Battle with ants

I've always been a cleanliness freak. I like things to be clean, especially in my room. My home, being an old apartment, has the inevitable endless stream of ants, lizards and cockroaches roaming. I don't mind the lizards that much except they sometimes scare me by zipping by too fast. The cockroaches are the ones that get to me as they're extremely disgusting, dirty and plain annoying. In order to solve the cockroach problem, I've resorted to buying those traps they sell in supermarkets. However, this works only to an extent. I'm so glad that I have very brave brothers and father. They always will catch the cockroaches for me no matter how late the night is or when as they know my fear of them.

Next up are the ants. For fear of ants, I do not ever eat or drink in my room. Recently, however, I found that my toiletries cupboard has ants visiting. This puzzles me to no end as there's only toiletries in there. I mean, how sweet or delicious can toiletries be? At first I thought that they maybe fooled by the nice smell of shampoo I kept in there, or even by the fragrance emitted by the pads. But I found out that they are attracted to the razor/shaver I kept there. Again, why they're attracted to the shaver, I'm not sure. I've always believed that to get rid of ants, you have to find out the source that attracted them. By getting rid of the source, you don't have to kill them, they will just disappear by themselves. So, to prevent the ants from coming, I decided to keep my shaver in the cupboard, soaked in a glass of water. I thought that this would be the solution that ends the ants' visit. You can imagine my dismay in discovering that they're still there. Now they can't get to the shaver but it seems that the water that the shaver is kept in is sweet. They ended up staying by the water's edge and kept coming back. Though I don't understand what it is that makes the shaver sweet, I was very annoyed by the ants. I had to clean the shaver and the change the water in the cup daily.

One day, as I was cleaning the cup and changing the water, I decided to use dish washing detergent to try to get rid of the 'sweet' stuff (normally I just change water and rinse the cup without detergent). Then it hit me that maybe I can put a little detergent into the cup and fill it with water, thus making the water I soak the shaver in, to be soapy water. And voila! No more ants! I guess the smell of the detergent is not sweet for the ants and also they're not so stupid as to kill themselves by drinking soapy water. Haha!

I'm still patting myself on the back for winning this battle with the ants. I just feel so smart for thinking of such a solution! Hee....oh happy days....

Interesting way of delivering airline annoucements

My weekend

Ok, I know that it's already the middle of the week and a bit late to blog about the weekend just past. I have been quite busy with work since the school holidays are over and I need to catch up on my sleep.

Anyway, last Saturday, it happened that my tuition for the early afternoon was cancelled. I was pondering over how to make it for tuition and go to church in time for the combined fellowships team building. I think God presented the answer for me. Well, it was great fun! The games that the Bethel fellowship came up with allowed for lots of brains to be used (which I like) and for the various fellowship members to bond. Most important of all, it was very fun! There were five games in all. We had to go to different stations and complete the tasks within 30 minutes.

The first station was where we were asked to taste six different liquids and guess what they are. I may seem simple at first but some of the beverages had similar tastes that made for hard guessing. The next station was where we had to rack our brains to think of solutions using strings to pour a bucket of balls into another bucket in the middle of the 'sea'. We managed to do this in record time. I don't know if it's because the people in my group are very smart or we happened to get it right by trial and error. Even if it's trial and error, we got the right formula on the first trial! Haha! We took only 8 mins for the first try and 5 mins for the second time.

The third game was to look at photos of certain places in church and go to that place and collect chinese characters to form a bible verse. The photos are taken in such a way that you need to think a little and to guess where the places are. Some of the places are that normally you wouldn't pass by or to take note of the small details. But we got in first for this category! Yay!

The fourth game was a memory game. We had to watch some commercials or pictures and memorise the details. This was pretty straight forward and easy as each group had 7-8 members in it. Each of us just had to take note of certain things and we got almost all the questions correct.

The last game was for all groups to come together and play. The organisers actually wanted to make it in such a way that we would compete against each other but we caught on to the strategy and worked together to finish the task. Overall, the purpose was to remind all that we're brothers and sisters in Christ and we should work together in doing God's works, even in the face of competition.

After the games, there was a BBQ session. It was also a time for fellowship. Most of the members in our fellowship did not attend this team building but I was able to talk to the younger fellowship.

On Sunday, it was worship as usual in the morning. After worship, there was tuition ministry meeting and after, choir practise for Easter. The songs we had to sing are quite hard and with so many to learn, this extra session was necessary.

