Cos now as we look back at the time that passed , its a luminous flash , that , well doesnt really felt that it has been well lived. But its time passed nonetheless , and face the fact, time, is running out.

For schoolwork, because with each passing day mean new syllabus being taught, more homework, done or undone (or not intended to be done) comes haunting every student. And the deadline for submission for the JC life ,ie. the A levels, stalks closely behind. Not that we seek to run away from it, nor are we really looking forward to it.

Its time thats the limiting reagent.

C'mon if we could live a thousand years i'll take ten years to complete my A levels.



For canoeing too, if you would look at it this way. Its not even being about the end of the year showdown. July doesnt qualify to be end-of-year. But its our showdown, the one-and-a-half year of effort, of time , of trainings and dedication and commitment and sacrifice. Condensed into a few minutes of water time . It counts.

We saw a glimpse of it in the past few weeks, the MR 500 and NJCC , which well , I would not exactly want it to reflect my achievements. Yeah not good , but its just how things have worked out to be.


As William Hung would have put it " I have done my best and I have no regrets."


Maybe, just so maybe, i dont want to admit that my best. Afterall it sucks to be slammed with the cold hard facts that , your best is simply not enough. Not enough , not comparable to others, not significant to others. And hence the only way is to press on, flailing wildly acting like clowns, or just retreat into seclusion and train for the Gold again.


Someone once told me we from Bedok are like monks deep in meditation retreat training, in seclusion where nobody sees, nobody hears, only when we emerge from hiding and wield our weapons in the battlefield did people start realising we're a threat afterall.

That's an optimistic view, considering if anyone even bothered to think we're a threat at all. Fine neveryoumind, go on thinking that way and perhaps, if not surely, when we next emerge from the monastery we'll have something else to show.

I dont have much to talk about it, NJCC came and went and was ... was... part disgrace part honour. Disgrace because i lost a race due to a rather stupid reason i'd kick myself for that. But owing to my emotional repair mechanism , i got over it quickly , ( about as quickly as it took for me to return from the 1000m startline having been dropped the bomb by race officials). Maybe i would have cried there and then had i not been through all that wear and tear of mental hardships.
But the end of it, i shrugged and laughed it off. Next time then..

Honour , not exactly very honour, personal bests are like self deposit in the bank of your self-esteem. And breaking it feels like striking the lottery. Winning a race is like being handed interest dividend payouts.
I struck my lottery though they didnt give me any interest payouts, and well, got to make a lot of random friends on and off the water. Fine to just say that there's alot more to have been there, and the gains are the lessons learnt.



There's more to it that just being in Macritchie. Afterall we spent nearly a full month training there, enduring the strict rules, the competitive environment, bad facillities, crowded lanes and hell lot of rain and storm and that anti-climax land training from coach at the carpark.
The weird stares we get from the resident teams, the hospitality received from schools with good ties with :D , the faulty A2 shed lock , fun playing with the drain water during a heavy downpour, the damaged C2 D: .

Its part of us now, and also the fact we see how competition from rivals really looks like, and the gaps we needed to catch up, not forgoing the fact that how much we've come ahead of some others, if that is but some cheap consolation.

And its just the days in Macr.

Marathon's over. MSA's over. We start over again.

Could it be ? Lest i fail my own hopes again, that this tests shall make up for the past. Yep and i may not have done everything possible to do well, yet i did as much was in grasp to achieve, some in some out. Nonetheless its over and let it be over. Look forward to the next challenge ahead


Marathon hmm, guess its just how things turn out least expected. Notwithstanding the medals i forgone, which was in grasp, but held little purpose in doing so. Yeah it could have been my glory to claim , but that glory didnt belong to me anyway. Nevertheless the thanks goes out to all who have and did helped in one way or another to make the week so pleasant to train, race in . One way or another, its over yes, and we have probably enough time to reflect on it before moving on again.

Talk about glory,
We always say: Praise God , Glory to God etc etc... What does glory, to God, meant?

Nothing actually.


I wont be offended if someone told me the same thing i figured. Glory didnt mean anything. God doesnt need the glory; he has all that is to claim in this world and not. But it does mean to us , and it must have mattered alot to Him.

