hall food is a semblance of real food. sad droopy min jiang kueh with peanutsmelling sugar fillings. stiff buns (hahaha). all sorts of funny kueh i wouldn't feed to my dog (not that i have one) AND my absolute favourite (ok one of many absolutefavourites) CHEECHEONGFUN drenched in mildly sweet SOYASAUCE. eeeww. i have to say i felt mildly cheated.

then i wondered about the exchange students and foreigners whose first encounter with local food is in hall. and then they'll think it's real food and everyone out there does it like this! and worse, some of them LIKE IT. imagine, they'll go out and tell people how they like the fullbodied, savoury saltiness of cheecheongfun, then get all shocked when it turns out to be sweet outside. i dunno. i'm incoherent cos i'm upset with the ccf.

yeah, isn't it nice? CCF. and the MJK from mr bean's. and BBT and CSB. hahaha i love acronyms! i'm a singaporean through and through! it just gives it more BITE, this staccato monosyllabic rendering of the words. like, let's go and eat *snap* YTF. as opposed to yooongg taauu foooo. what a mouthful.

and speaking of which, i found an entry on wikipedia on SINGLISH. it was like a thorough analysis of the language and the different levels and degrees this CREOLIZED language was used in singapore! with different sections on the meanings that those wonderful sounds like lah and leh and lor take in, and its usage. "please note that kena cannot be used with something positive, like kena lottery." astounding. the sort of thing i would expect from good old gigi wong. haha.

how can i write a comedy when i don't feel even vaguely... comic? having to churn out something Witty and Cogent and better yet, charged with tension that builds up till the end where it bursts out like a broken dam. or something like that. hahaha.

anyway, so i decided to do research and i read baby blues. the first 2 series!! from when zoe didn't have a recognizable face!! in other words, adorable!! and, and, such a steal! i love 2nd hand book bazaars. yayyy. anyway, i digress. so, i was utilising my time efficiently researching on what makes bably blues so funnyyy. i wish readings were more, in this vein! haha. so, i consulted rochelle my fellow researcher, and she proposed that it was because, it's just SO FUNNY. heehee. no actually she said it touched on something we could all identify with, and it blew up details we tended to look over, so it was tender and amusing and stuff.

however, after all that research, i still couldn't come up with anything!!! grrr. i wish i could do like our science experiments back in school: "unable to produce results because experiment was a flop. let me examine my flop in detail." and so on and so forth. hais. sometimes, comedy is the hardest. and oftentimes, comedians are secretly (or not-so-secretly) depressed. the clown syndrome. is it cos u get so spent trying to make others happy you've nothing left to amuse yourself? or is it that u're a depressed person who makes others happy in an attempt to cover up for your own unhappiness?

Happyness!
is having your lesson cancelled when you haven't done your work
is having dinner at spinelli's on western"food" days
is stepping out of a freezing LT into the glorious (relative) warmth
is having hugiantimous scoops of gelatissimo AND island creamery's AND ben&jerrys!!
is the first gulp of ice cold soyabeanmilk after training
is being wrapped in a fuzzy warm towel after shower
is a downy yellow duck
is dried mangoes
is catching a frisbee
is rowing on mirrorwater
is being fetched home in my daddy's car
is being hugged
is being with YOU. :)

1- Poème

Demain, dès l’aube, à l’heure où blanchit la campagne,
Je partirai. Vois-tu, je sais que tu m’attends.
J’irai par la forêt, j’irai par la montagne.
Je ne puis demeurer loin de toi plus longtemps.

Je marcherai les yeux fixés sur mes pensées,
Sans rien voir au dehors, sans entendre aucun bruit,
Seul, inconnu, le dos courbé, les mains croisées,
Triste, et le jour pour moi sera comme la nuit.

Je ne regarderai ni l’or du soir qui tombe,
Ni les voiles au loin descendant vers Harfleur,
Et quand j’arriverai, je mettrai sur ta tombe
Un bouquet de houx vert et de bruyère en fleur.

- Victor Hugo

2- Translation

Tomorrow, at dawn, in the hour when the countryside becomes white,
I will leave. You see, I know that you are waiting for me.
I will go by the forest, I will go by the mountain.
I cannot stay far from you any longer.

I will walk, eyes fixed on my thoughts,
Without seeing anything outside, nor hearing any noise,
Alone, unknown, the back curved, the hands crossed,
Sad, and the day for me will be like the night.

I will not look at the gold of the evening which falls,
Nor the faraway sails descending towards Harfleur.
And when I arrive, I will put on your tomb
A green bouquet of holly and heather in bloom.

Poem! French! Hugo!
Haha... I think the imageries are quite nice! The snow and the forest and the setting sun and the flowers in the cold... Spring in Winter, Life in Death.
But i do think that the sentiments are rather freaky. I MEAN, he wrote this for his daughter. It just rings of paedophilia la. Not to mention incest. Unless it's a, hmmm, French thing. Or he just likes wallowing in grief. And the irony of going "I will not look at all this beauty around me" when by saying that he already has. Or am I just a cynic. Haha. But sm agrees with me!

I got the poem from this website http://www.learnfrenchinboston.com/podcast/efp05_demain.cfm" title="http://www.learnfrenchinboston.com/podcast/efp05_demain.cfm" target="_blank"http://www.learnfrenchinbosto... (support her: make a donation!) and the lady spent such a long time analysing this LINEBYLINE I ended up memorising the entire poem by the end of it. Reminds me of nj days with champagne going thru heartofdarkness - which could really turn the sky dark man, by the time we were done. I remember after the final intensive makeup lesson we emerged from class to a thunderstorm. A fitting conclusion to the book, really. Haha. Man, jc seems such a long-ago thing!

The more we grow up, the more there is for us to look back on. No wonder by the time people grow old they morph into mellow nostalgic story-recounters rocking in chairs, with dreamy benevolent smiles and vision bathed in sepia. And La Vie en Rose playing in the playground. Jeux d'enfants!