Belle left this world last week ... i thank those who have in one way or another shared part of her wonderful 14 years ... i hope she finds doggy bliss.


rj
08/09/05

Ciao guys!

I had my first Italian class today. They put me in elementary although I signed up for beginners...they assigned us to classes based on this italian proficiency test we had to take last Friday. Anyway, everyone in my class seems to be super fluent in Italian, likely coz the majority can speak Spanish (which is really similar to Italian) along with several other languages. Everyone is multi-lingual in my class it's scary...lol at least I'm multi-lingual too, although my french isn't too fantastic.

Since my class isn't a beginner's class, the lecturer was just rattling off in Italian, assuming we all understood, coz well her rationale is, if you dun understand you're in the wrong class. I think maybe they put me in the wrong class, coz it takes me awhile to process what she's saying. I think I'll probably stick with the class for awhile and see how it goes, but if it's too tough I can always tranfer down a level...coz lotsa things they assume you already know...which I do...somewhat but not tremendously well. Guess that means more studying for me...ugh! Classes are completely insane though...we've got italian class all the way from 11.30am to 4.30pm with only a half hour lunch break in between!! Geez...there's only so much italian one can take you know?

hey pple! you should check this out!

http://www.swensens.com.sg/images/promo/26-sept-promo/26-sept-promo.pdf

I went to Thomson Plaza yesterday with my mum and brother and I had all the ice-cream i could eat!!! buy 1 main course/pasta and get unlimited ice-cream for S$1!

haha...do you believe that i tried every flavour of ice-cream they had??? let me list them for you...

chocolate
chocolate freckles
cookies N cream
lime sherbert
mango
frosted chocolate malt (my favourite! ^_^)
yam
vanilla
pistachio almond
strawberry
thin mint
chocolate chip
coffee
sticky chewy chocolate
orange sherbert
chocolate peanut buttercup
mocha almond fudge
yummy raisins
wild wild berries (flavour of the month)

haha...i guess i should cut down on my dessert intake after this...got army half marathon on 11 sep 05...

Ciao!! How's it going with you guys? I'm getting settled somewhat now (meaning I don't always need a map to find my way back & I know some short cuts). Milan is huge and all the buildings are so old!! The architecture here is impressive especially the Duomo which I went to see yesterday. That is a wonder...I'll post some photos sometime when I get round to resizing the photos. Other than the architecture it is an ugly city....like honestly. The transport system is great though, you can pretty much travel everywhere by metro (the subway) and with the same ticket you can get on the bus, the tram and the electric bus. It took me 2 days to figure out how paying for the buses, trams and electric buses work coz my friend and I were standing there watching the people enter the bus and none of them ever seemed to pay! They'd just go up and grab a seat and that's it....then they hop off, all without paying or punching a ticket.

Probably the most significant event that happened to me in the last 3 days I've been in Milan is that I lost my keys!!! The very day I checked into my residence and received them I lost them!!! I think I must be the only student in the residence's history to lose my keys so quickly!! What happened was that I went out for dinner with my room mate (who thankfully is a chick and not a guy) at one of the restaurants by the canal and I dropped my bag and I reckon my keys must have fallen out then. Anyway I only realised I lost them after we got back and I was looking for them to open my closet door which I had locked. My room mate and I didn't know the name of the restaurant but thankfully my room mate had part of our bill which had the restaurant's name and number printed on it (if you wanna know why she had a part of the bill it's because the waiter had written his phone no on it for her after she gave him her no...she's American 'nuff said). So I called them up to ask if they could look for my keys and I was explaining about my keys in English and what-do-you-know, non parla inglese!! So I tried with my sparse Italian to explain the situation and finally 15 mins later they got it. Unfortunately they couldn't find my keys so now I've to pay like €26 for a new one. The only good news would be that it's only €26 and not like 100+ or something...

Ok I could rattle on forever about every little thing in Milan and the people and the crazy Italians, but I was thinking of putting that on my blog coz my blog has been sadly neglected so for further detail on everything, read my blog!!! I'll make it easy and add a link too!! Here!