Who wouldn't mind being noticed and in the limelight for that instance when you've just done something you're proud of , achieved something worth attention, worth the applause. Maybe a article or interview in the headlines would've been nice . I would like it; it my nature and probably everyone else's too.

It's just that time and again history has proven itself reliable to predict. How many great people of their time falter in the near future cos they just couldn't get over the initial hussle. We as human probably lost too much to that little devil in the corner of our hearts called "pride"

So its not really that bad when God took the effort to instruct people to give the honour back, not to keep , but to keepsafe.



Imagine this , a budding five-year-old just won in a certain contest a large satchet of sweets and candies. And like any other five-year-old, he's probably thinking of keeping all it to himself, and down them like rice that night, afterall who could blame him? He 's won it, fair enough.
And before long , he's getting into trouble with the tummy aches that accompanies candy dinners.

So this is where the Father steps in. He reaches over to the child's bag " I'll keep that, " and promises only to give him a sweet at a time, once every two or three days. And yes the child will grow resentful , throw tantrums and fuss over everything else, uncooperative mealtimes, struggling against the hands that meant to help. But afterall its for his good.

So is the case with the glory we get from mortal kinds. We get upset whenever due glory isnt given to us. We wrinkle our eyes when we hear someone publicly honouring God for what seems like his own achievements .
BUt afterall, what our heavenly Father meant, was to keep the sweets from us , protect us from the tummyaches of life's too much honour. Just like a grown up wont need to steal sweets from kids; he could buy a barrel load if he pleased, our God doesnt need our glory. He just meant good .




So the next time we are urge to give God the glory, dont wrinkle up like its your life's possesions. It goes a long way back if we are to trace how much this could mean to us , but yes its for our good, probably, until you can convince me otherwise, that you could handle the issue of mortal pride.

Race Day. Tmrw



Something that we looked forward to, something that we spent our precious afternoons training for, something that, well, just is a common goal that all would like to see come to pass.

Afterall, didnt we pledge to uphold this name, to carve out a history that belonged uniquely to us, to claim a portion of the somewhat saturated piece of treasure that was available to whomever was willing to sacrifice time and effort of it.

Yes the week was spent, half in half out of schoolwork, pressing productivity of my internal generators; morning with the full sch routine, afternoon speeding around kallang, night back at sch with whomever is left hardworking. Cept that i was doing triple duty. heck
Back to the point, which really tests one's commitment, no wonder there are really those who break down and steps away for it. I dun really blame them.


Back with that issue, carrying a load of expectations along with me. I'm not God, I aspire towards God-like , I live as if I was an angel, but afterall ,i'm but a saint. Ok literally, but yah thats the whole point.
I'm not perfect, I dont always self motivate, there are time when i want to , felt like , almost gave up .

Holding on , because i know there are others who did their part of the work, fully expecting me to do mine so that things would work out.

Yes i know i should, but its like the saying, life is a long long marathon race, you cant always give everything you've got, or you're just a badly adapted sprinter.

So i apologise, if in anyway, my weakness , in flesh, in spirit, as ever failed to do its part.



Friday's training made me think more. So what if i was leading the rear pack ? So what if i could defend my place against another k1 challenging my position? So what if i could charge another K2 ? The gap difference is still, disastrous. Wonder how many other real competitors could fill in that gap, otherwise, my ranking is ka-boom. Crap Crap Crap.

Somewhere , somehow, i lost the fight to keep up with progress. Well like i did last year, just because i wanted to more.

That's all it meant, it doesnt have to make sense, it doesnt matter


Afterall Race Day's tmrw .

Woah new year
Another beginning we all would like to think its just nothing, its just routine, its just saying we got thru promos.

Then again everything going on ahead full force now. We're seniors ! To say the least, its always different to be seniors. Its like the unchartered waters to conquer, back when our seniors were around, we could only look while they made on their way. Once on our own ships to ride the journey of a J2 , aye it doesnt really feels much different?

Crap i realised i havent filled up my goals for the year. Aye time to sit down and do some reflection, if you havent, pls do. Because i havent, but shall do so. NO more time wasting, because i realise i didnt really did much for the past year, and hence i cant really compare what progress i would have wanted myself to go thru. 18 years old would sound more cool than 20 years old. And since most of us guys would spend our 20 year old stage away from active civilisation, thought we might as well make our impact felt now.

