want-to-rape-you"Lum aka Chansey aka porn star, and Wai Kit. we were from the same bmt section, and now we're classmates in OETI, armoured vehicle training wing.

they really make life bearable for me in oeti. we can just talk cock all day, or when there is smth to be learnt, we do it together. when they were gone for guard duty on thursday, for some reason i felt really down, bored, lost and unmotivated.

victor lum is a porn star..why?.. i won't really elaborate :) but his antics and almost every aspect of him never fails to crack me up. whether its the way he goes "CHANSEY!" in his fake high pitched voice (he likes the pokemon) or just his face, deep voice and mannerisms ("ka-ni-na! cannot take it!", "fook you!") combine to make me laugh. we can talk about anything, christian poseurs, hot girls, rock music blah the list goes on.

wai kit is a really nice guy. we always seem to be hungry. and so we love eating and sharing foood haha. and he's always the one who makes me get off my ass in the workshop to get on with the lesson. or else i'll just be stoning there.

wai kit and LUM, bmt days

and today i just did an act of great human kindness, that is DONATING BLOOD! haha feels dark and gothic.. but 1 bag of blood (450ml) saves 3 lives. hope i can really save 3 lives. heal the world! and by doing that i got a half day off. woot!

2006-04-16T22:14:00.000+08:00

my friend damian looks like a girl from behind hehe.

he's a great bud of mine. we both love rock music. he loves punk,emo. which explains his cool dress sense. he's now in school of infantry specialists training to be a chiong suah sergeant.

well we went shopping at peninsular shopping centre. many mats there. and lotsa hard sell tactics shops haha. be prepared to walk out on the owner asking "nothing for you boy??!!!" i saw a never-seen-elsewhere pair of olive-brown pony shoes. it was the perfect colour that was missing in all the shoes i had! but they had run out of size. damn sad.

there're now von dutch shoes in sg. $129 per pair.

i saw this at the sports shop at capitol building. i dun think they're that great.. i still want pony shoes!!! *cries*

emokids

2006-04-12T22:12:00.000+08:00

i think i should blog more often but i'm just too lazy HEEHEE. many interesting things happened this week.

sunday i went shopping with my bro. and the weirdest thing happened in Topman. some gay tried to pick me up!! WTF. i was browsing when suddenly this malay guy staff came to me and asked casually "are u looking for anything?" as usual i said "nah just looking around." later on when i was looking at the accesories, he came up to me again. and looking at my black-and-white checkered vans shoes, he said "Hey nice shoes! give me your number and next time i call u to play checkers." oh man WHAT THE FUCK? which part of me looks gay i really wonder. at first it didnt occur to me that it was a pick-up line... i just smiled. oh well...

i REALLY want to get this pony sweater!!! my bro says i look like a 70's athlete in it HEh. but the thing is i can't use it in NS. can only use on weekends. so i'll wait for great sg sale. hope no one buys it.

a personal update. my vocation is an AUTO TECHNICIAN - A VEHICLES, meaning armoured vehicles in ayer rajah camp, somewhere near acjc. i'm studying in OETI which is located in the camp. OETI - ordnance engineering training institute or Only Eat Talk and Idle haha. it's half slack so far. my instructors are pretty relaxed and caring so it makes for a good experience. plus i can go home every day! Woot!

monday they conducted a bag check. we had to empty out everything, including our pockets. i was freaking lucky. that was the first day i did not bring my mp3 player!! in army camps mass storage devices are banned items and you'll get charged if u smuggle them in. well that was what i was doing for the past 3 weeks!! and something made me not put the player in my bag that morning before i left for work. hmmmm great luck huh

2006-03-14T23:49:00.000+08:00

it was such a nice feeling to kayak again!! the wind and sunshine in my face as i cut the water woot. well i went down for my juniors' training today at bedok reservoir. took the sumo girls one for one. i rowed a T1. and got a nice tan haha. or more appropriately nice burn. which will turn to a nice tan. had a sumo feast at Subway with the sumo girls and joycelyn. and i just linked their blogs to mine.

went shopping with damian poseur bro impromptu in the afternoon. i found tonnes of stuff i like but don't need. pony sweater. pony shoes. puma black&white suede shoes. arrgggh!! if only i had all the money in the world....