When I got home, I had to get my laptop and go to the library with WJ to plan for our Europe trip. I can finally say that other than packing my bags, all plans are in place for the Europe trip! We booked our flights within Europe and accommodation in Switzerland. With all these logistics, almost $2k is gone! Although it's major damage to the bank account, I'm really looking forward to this trip. It's almost 3 years since I've seen the host family and I get to see Frankfurt and Switzerland. I'm glad that other than London, I get to go other places that I've not been to before. I dislike going to the same places twice actually. The world is too big and Europe is too expensive to revisit the same places so many times. In fact, if not for my host family, I wouldn't go London again. Not unless it's free! Haha!

Now, I'm at a dilemma. I wish for May to come soon, so I can go for this trip. But at the same time, May will be my birthday and it will be the big three-O! Oh no! Getting old! I don't even want to think about it. Let me pretend for another two months.

Photo blog

Another round of blog with photos, since I have nothing to blog about in my life. This time I decided to put up photos of famous monuments or places that I've been to. Hehe. Must show off a bit. All photos put up are taken by me! I didn't cut and paste from other places. Just to make it clear.

This is Brooklyn Bridge in New York. It connects Manhattan with Brooklyn. This was taken while on a cruise around Manhattan. In the summer, it's supposed to be very popular for walking on the bridge but I've not had the chance to do that. This is Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles, California. This is where the annual Academy (Oscars) Awards is held. We can't go inside the theatre itself, so lots of photo taking outside. On the pillars along the lobby are movies names that had won Best Picture over the many years. When the awards is held, they usually close off the roads in front and leading to this theatre.

This is Central Park in Manhattan, New York City. This is the view in summer time, when everyone would take the chance to picnic in the park. Because there's no beach within the city, people would also wear their beach wear (bikinis, etc) and sun-bathe at the park. It's very funny to see that because it just looks so silly that they're in swim wear but there's no water for them to swim in.

This is the famous Rockefeller Christmas tree. They put this up every Christmas until after the new year. You can see the tree in many movies if the setting in around Christmas, eg, Home Alone 2, etc. The people at the bottom of the tree should also let you know roughly how big the tree is. There's always a lot of people at Rockefeller Center around this period, from tourists and locals who are doing their Christmas shopping.

This is Capitol Building in Washington, DC. It's very majestic looking and anyone who gets to DC will think that this is the White House but it's actually not. The White House is actually a very normal looking building. The Capitol is where they have all those senate meetings, etc. When the Presidents take their oath of office, it was in front of this Capitol Building too.

This is the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco, California. It was a bad day when I went, with fog covering the top part of the bridge. On a good day, one should be able to see the whole bridge. Although it was supposed to be summer, you can see that it's actually quite cold. That's San Francisco for you! Also, the Golden Gate bridge is not gold, it's red!

The very famous Statue of Liberty on Liberty Island, New York. Actually, from New York City itself, you can't see Miss Liberty very clearly. She is like a dot in the distance because the island is some distance away from the city. If you go to Liberty Island, you can't take very good picture also because she is too big. The trick is to take the whole statue when you passed by her on the ship to the island. I've seen her on twice when I went on cruises and only got on the island once to see Miss Liberty.

Follow me!

I got on Twitter recently. http://twitter.com/wintay You can follow me on it. It's actually a little like small blogs that I will update my feelings and events throughout the day if I'm online. We'll see how it goes. Just something new for me now. Maybe I won't last long there. Ha!

Busy but fulfilling day

Today I had appointments from noon all the way till night. I was quite tired because I stay up every night to play Mousehunt on Facebook. I say it's fulfilling because at least I'm doing productive things and I always feel happy whenever I do things that I like and it makes me busy, or at least look busy.

During noon, I went to CZ's place for her son's one-year old birthday party. CZ was my senior in Secondary school prefects and girl guides. After she graduated, we have not met up at all, but I send her birthday cards or wishes every year on her birthday. Thus, she always feels very touched by me. We actually lost touch some time back but she found me on Friendster while I was in USA. We have always promised to meet up when I came back to Singapore but never found the time to do so. Last year, when she gave birth, she invited me to her son's full month party but it happened to fall during the week that I was away in Japan. So this time, when she invited me again for the birthday, I had to go. Much as I love children, I have to say that my main purpose in going was to meet up with CZ, rather than to celebrate her son's birthday. Being single and unattached, there's always this situation that I have to attend some social functions alone. Take this time for example. I have not seen CZ for so long. We are bound to have some sort of distance. CZ tried her best to entertain me but she has other guests to attend to too. Also, the more she tried to make me feel at home, the more I feel bad. I did not feel very awkward, since I was there for a little more than an hour only. I just felt that if I'm to remain single, this would happen for the rest of my life. I have to get used to it, I guess

After the party, I left for my tuition. It was a back-to-back tuition session lasting three hours since I'm tutoring a pair of brothers of different levels. That was quite fine actually since I've decided not to flare up at the slightest mistakes. I've learnt to let it go and see them as children who needs my guidance. Instead of raising my voice at them and making them frightened, I should try to be gentle and help them remember their mistakes.