Trying our best, we have a whole packed schedule ahead of us, those blasted MSAs which Lee hak boon's wife probably got the idea from him or did not. Maybe that'll will change the way SA functions, haha kinda too slack in academic efforts.



OK something else to think about...

Thursday chapel service .



Here there's this 12 year old girl who;s blind from birth due to some unfortunate mishandling coming to showcase her singing talent. That besides her somewhat talented voice , its what she says , if you think it again , that made the impact


"..... I dreamt i went to heaven , there i SAW the green grass, i breathed the fresh air , i SEE angels around me ..."


If anything, that about what she said, somewhere along that line. She blind, mind you. From birth.

IF she said she saw, then what she saw must have been ... heavenly.

No cultural influence , no stereotype . Afterall what's green to a blind? How do you describe an angel to a blind person?

Its not like those kind of fat chubby children with undersize wings, holding star shaped magic wands who go about kissing people and what not.

ANGELs

How do you dream of angels from nothing? Tough time thinking, what i'll say is she saw it . she saw the real thing. Benefit of the doubt, she saw what most people wait a lifetime to get a glimspe. What beauty is that, when your mortal sight is deprived of you, and you receive a divine vision?

Its a hard choice, thankfully we never might need to make. Not that I would die without my eyes, but hey you wont see the ugly, but u also cant see the beauty in the mess.

And i'm always looking out for what the things the world can offer, somewhere to salvage how much fallen it has been. We dont get to see it everyday. But its been around since creation . So why not..

Now we have that to be , some sort of much awaited rest period that was feels good enough, letting off the tension for just awhile before embarking on a new journey.

That means: school's starting soon


We'll like to think that way, its kind of a weird way to end this year, with the companionship of a different bunch of frens.
People from different backgrounds and characteristics, forged into common identity and comeradeship by a sworn oath, that which we now call our team . ( ok we didnt swear no oaths when joining, but heck u get my point)

Christmas countdown? ALternative tactics used was to not go town anymore cos its quite senseless to go in and attacked by spray cans and gropers .
Hanged around at vivocity and sat down with portions of the team , in relative peace and tranquility ( that the right word to use?) chatted. enjoying the presence of each other, admiring the the sea scenery and night sky view, mindlessly hoping that some angels would appear from heaven and serve as a choir to complete that kind of atmosphere.

Whoever thought of that original idea of going vivo, yeah thanks for that, and stopping me from going town.
THough when going home that night i almost got chased by stray dogs :(((

Christmas Eve, really there's little point of counting down afterall, which u see many forgoing the true meaning behind it all. Cliched it may sound, but that what which was meant for is used as an excuse to party on yeah .


I dun need to say it all out, but if u still dun know what Christmas is ; GO to church.




Yupps then Christmas Day itself was spent going to church in the morn with Qian and Yong , despite everyone lacking sleep.
As was put blankly, it was good, to say the least , if otherwise right, cos its been so looooong since then.
Guess its time to find back the me i left behind here.

OH yeah random stuffs along then, on the way to church at the mrt i came across a scene of this guy talking out loud to himself. Me being me, i tried moving closer to hear it out and get an idea of what's going on.

Sounds like a nuts case, but some sort of high class nuts case. It was a man in about forties, in decent clothing, talking to thin air , advising about some sort of legal or financial business. Sounds like he's a lawyer or property investor of some sort , or he thinks he is .

That which made me think , its like , after spending a quarter of your life in education, another quarter sluggiing out in the real working world, this is what life could produce. A dark side of nature, making a man lose his purpose, that , or making him slip into a world of his own.

I thought, how does it really feel like to be in that kind of position. The world would be diffenrt, subjective, and very much restricted to his own point of view. Given the way he was arguing with "air" , sounds like he's insistent on his own ways.

Kind of a tragedy if u think of it , a great life and future spoilt by, whatever factors that led to that.

for all that the world could offer , that is

For what is training

Right so long since i posted , cos now, ha i (or rather my dad) fixed the comp, so it doesnt have so many problems.





Life is , training. Nothing else.