2006-03-13T15:41:00.000+08:00

"SMU - the land of milk and honey" that's what my porn star friend VICTOR LUM says. indeed i must say. everywhere u turn is a bevy of beauties! aaaahhh!! thus one of my weaknesses - to look at hot girls - came to surface yesterday at their open house. i seriously wonder how the guys there can focus on their work. i'll just be gazing at all the eye candy all day.. hmmm or maybe it works the other way. hot girls motivate n stimulate guys to show their potential in their work. whatever it is i hope i can get into NUS FASS. or smu sch of economics and social sciences.

speaking of weaknesses, i think i'm a terrible decision maker. i think of too many possibilities. one instance was when deciding which camera to buy last week. in the end i chose the casio exilim Z600. heh. yay no need to borrow from sarah anymore. and another is when deciding on uni courses. in fact one good thing that came out from my so-so results is my choices of courses have been whittled down for me. haha. but really, i hate making life-defining decisions, thinking of career etc. argh when will i grow up.

well sarah was such a nicety, she made time to accompany me to nus and smu open houses although she has a test on tues.

today i went to the dentist. said i have to take care of my wisdom teeth. ha and he had a hard time scraping stuff from my teeth!! must be the field camp. i didnt brush teeth for 3 days. hoho.

and i saw many scouts along the way. it's their Job Week now. brings back memories of my own job weeks heh.

2006-03-10T19:52:00.000+08:00

it's been half a century since i updated this blog. all apologies to everyone who thought this blog is alive and kept checking for new posts... i was to lazy and tired and couldn't find time to blog the past 6 weeks.hehe. WELL now since BMT IS OVER (hooray!) and after the constant egging of sarah and Grace the Flirt, i'm a blogger once again! pardon my expression and sentence structures, my brain seems to be shaven away along with my hair.

A Level results and university
well ok i got B for maths, C for physics and D for chem and B3 for GP for my A levels. not very nice results - everyone seems to have at least an A - but they're a reflection of my daily work in jc. i did almost all maths tutorials and none of chem haha. i hated organic chem. its the biggest turn off in life for me. and i enjoyed doing gp essays and comprehensions the most. all these have also let me arrive at a decision - i dun wanna do science and maths in university. as i grow older and study higher levels of maths and science i basically just lose interest and it bores me.

i want to study sociology, something that interests me. well i may sound like i'm making an excuse because with my grades i can only make it to engineering and arts and social sciences, but im seriously interested. because for me, i'm one who dislikes conformity and pop culture, understanding social norms and related stuff would be good. i'm not really having career prospects in mind, but as my mum says, any degree is fine, knowledge is power! haha.

and the 3 unis' open houses are tmr. i'll probably go and find out more.

Army Life
so bmt has ended. it was a once in a lifetime experience, but not one i'd readily volunteer for. but since every male in sg has to go thru it, i dun really mind it now especially since im in PES C. ha. in the army u meet all kinds of people. but its the negative characters that always leave a bad taste. its mainly selfish people who irk me. ah wells i shall not whine. Field camp was an experience. especially crapping close to nature. haha. flies buzzing around ur ass. and covering ur crap with soil and powder hoho. bathing for 3 days. and wearing ur helmet and sbo, having a layer of camou cream and carrying ur rifle everywhere u go. we only had powder baths and ate squishy food called combat rations. i've no idea how PES A guys can tahan for 7 days! after 3 days i was dying to get out.

and i've a new found interest called TUG OF WAR! i was in the team that participated on Games Day. we trained hard but well we lost. but the spirit of competition and feeling of camederie was great. great memories. 1-2-pull! 1-2-pull!!

pictures will be up soooon.

oh well now i hope i get a good posting where i can stay out and go home everyday! pray pray pray. ah i dun pray.