Then, I had to attend a meeting with the Character Building members to prepare for our next semester's programmes. Since I had an hour to spare between tuition and the meeting, I went to the library to look up information for Switzerland. Yishun had a new library and their travel guides are so much more extensive than the AMK branch. I've actually found quite a few books and intend to photocopy them just like what I did at AMK. However, I found that this Yishun branch does not have any photocopying machines! I was quite miffed by it. Left with no choice, I had to choose two books out of my many choices and borrow them home. It was so heavy to carry them home!

Anyway, the character building programme was easy to plan for, with MT's help. MT asked me today how old I am. She is quite new to church and was just beginning to know us. I just said I'm very old, much older than her (she's 17, btw). Well, she said I do not look like I'm old. She said I look more like her and her friends' age. Haha! This means that I look like a teenager. Actually, I'm not sure if MT said this out of compliments or out of insult, because I've realised that she is mature for her age. If she thinks that I do not behave like my age, does she think that I'm childish or immature? Hmm....maybe I shouldn't read too much into it. When someone says something nice, accept it graciously. Ha!

Wish I can use my brain

I know I have not been writing much. I hate this. Actually I go online almost everyday and everytime I wish to blog. The only problem is I don't have anything to blog about. Usually if I don't have interesting events happening in my life to blog about, I will have some thoughts to share. My lack of topics to blog about means that I've not been thinking or using my brain! *gasps* I have been so addicted to facebook recently that the only thing I wanted to go online is to go Mousehunt and catch mice. Of course, since I've already booked tickets for London, I've been doing a little of research online too. Looking for places to stay and go in Switzerland. Now that I realised that Switzerland is quite an expensive place. It didn't go with the rest of Europe in converting to Euro and while it's currency rate is not sky high, it's standard of living is still high enough for me. I've been trying to look for cheap or affordable hostel online but I guess those really cheap ones do not have websites. Maybe I should look harder.

Ok, I'm rambling now. I hate that I do not have a fixed blogging pattern. When I read others' blogs, they are able to present their thoughts into such nice and interesting reads. I wish I can do that too, but when I start blogging, I just sort of write whatever comes to mind without any pattern. This makes it very confusing to read and seems that my blog has no point to it. I hope I can blog more. Should use my brain more often.

Vacation planning!

The recent economy downturn has made air tickets more affordable. I have been saving up and wanting to visit my host family in London and finally I'm going! Yes! I'm so happy! There's a promotion going on with SIA and the tickets are really quite reduced from the original prices. However, the stipulation is that it's a two-to-go offer, so I had to ask around to get someone to go with me. Actually, I didn't have that much difficulty looking for someone. The other day, the best friends and I met up for a meal and I just sort of asked WJ casually if she wants to go. I was surprised that she gave a positive reply to me immediately. So, when I got back, I went into serious thinking and planning and find that I should really go!

This is a good time to go not only because of the low cost of air tickets, but also my host family maybe moving back to the States. If they go back, flying to USA would be more expensive than flying to Europe. Also, I have friends in other parts of Europe and this trip to London would be also to meet my friends. So, if my host family move back to USA, it would be a long time before I go to Europe again.

So, today WJ and I made some initial plans and we're confirmed going. We're going to be there for two weeks as WJ says it makes sense to stay longer since we've already flown all the way there. Other than visiting my host family in London, we're going to Germany so I can visit a friend of mine who's German. We were au pairs together in USA and our children used to have playdates together. I really miss her and it's great that we get to catch up in her hometown. After Germany, we're going to go to Switzerland. I have a friend there too, although it's not confirmed that we're meeting up. I met this friend while on tour to Scotland. She's a very sweet girl, very young but mature. We've been keeping in touch. I'm not really that close to this friend but I'm hoping that we can meet up.

Well, there's a bad side to taking this Europe trip. I have to give up going to church camp. It's not really a matter of clash of timings and affordability. Most of the fellowship people are going and I really hate to miss all these memories with them. All the children there for me to play with! But again, I'm giving them up for my little girls, K and B. Although I can afford to go, I don't want to spend all my money and end up being left with nothing for a rainy day. Sigh...you can't always have the best of both worlds.