This holidays, despite promises to be active in church more, to study more, they don't seem to count for anything. Training.



Round Ubin came and went, of which i sank and returned. Then comes another endless routine of long distance training for the upcoming Canoe Marathon. And its , taking its toll. Losing the idea of studying in JC , sometimes i wonder what am i doing here for. Losing the idea of training, and i wonder... Why do i train for.



Why do i do things but give it up in future to replace with another impulsion interest.

Kept sane by the constant companionship of teammates, that otherwise, oh my, i realise i dun have anything else.



So now we resist anything that tries to disturb the stability of the team bond, that included those unfortunate incidences, which well, ultimately goes out to a selfish purpose.

Its not about running away from difficulties, but there's just so much that could be done in its face.



Ok fine that would just mean we'll have to move on.





Training~~~~~



Aye long dist training just means i'm left forever to chase people in front. And that what i;ve been doing, other than keeping people from chasing up to you. Thats just like any race.

Time trials, well, satisfying, but not contented.



Ahh losing track of time, since which is which training session did each event occur i cant remb.



Lets just say the Christmas break is something worth looking out for...

Can't be strangers

Right so now just came back from a real eventful day.

Morning whizzed past fast in the Pasir Ris SSC , waiting for people, then more waiting for coach, before getting to real work doing boat maintainence on site.

Then only did we got down to test the water conditions at the Pasir Ris coastline.
Yes and i empahisize the coastline, because we never got to go out any further then the coastline region.
Wave condition, i would put it, to be something like having a lot of powerboats doing endless power runs past our boats. MOreover, these K2s and K1s are flatwater sprinting boats, and when put into choppy conditions as bad as these, we never got a chance to paddle proper strokes.

Took a K1 out, since coach refused to put out our K2 in those conditions, but the session lasted barely 30 mins, for fear of damaging the equipment. Yeah the tapping strokes had to be so frequent and hard, i thought my blade wouldn't last out. Being bullied by metre tall waves, yes they were at least a metre from trough to crest, and when sitted down in the kayak, they overshadow you.

Bedok <>

You could never hope to have conditions like that in a reservoir. And we may yet to need to abandon the race tmrw if conditions doesnt change for the better. So much for the long distance trainings.
BUt then again, it was real fun riding the waves using sprint kayaks. The bow could angle down all the way till the water line was at the cockpit combing, and the next wave would literally crash into our small little boats, utterly flooding the interior.

Heck, i would have gladly paid the $20 race fee just to come here and play with the water. Hehz



After that was a period of transition, while i went over to Mark's house for a reunion outing of PAE 07s07 .. Yupps no doubt it was as usual round of talking, a closer bonding session. And its always have to be that after we parted then do we treasure the bonds we once had. Nevertheless, it wasn't awkward at all, since everyone still pretty retained the bonds shared.

Eating junk foods just one day before race is a sin, something i might have to foot the consequences.
And to add on the the carnage, MArk brought out his private stash of citrus vodka and whatever cocktail mix was that. Since it was quite a first time had I hanged out with friends in the presence and availabilitiy of liquor, I thought I might as well take the opportunity and try it out. Wouldn't hurt i guess...

Thus i downed till I flushed red, it wasnt a lot , just a small plastic cup of that vodka , and the cokctail milk mix, enough to make me start smiling senselessly, followed by a headache i couldnt help but drop onto the table while the rest of them continued talking.

A short rest nap on the couch while some played cards did help to soothe the whirling...

And for once, i decided to return home voluntarily on taxi.

Hence ended this little outing we had, since Arun is leaving for Aust soon, make do for a little farewell party for him then.

The bonds we once shared, may it last till. Yet i'm quite surprised the time span since we met didnt degrade us to the awkwardness amongst strangers, that is.

28 Nov 2007

The morning started off on a rather low note, late for training despite flying down on a cab, yeah and that’s just the start of a chain reaction that kinda wrecked the training session for me at least. Being late, given a talking, punished 300 push ups then I got to rushing around getting my own equipment ready, then rushing all the way to fill up the water bag only to have it leak half its contents out because I didn’t cap it properly in the rush.