2006-01-30T23:20:00.000+08:00

it's one week of BMT over!! and happy doggie new year! WOOF.

i booked out on saturday morning and sarah was there to greet me with macdonald's breakfast. nothing can describe my joy of being free again!! it lasts till thursday night. but for now i'm enjoying all i can!

my basic military training has been quite fun and relaxed so far. all i do everyday is eat, shit, sleep, area cleaning and rifle stuff. i alr can assemble and strip the rifle hehe. friday and thursday nights i had 2.5 hours of personal admin. so a bunch of us hit the gym hehe. the food there isn't bad too. my section mates, platoon and commanders are colouful characters. i've bonded with my section mates quite easily over a week. quite amazing.

the past 2 days of cny have been quite well-spent. absolute pigging out! first day went to my tanah merah aunt's house. played with the 7 dogs. and got my cousin's email address, she's into alternative music like me! haha. was quite glad cos i've never been close to my cousins. and i saw photos of my cousin Winston's 3 kids. only saw 2 of em in real life before cos he works n lives in London as a diplomat. i'll put some pics here if i can. and i ate lotsa goodies. had a KFC feast for dinner. junk food paradise.

and today sarah baked brownies for me :-) i'm glad our relationship is still going strong depsite NS. cheers to all for the year of the dog!

recruit tan signing off

2006-01-20T00:44:00.000+08:00

its exactly 12 hours to enlistment! ha. today's the last time i'll eat home-cooked food, sleep with aircon, be online liberally, run my fingers thru my hair heh. and so on.

i'm feeling a little excited, nervous. ah. lousy vocab can't express myself.

i'm pretty sure i'll learn to appreciate everything i have when i'm in there. also looking forward to meeting and working with new people. hope my buddy would be a decent guy, best would be jason low hehe. most of all i hope i'll appreciate sarah gloopest more. these days we seem to be arguing over almost anything. hope things get better during this break.

all right today i'm officially RECRUIT TAN!!! a soldier! can u believe it???

2006-01-19T23:03:00.000+08:00

the SAF must have made a mistake.. i don't think darren tan is 18 years old yet......

2006-01-17T23:47:00.000+08:00

today i had such a great time cam whoring and doing stupid things with grace the flirt and pavel!!!

first we went to bugis village. Flirt wanted to buy a bag for her sister. and omg nowadays they have pirated versions of every brand from emily the strange to roxy to billabong. i realise flirt is queen of budget buys. HAHA. her big buckle belt cost only $9!? and it looked like its from topshop.

our backview is nice :)

flirt was trying to get into our picture

why the hell do i look like i'm holding Flirt's hand???

we went to Pasta Mania for dinner. flirt's favourite place, she's a member somemore!? but i think its quite sucky. only like their cream pastas. their clam chowder was sour and dilute. urrgh!

the strawberry ice cream left a bad aftertaste

flirt looks sad, like she's eating Army food!

the displeasure with the food was evident from our faces

we started to do funny things after buying tickets to Derailed. there were cardboard cut outs of movie legends and we did absolutely lame things with them haha. the movie itself was boring at first. but we soon discovered that the plot had as many twists as a Channel 8 drama serial. lol watch it for urself to find out. pavel managed to smuggle beer into the cinema and after 2 bottles, he started talking nonsense. he was damn high haha.

i saved king kong from the t-rex

james dean

marilyn monroe was so shy cos pavel was there

haha

pavel loves teresa teng

pavel: "i did it!"

cheers!

we were horny with the pole in the lift

really enjoy going out with pavel and flirt. flirt keeps blatantly asking for treats and pavel can't stop irritating her going like "ya la stop flirting" on repeat. plus he keeps taking pics of her like some paparazzo. and she gets REALLY pissed off. haha. will miss the all the liberties when i enlist. *sobs*

after the movie we walked through this street filled with shophouses converted into pubs and restaurants. it felt very foreign, like malacca. pavel was so high he was standing in the middle of the road taking pictures of us haha.

we love disturbing Flirt

an UNGLAM shot of flirt again! hah!!! there was an unglammer one but i promised not to put it up heh :)

2006-01-16T21:02:00.000+08:00

as my days of freedom come to an end, i decided to be appreciative of my last day of work and take some pictures as souvenirs.

i would like to talk about my kayaking team mate and colleague Yan Cheng. on my last day of work as a suntec part timer (damn they still havent paid me for december!?) , i got to work with him. i've never really known yc well. but today he really cracked me up with all his musings and hokkien/chinese haha.