Hey guys, check this out!

very funny comicblog!
http://studentssketchpad.blogspot.com/2005/08/schools-journal-1.html

recognise the colour scheme? hahaha...

didn't know our school was so keen to join the blogging revolution...10%??? and they probably have their homework to moan about...

hello darlings!

sorry toni couldn't go airport to send you off today... a bit of a rush going from west to east back to west again.. now that i'm a weekday westie (urgh. the east is so much nicer tho)..

anyway, the diary's with me..the girls are welcome to it anytime.. haha.. mic i wonder when you'll learn that the diary is GIRLS-ONLY. i thought i already told you that the last time you came to my place.. haha..

anyway, just an update: i didn't get selected for the 2nd interview for the NUS Overseas Colleges thingy.. think its my CAP (currently only 3.6/5.0 =C), and my inability to speak coherently at 10am in the morning... but in many ways i also think that its not in God's plan for me to go for the NOC thing.. at least not yet..

i can't say i'm not disappointed, but more because of the rejection rather than not being able to go... and in many ways i'm kinda thankful i don't have to think about something extra at the moment because i'm also applying for this 10-month missions trip programme (no i'm not going to Africa for 10 months, its just a 9-month preparation and training programme that will culminate in a 2 to 4 weeks exposure mission trip, highly unlikely to be Africa). the meetings and stuff are mostly on saturdays, so that would mean me missing church on saturdays.. (having to go on sundays, which isn't too bad, but i'm involved in quite a bit of stuff in church on saturdays, as you all probably have realised). so if i get selected for NOC (which is a 1 year programme), i won't be seen in church on saturdays for about.. 2 years? so i suppose God has other plans for me at the moment, in church or otherwise...(but well, i could always apply again next sem.. but we'll see)

in any case, was just thinking how nice it is to have friends who accept you for who you are, and let you rant like that.. heh. thanks guys! really miss being able to just hang out everyday and being able to attend classes with such good friends so you can share just about everything... anyway, take care all of you!

Hey guys!

First off I must say Mic & MZ what a brilliant idea to start up a group blog!!! Very handy for keeping in touch especially when everyone eventually gets scattered all over de world. Although I think I'd probably find myself posting on this blog more often for de time being rather than on my blog which I've yet to update since my trip with RJ.... I juz can't be stuffed right now.

Ok next piece of news.....the All Blacks were practicing on a field on campus today in Dunedin & I MISSED it!!!! Like ARRRRGHHH!!!! Dun ask me why they were practicing at the campus field when we have a stadium coz I have no idea, but that's not de point....the point is that they were there & I wasn't!!! *sob*

Thirdly "I'm leaving on a jet plane, don't know when I'll be back again..." (I really don't...but probably sometime in Feb 2006) on 30 Aug at 11.05pm. Since my flight's so late anyone who's free at night and wants to see me off can come say bye. I've to be there to check in 2 hrs before so I'll be at de airport from 9.05. Oh and do any of u guys have anything in particular from Europe that u want me to help purchase?

Hello my dear friends!

I just had lunch with ant, mz and ah teo...as we were chatting over ice-cream (yummy venzeia ice-cream might i add...we had yoggi & giandia) we came to the revelation that from next year onwards, it might be very difficult for us to meet again...so mz & i thought that creating this blog would help to keep us close even when we are so far away from each other...

Anywayz, please post anything you want to here!...you can talk about your dog / dogs...chinchillas with testicular problems...or your overgrown rabbit!!! And better still, post some photos and maybe share with us how they came to be your pets...

Or you could also rant about some good food / bad service / idiotic behaviour that you've come across and would just like to share with us...haha, basically anything you find interesting would do!

By the way, if you're wondering how the name of our group came about...let's just say that mz was the inspiration behind it...

Well, hope to see plenty of posts here and I hope that this doesn't die off...we can also use this to co-ordinate our outings too! Happy blogging pple!



~mic