OK there goes my recovery drink. Hastily started out, with no warm up since everyone was already done with it and waiting.
The 500m up and down sets at high power didn’t do much good, since right at the start I burned out , not being able to fully utilize all that I got, and becoming more and more demoralized with each passing set. Until the fact I regretted going for more, save that supposed to be more practice and more training, it did only to make me more down and use even lesser strength. There you have the power of the mind, but then, I was completely off the mood for training.

True I could blame a lot of factors; the bad morning start off, lack of energy, the strong up winds, the lack of a warm up, people cutting lanes etc etc.

Ultimately it comes to the knowledge that, hey , its just I allowed those to take the negative impact on me. Its not about how badly they will do, hell you cant blame the devil trying to disrupt your life; that’s just his job.
What you could do is protect yourself against him. That’s where I failed, that’s where during training, I allowed myself , for that moment, to wallow in self pity and the “ its-not-fair-for-me” mindset. Yes, and that’s where I have to take responsibility for, and the price is a wasted training session, just mere days before the Ubin race.



That’s just one of the bad stuff that has to happen. On a higher note the day had much excitement brewing in its bowels. Hanged around after training, wasted some time before heading over to Queensway to collect the new jerseys and thereafter, headed on to Qian’s or rather her brother’s chalet to hijack it for the night.

Took some time settled down and played our night away.

Finding it a first time , know that really, there wasn’t really much to make of one’s birthday. Not that it really mattered, because, for the past years, its all been just as normal as any other day. Maybe the dinner would be better, but that’s just about it anyway.

But since, this time I wasn’t spending it at home. And I really do mean it when I say it was really a surprise, the way it was brought forth. Even though I didn’t really make a lot out of it, but yeah, I really do appreciate that.


THANKS TEAM … that ‘lil gesture meant a lot … Hehz



And hence continued the night away, playing cards till late late into the night until one by one the people collapsed, those who did so early got the best rooms and beds, those who didn’t made do on the floor, with stolen pillows and blankets and towels ..










29 Nov 2007


Right spent the early morn slacking, allowing this bit of enjoyment outside of training , that which comes so rarely.

Towned and watched “The Kingdom” , something which touched about the terrorism issues in the middle east, one of those shoot-em-up movies that probably worth watching only on TV. OK I shan't spoil too much, but then again there’s just that something I felt most about the movie.

Those who watched it will know, like when the head villian was dying, something he whispered to his granddaughter, very much similar to how the female lead was comforted upon the knowledge of the death of her close friend. A promise that “we will go kill them all” .

Kind of put to thinking that, its really alarming how vengeance can comfort. Yes it is saying that the thought of revenge, of violent retribution can serve as a motivation for life which is quite something which happens in the world today.

Kinda disappointing to find out that the ending has to end so negatively, in a note to say that actually glamorizes violence. I was expecting the director to put in something like “ Don’t worry life still goes on” , or , “ Its ok there’s still hope” kind of message to include when character faced the death of a loved one.

Then again, its just this world that’s going about it. Go find any Doomsday talk in any religion and you find that it says that THE END comes preceded with a period of mass violence, moral degration and the likes of it.
Who’s to say the world’s going to last forever?




And hence after got back to Bedok to train illegally with TP, and since it became like a self training session with not much of a program in place, I went on with my own 500m sets while Eugene goes for his rounds.

Same kind of feeling , reminiscence of the A divs race again, using the same boat, same paddle, same lanes, but a much different me. A different feeling though, no one’s looking, no one expecting much, no stress, no competition, just a maxx effort in the the sprint. Taking revenge for the lost training the day before, and the last time trial which went so horribly wrong for me. Hmm lets just say I’m playing around for now ..


Back then when the race meant so much for all that I fought for. As I paddled down I was thinking, hey its just how much u really want for it, that kind of dissatisfaction that pushes you to fight even harder.

Because I was dissatisfied then, being left out of the PA championship race in June wasn’t quite the way I intended to be. So I fought, for every training, for every bit of time I get to practice with the K1. The passion to win, not the actual race, but the fight to get to participate in the A Divs in July was that overwhelming factor.

I fought , and hence , qualified me to say, I got what I fought for. And its this kind of self training that allows the active exploration of skills learnt, and putting it to practical use. So for once, at least it was worth the while.