yan cheng looks like a beng. his look is just very chinese-y. i found out today that he was a malaysian, now sporean. i kept asking if this and that girl is hot, and he told me his ideal wife must be xuan shu meaning demure, decent. lol. and yc taught me all these funny tai ji quan. he says his qi (energy) is always circulating. he meditates every morning doing the bao shu shi (hugging tree stance). hahahaha. he knows all these techniques because his secondary school wushu instructor taught him. and because his energy is always flowing, he can feel heat between his 2 palms. i could not help laughing all the way and he seemed pissed off. waha. and guess what when we happened to see tanya chua walk past, yc went hyper running around saying "tanya chua tanya chua give me pen and paper!" like a star struck kid. he's such a funny guy.

and i decided to be an idiot by going to ben&jerry's where CHIAM works. i had my final serving of b&j's ice cream before i enlist, and i got all the staff to autograph my tub haha.and even took photos with em. hoho. and the girl i "like" was so paiseh. for the record, i dun like her in that way, just think she's pretty and nice and i wanted to keep memories of my work the past months. hehe
slut at work??

wee koon and I

skater dude hehe

raphael boy! his mum works at one of the shops. saw him only once. such a cute boy. same pri sch as me too

chiam!

pushing trolleys is my thing

sharing my ben&jerry's with lydia

we're working OT and not getting paid!! this is YAN CHENG haha

i work at b&j's too...

that's the girl i "like" yanlin on the left hoho

2006-01-13T23:48:00.000+08:00

it was my day off today and i decided to crash NUS with sarah gloopest!!!! haha. and omg i hate travelling nowadays with adult fare. not only did i have to travel all the way to buona vista, we still had to take a bus into the campus. ha but it was fun seeing so many well dressed girls. and the guys are all older than i am. haha. i accompanied sarah for a physical chem lecture. man the lecturer appeared to be worse than Tan Ah Lek (my chem teacher from tpjc who totally killed my teeny bit of interest in chem with his oh-so-boring lessons and bad engrish). but he was funny coming up with a song called You'll Never fear Prof Goh, ripping off liverpool fc's theme song. but i took out my kerrang! to read anyway.

we went to arts and social sciences for lunch! haha much eye candy indeed.

i wanted to cam whore but didnt have a chance to. would look like an idiot to the students there haha.

at night we went to the esplanade to catch the free gigs. first was UGLYMEN, a malaysian-chinese band who wore jumpsuits and warmed up before their show (slipknot?) ha they were so entertaining. they were quite old and balding and had bellies, but could still jump about haha. but their songs were all in hokkien, cantonese and chinese haha. Ronin gave a nice semi acoustic performance too. Bang's voice is so nice. and he could multi task. sing and play drums. haha.

it was a nice day with gloopest. a break from the normal couple activities.

2006-01-12T23:49:00.000+08:00

i met Gloopest for lunch at Soup Spoon at raffles city at 11.30am! i got my free Grande clam chowder and it was really filling! i was so full, felt like puking after that. i need to exercise soon. i was sitting down that day at work and felt the flab on my tummy haha. im so fat now :( enlistment's soon. don't want to suffer in that crap of a place called tekong...

after that i went to collect my specs while gloopest went to orchard but the reason i dunno. she "intended to spend more than $100". ha crazy girl. my specs fitted well within 15min so i had 3 hours to kill before starting work! so i joined gloopest at Forever 21. she bought a tee with a slogan I LOVE ROCK N ROLL. haha so do i man. and at topshop she found the best pair of jeans i've seen her in. it was black in colour and the cutting is Baxter. she was so happy and i'm happy she is! the wonders of retail therapy. later on i bought LUNARIN'S new cd called THE CHRYSALIS. get it too. support (good) local bands!

ok tmr i'm taking off and gonna crash NUS! hoho. and go for RONIN acoustic gig at esplanade. woot!

2006-01-03T23:32:00.000+08:00

today i went to find a belated bday present for herng yih with CLAUDINE! we met at Topman wisma at around 7.30pm. i bumped into the vocalist of local band RUSHED, Jess. i had caught them once at Quiet: The New Loud II at the art museum few weeks back. so i introduced myself. sounding like a groupie here haha. but i told him if he wanted to buy anything from topman, he could use my members' card. and he did! claudine bought a tee for her friend too. so yay! more points! :) oh and i tried on the tightest jeans i've ever tried in my entire life!! it was so blast from the past! straight from the 70's Ramones era! hey ho let's go! what im missing is a mop top.

we couldn't find a proper present so i suggested going to Zara and we found a nice yellow tee that says Too Hot For Hell and has a bikini lady :)

we ate at the Food Republic food court and it was huge! i didn't finish walking around but i settled on a seafood soup.

yay i've already met up with my class, Flirt, pavel and claudine since school ended. quite satisfied. and soon gonna start work with lydia, nurul, sazali and yan cheng. woot!

2006-01-03T00:42:00.000+08:00

a day with grace the flirt and pavel

today at 3pm i met up with pavel and grace the Flirt! we wanted to watch a movie and decided on The Family Stone. but the 3.20pm show had only front row seats left so we bought tix for 5.25pm. pavel was such a nice guy and he treated us to that and potato wedges and ice lemon tea. he's really just a misunderstood nice guy.

so we had 2 hours to kill. we headed to HMV at heeren to cam-whore....lame. after that we proceeded to paragon starbucks to drink coffee cos we realised shopping is boring hurhur. we continued cam-whoring and finally the camera died on us. haha. it was flirt's fault taking lame pictures of orchard road that don't have our faces. and Flirt was so fascinated by a baby at starbucks. and she got pissed off pavel read her smses from a certain GARY. hoho!

it started raining heavily and we were stuck at taka. but we ran to cine just in time to catch the movie. it wasn't a great movie. just light-hearted Xmas family movie. we went to play pool at the 8th level and MAN, it was a lame place blasting TECHNO music. could almost die!

i had fun laughing and being so carefree. and it's great keeping friendships after school. but the end of freedom is 20 days away...

wow pavel's forearms are huge..

metalheads!

F-K

GRINS

OEI. SEE WHAT SEE!

baby!

suck on it

an unglam shot hurhurhur

2006-01-01T15:52:00.000+08:00

Countdown to 2006!

yesterday i went to the ZARA sale. i think only zara's tees are nice. and i'm saying that cos i'm a tee shirt lover. their jeans are way too loong. sizes not standard; the tee i bought is M but the last time another i bought was XL (although an L would be better then)! but still not standard means not standard. woman's tees too long too. don't they know they're catering to the SINGAPOREAN market?? and the staff all look unfriendly and worse, GAY. those at the takashimaya outlet... man.. gay. my fav is still topman. good service and nice music, unpretentious. i prefer the casual feel-good vibe from topman. at zara they need to wear SUITS. haha. best of all topman's discounts are the best. hoho. zara's discounts look like the original price!

anyway the tee i bought is $24.90 only! cheapo darren only buys nice cheap things. there were only 2 pieces left. original price $29.90.

i met my class for dinner at swensen's marina square. my class is just retarded haha. only grace, adeline aka the Hobbits and I were punctual. the rest arrived 1 hour late!!? but still keith and cai li entertained me with hilarious tales from their 5 days PES E BMT. well for your info pes E is for people with severe problems (caili has a weak shin that may break easily and keith has a blood problem). well the problem is that weird people are in that category too. the funniest, and perhaps pitiful, was a guy with obsessive compulsive disorder. he bathes for 2 hours cos he does things over and over again. and he shat on his pants after that. and this is the lamest, it kept me laughing like an ass: after peeing at the urinal, there was a bead of pee on his head (yes that head). so he washed his head at the tap, with his head touching the tap mouth! wtf?! and he did that to 4 taps, leaving only 2 taps that people dare to use waha. its funny, but he's a poor thing.

at about 9.30pm i met Sarah the Gloopest! we roamed around doing nothing and waited patiently for the fireworks at the Esplanade. when the fireworks did come, they were great! but not a big deal.. i've been seeing fireworks every national day from my house haha. but still there was a new experience: i tried catching them on camera! singaporeans are really weird people man. they come to see the fireworks to usher in the new year. but when its over, they CHIONG to the mrt. nobody shouts "HAPPY NEW YEAR!!". i tried to but ended up looking lie a retarded lunatic. one ang moh guy did pounce on us wishing us and i was very happy at least someone shared my thinking. and the mrt station was packed! it felt like some mosh pit waiting for Slipknot! singaporeans ARE one weird bunch. it wasn't as if they needed to catch a plane. even if they did, they're MANY planes..

oh ya i met my friend seng wai. seng wai was my junior from Stevenson patrol in my VS scoutee days! he's in MJC now. haha now he has HAIR. he used to be botak last time haha. i met him at Looney Toons at marina square. and i wanna buy the pooh bear i'm holding!!

happy new year one and all. my new year resolution is to do my best in everything. sounds lame.

zara tee!

my class!

seng wai and i. who'll buy me the pooh?

miss gloop waits patiently for the fireworks

finally!

2005-12-30T23:59:00.000+08:00

MOSH / Seafoood feast at Bedok

today i met my good ol' VS friends at the annual MOSH! hongxuan, izzuddin, ruiwen. but unfortunately many people weren't there. Patrick wasn't there. he was busy giving CHINESE TUITION!? made friends with a guy Charles and a girl RongRong, farwaz's friend, haha funny name huh.

the bands were not bad. first one was some mat screamo/emo band Fall From Grace who can't do proper covers of MCR and taking back sunday. and what i couldn't stand most was the vocalist's fake ang moh accent!! but the Vinyl Summer was great. they're all of 16 years old but they were damn good, coodination and technically. the guitarist could do nice solos man. Kiosai was good too. they seemed to be quite popular. with the mosh pit forming quite voluntarily haha.

but after that i headed for tanah merah to meet sarah wong for a seafood feast to satisfy her gluttony tendencies!! we ordered sotong, sambal sting ray and mussels. it was hell for me! i can't take much chili. and had to consume 1.5 cups of sugar cane. my face was dripping with sweat. but overall it was nice and filling.

while we were walking back to her house and me to the MRT station, we came across an Elderly Ftiness Corner! they had such funny machines. like Space Walker u feel like walking in air. the tai chi spinner where u bend ur knees and spin wheels!!? and we took crazy SMU jumping shots! cam whorrrrre.

photos pirated from sarah's blog!

2005-12-29T22:26:00.000+08:00

New Specs!

i went to make new spectacles today! these days everyone's wearing thick oversized black (rockers) or white (mats and cheena twits) plastic frames. girls like wearing quirky colours. so do aunties. so being darren tan that i am, i set out looking for something unique :) i had seen Alain Mikli frames at raffles city before. and the designs on their website were uber coool. so i asked to see some at the optical shop. and DAMN. each frame costs 980 BUCKS! wow i didnt know it was designer shit! i really dont get the whole designer market and overpriced crap. the frames looked great. but 980 is way too steep man. i'm a "discounts, cheap, nice and good but look ex" shopper. hehe.

after a few hours (yes i'm so picky), i finally whittled MANY down to three. i incidentally chose the one that's cheapest haha. its dark brown with some design at the side hehe. its some funny cheapo brand called Eyestar. after a 30% discount the frames cost only $66. but i found out i've this condition that's called Lazy Eyes. haha. my eyes get tired easily. thats why my eyes are always bloodshot after a long day out. i'm not so short sighted but this condition causes a hike in the degree. im blogging my degree down cos i always forget. its Right 200, left 225. ok.

2005-12-28T23:01:00.000+08:00

I'm getting re-hired!

i've calculated. i stand to earn $780 from my working stint as a gift wrapper at suntec! yay. thats after deduction of CPF. the pay was $6 an hr and $9 an hr on Xmas and Xmas eve. not bad for a one-month job. it was my first ever holiday job. i had no past experience cos i was always occupied with CCA and (trying to do) holiday homework. and it made me happier when the advertising and promotions executive of Suntec called me up today and wanted to hire me for their Chinese New Year promotion! he said i'm "steady" and when i asked "as in?", he said "hardworking". :-). three cheers for darren tan! and i was the first person he called, and he needs me to contact my colleagues to ask if they can work too. cheers again! but due to the effing army (i'm enlisting on 20 Jan), i can only work for a short time. the job starts on 6 Jan and ends 12 Feb. anyone interested?

i really feel proud of myself for being commended for my work. darren tan always gives his best in everything.... well almost everything...

2005-12-27T21:35:00.000+08:00

East Coast Park and TOPMAN

today dearest sarah and I went cycling!! it was a simple yet nice activity. it was a break from the normal couple's fare of eating and shopping in town. even though the idiotic rainy weather was threatening to spoil our day, we were satisfied in each other's company :) and we had unhealthy macdonalds' for lunch. macs new rice burgers are called Fan-tastic. how lame... i ate the beef one which has just 3 grams of fat ha ha. and i ate a bar of hersheys chocolate. thats my weakness. CHOCOLATES! just pure milk chocolate. and while we were on our way to parkway, we took a really retarded photo of ourselves in the CCTV! waha. inspired by Hard-Fi.

and at Topman parkway. i sorta splurged on five items. 3 tees, 1 collared shirt, 1 pair of jeans. but they were all on the discount rack, 30% off! so i'd like to think i'm an opportunist. get great stuff at good prices. one tees was $16 and 2 were $23, the shirt $48, and the jeans $46. so i got a great bargain. the shirt is red kinda so can wear for Cheena New Year! haha. and i was really in the mood for retail therapy after working my ass off the past month. and as a result of spending $156, i'm now a member! so anyone need 10% off topman/topshop/dorothy perkins, you know who to ask!

2005-12-11T21:43:00.000+08:00

Round Ubin Kayak Race 2005

its been a loooooong time since i last updated this blog. so now im reviving it! haha. i think i'll try to update it when i'm free.

well as the title suggests, today i went for the marathon round Pulau Ubin! it was a blast! especaially rowing in a K2. but of course it wasn't without difficulties. the waves were worrying at times, but lucky for me my partner james white is one hell of a garang and zai rower! he's totally fearless of the waves and it infected me. it was my first time using a spray cover (the red "skirt" in the pic) and it really helped to prevent water from gushing in when the boat tilted. but poor White, the waves crashed into him no less than two times and he drank some really salty water haha. we started the race in the back pack but i think we did reasonably well, finishing among the front. but we don't know our timing, that's rotten. the official said it'll be posted on their webbie. hope so.

ok here's some pics!

2005-09-13T23:40:00.000+08:00

yay i've been discharged!

today i was discharged from Mount Alvernia Hospital. back to normal life. i've been eating western food (no rice) for the past 4 days (cause i chose too hehe). watched tv and just laid in bed everyday.

i had been admitted for pneumonia. i had been ill since 31st Aug and throughout the holidays had really bad fever and cough. i would wake up at night coughing, it was hell. i didnt know what i was suffering from plus i had to study for the prelims after the hols. it was a depressing period. after 3 GPs and 2 courses of anti-biotics, my mum brought me to hospital on Friday 9th sept, and i was admitted. X-rays showed my left lung had white patches which indicated the infected parts. the doctor said i would've DIED if i didn't get treated. wow that's so effing unbelievable.

an observation during my stay: the people who we should pay tribute to are the nurses. their job scope is broad. taking care of patients means catering to all their needs, taking orders and serving food, taking their pulse and temperature, answering phone calls. they're on their feet all the time and always wear a smile. it's a tough job and their salary isn't very high. they really should get more recognition.

i'm really appreciative of my friends namely herng yih, juan ling, sufiyan, lydia, nurul, and cheryl and clara Sumo. they visited me and really made my day. i feel blessed to have such great friends. thank you guys! and of course not forgetting mum, dad. mum took care of me throughout this period. and last but not least you know who you are sarahehe.

now another chapter begins. its about 8 weeks to the A's. i missed prelims (which are taking place now) and the "exam experience". hope that will not be significant. and i've to embark on non-stop muggerfucker mode. sigh.

2005-08-17T16:16:00.000+08:00

the biggest gig of the year: Slipknot The Subliminal Verses World Tour LIVE IN SINGAPORE!!

today was THE day. Slipknot was gonna perform in sg for the first time ever! Pavel and I had gone down to Shenton Way during the June hols to get the tix way in advance, and we couldnt help but wait in anticipation for this day.

Pavel, my brother and I reached fort canning green at like 7.50pm. the ticket said it started at 8 but it was obviously gonna be delayed. the Green was already crawling with maggots!! but thankfully we had vip cage tickets. the unspoken dress code was black, and we got into the 2nd row. we waited anxiously for the band to appear, with the crowd getting increasingly restless and chanting "slipknot slipknot!". then the PA started playing my chemical romance. the congregation of metalheads weren't in the mood for any punk-pop teen-angst laden music!!

dry ice kept being emitted and the PA played Prelude 3.0. before long the band appeared: drummer was the first, followed by the rest, lastly Corey. the crowd went BALLISTIC. i was crushed by the onslaught of crazy people. and i dun mean to be racist, there was an Indian guy in front of me who kept swinging his long hair back and forth, and my face, mouth and hands were often smothered by it!! i wasn't the greatest of fans, but i was awe struck seeing them in the flesh for the first time, when i could only hear them in the past.

"Are you ready Singapore for the chaos?!" Corey growled out to the ecstatic fans. the band broke out into The Blister Exists. "they said it would never happen, we would never cross the border. and now here we are."

the crowd had formed what was probably the largest and most intense mosh-pit ever seen in Spore. it was non-stop moshing and jumping, what a mosh pit really should be! i was obviously sandwiched worse than sardine and sweat was free flow. my ribs were compressed and the gig wasn't for the faint-hearted. nevertheless, the crowd though brutally aggressive, looked out for each other (corey: "we're all here to enjoy music right? not get hurt. we're family. and family takes care of each other"). thats smth i love about moshes. the feeing is warm.

the band played all the favourites. some i could recall were Left Behind, the heretic anthem, purity, spit it out, people = shit, everything ends, vermilion, before i forget, pulse of the maggots, duality, wait and bleed, surfacing.

although the band was given a long list of do-nots, they managed to deliver a spellbinding performance. they gave their all and sweat was flowing down their drums, guitars, and sleeves. they have the ability to reproduce what u hear on their CDs. not many bands can do that. their sound is unmistakable: drums, guitar, bass, synthesizer, metal cans as percussion. what u get is noise, pioneering of great noise. heavy metal masterpieces. the band kept going backstage after almost each song, and for one song they came out unmasked.

before i knew it, the gig had ended in about 1hr40min. my ears were ringing. i was covered in sweat (my own and others'). but i was part of the greatest gig of the century.

here's a pic. i'm inside!!! behind the long-bearded guy (photos from soft.com.sg, i'm sorry i forgot to credit them previously. all apologies!)

2005-08-11T06:00:00.000+08:00

HELLO PUNKS / a wild goose chase: the mystery of the mythical ronin gig

hi everyone this is darren tan speaking haha. yes can u believe it, i'm blogging.

oh well my first entry is about hanging out with the Ronin guys! haha. monday night 8 Aug, junhong and i went to the Carnival@marina to catch RONIN. yes we were looking forward to a great anti-national day show. but what we were about to encounter was beyond our imagination.

when we reached at 8.55pm, the stage was massive and this act called The Great Shanghai Escape was performing. as the name suggests, it was lame, and lamer Sporeans were enjoying it... we waited till 9.15 before asking where the hell ronin was. as it turned out there was ANOTHER faraway stage where english bands were performing. well we ran, along the road and across the muddy field, but as it turned out.. it was some lau-pok band performing to empty space. wow. we asked the organisers, "where the hell is ronin?" and they told us to try yet ANOTHER stage nearby.

we started running (again) and as we got closer to this stage, yes..... it indeed was ronin! but the crowd was like 15 people.. no one standing. man. so we went to the front of the stage and head-banged and egged people on to join us. about 4 girls joined in and started jumping like groupies. the show ended 10 minutes after. the ronin guys really appreciated our presence. and they kindly agreed to pose for a picture :-)

after that they told us to accompany em to the earlier stage and we chilled with em, we had free bbq food, beer and maxim! simon kept telling me to gulp the beer down and finish it! Bang told me about himself. he looks really innocent and geeky, but man he's a killer drummer.hah. sean is one of the more serious guys, he went to vj, and only he and Levan quit smoking. the atmosphere was pretty laid-back, with really lao-jiao bands playing tunes like Smoke on the Water, and I Will Survive. they performed another set at 11.30 and we watched the fireworks together, before taking the river taxi to clifford pier. and Levan gave us his number and told us to add him in MSN! cool

oh well the ronin guys are pretty regular guys u'd find on the street. just that they choose to pursue their passion, while most of us do not. they have no airs about them, agreeing to perform even when there's no crowd and delivering 2 kick-ass shows. it really shows their dedication.