According to dictionary.com, Remnants =

1. Something left over; a remainder.
2. A piece of fabric remaining after the rest has been used or sold.
3. A surviving trace or vestige: a remnant of his past glory.
4. A small surviving group of people. Often used in the plural.

I guess in one’s life, there’s always remnants…that little bit of left over from the past, or a surviving trace of that memory bit. While randomly going through the remnants of my past, what seems like almost forgotten memories and traces began to form its full picture when I start to piece the remnants together.

There is a window period of 3 years, 1998 – 2001, in my life that seems almost non-existence to me. So much has happened in these 3 years – good and bad. I had also had friends that I have totally lost touch with. Friends from Yishun Junior College and Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts. I remember the remnants….

At Yishun Junior College

• I played truant for the 1st time in my life and many times thereafter.
• I faked MCs, my best record – from 1 day to 14 days by adding 3 strokes.
• I go to class occassionally.
• I even participated in the band.
• I sucked at C Maths and I remembered clearly there were always kind friends who are there to help.
• I loathe PE lessons and I remembered clearly there was always someone jogging with me.
• I only remembered 2 names, of classmates who were not from the same Secondary School – Sarah, Ryan…which I have tried searching for on Friendster but to no avail.
• I quit after 6 months.
• I even sat for my mid term paper before quitting. I do not know what’s my results but I am sure I flunked my C Maths.

At Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts

• I was exhilarated after finally starting school at NAFA after a year of $ saving.
• I loved all the basic foundation classes, never skip school, at least for the 1st term.
• I worked night shift at Seagate after the 1st term, I started to skip some classes.
• I was great with colour studies, marker colouring, visual studies and art history.
• I was really bad at sculpture, still life drawing and airbrush.
• I remembered some very helpful friends – Kevin, Sam, Simon, Rachel, Elaine, Renee, Remy, Claire, Zoelyn, Nur, especially Kevin who always stay behind to help me with my sculpturing work.
• My clothes were always splattered with either clay or colours at the end of the day.
• It was the 1st time I spent 3 days 3 nights trying to finish a colour piece for my 1st year project. Zoelyn and I were at Sam’s place in Hougang. Stoned.
• I learnt pool from Rachel, a very funky gal who could clear the table with 1 shot and Elaine as well.
• We hanged out together most of the time and get free booze at the then Samsara where Rachel worked.
• It was then that I tried drinking a lot and hardly get drunk.
• I also get to hang out with a group of bisexuals and lesbians. They are great fun to be with.
• I stayed over at friends’ places very often and for some long time at Zoelyn’s at Serangoon and Claire’s place at Bedok.
• Remy, the class monitoress, helped me a great deal.
• On the day of the 1st year project presentation, I almost could not participate due to late school fee payment. I had to run down to the school’s admin office and was lucky they gave me grace.
• I passed my 1st year and got my place in Diploma in Interior Design for my 2nd year.
• I quit after the 1st year due to $ issue.
• I got back in touch with Elaine recently through Friendster and am still searching for whoever I can remember….

Remnants,
A part of life that is always encrusted somewhere.
An important aspect of memory,
The surviving bits of your past,
The mystery to solving a jigsaw.

• 5 years old: 1st best friend! His name is Jeffrey. I remembered we won’t go play see-saw without each other even though we have other friends in the group. He is my best “Vermicelli + Egg” kaki whenever our mothers bring us to steamboat. Till today, our mothers still laugh and nag about this – so not worth it to be eating only vermicelli and egg at steamboat! He is married now and sadly, we don’t even have each other’s numbers although our mothers are still in touch.
• 7 years old: 1st boy-friend! I remember him dearly, even till this day. His name is Shao Ling Sheng. We were very good friends. I even remembered he hugged and spinned round and round even though I was already very big-size then. He moved at Primary 2 and we lost contact since then. Sad…
• 8 years old: 1st leave home! I was being scolded for something (I can’t recall it now). In a fit of anger, I left home! To where? To my classmate’s house 2 floors down! hahaha..my mum definitely did not have a problem locating me.
• 9 years old: 1st operation! I love this operation! It was for my inflammed tonsil. It was so inflammed that I had to remove it. Why do I love it? In an attempt to bring down the temperature in my throat, I ate tubs of ice-cream every day! Hurray! But I was so scared that I will lose my voice forever when I cried out with no voice at all after the operation and I survived on drip for 2 weeks with no food!!!
• 9.5 years old: 1st house moving! I don’t recall much. The next thing I knew, we were in our new house at Teck Whye and I am going to a new school.
• 10 years old: 1st hair band! I insisted to have 1 although my hair was short. I remembered its Christmas and it’s those with lace and a little ribbon.
• 11 years old: 1st Dental Punishment! Who doesn’t hate primary school dental nurses?! It was recess and I was being punished for not brushing my teeth in the correct way. So there I was during recess, standing right in the middle of the common corridor where everyone will pass by on the way to the canteen, brushing my teeth!
• 11 years old: 1st love! Yes…that tall and big-build guy who came running in late during assembly. I had the longest crush ever on him. Read more about it here
• 15 years old: 1st wired bra! Hahah. This is hilarious! I asked my sitting partner in class if he noticed any difference in me that day! That difference between a normal cotton unwired bra vs the wired bra. Guess what was his answer? Yes, its a he!
• 14 years old:
  
  • 1st job! I was flipping waffles at Nagoya cakeshop in Teck Whye, part time of course. The boss happens to be my neighbour.
  • 1st Beer! I bought 2 cans of Heineken and drank them in my parents room and I called my best friend then and uttered a load of rubbish! It was funny the next day at school.
  • 1st cigeratte! I bet my best friend, “Mr Ng Ah-Boy”, still remembers this. We were at a chalet and we decided to try it out so we got ourselves a packet and started puffing away. Awesome! It was that only one time. No kick! Hahaha
• 17 years old: 1st truant! I am a great student and is an excellent leader in school who is never late and never play truant. But I did in my short 6 months of JC life. It was exhilarating! What can I say? We were only young once! hahaha
• 18 years old
  • 1st time! Yes, that’s when my 1st time gone…
  • 1st time staying alone! After my parent’s divorce when I was 16. I stayed with my mum. But due to the frequent quarrels and my then mum, I moved out and stayed alone, renting a room.
  • 1st weight loss! I lost 20 kg that year! Thanks to the frequent exercise my boyfriend and I had. It was basketball, gym and swimming almost 5x a week!
  • 1st 3 point! I never managed to shoot a 3 point at basketbal. I did that that year.
• 20 years old: 1st Role Model! I never did have a role model until I met Hans Chong, the boss of Tom & Stefanie. T&S is the place where I had a lot of memories and where I learnt alot and kickstarted my whole career. Hans once said to me that without me, he just doesn’t feel inspired! Even though we quarrelled, argued, etc. We also worked hard and strive for the business to be better. All thanks to him for the me in my career now. He is still my role model!
• 23 years old: 1st Business Venture! I started a design and events company, Cre-A’Zon Pte Ltd, with 3 other friends. The business was quite well until I took too big a risk with some projects and the company closed in end 2005. I was pretty badly affected by this. But life came around.
• 28 years old: 1st time listing my 1st times!

These days when we say “Pause”, it will be most probably be under the following circumstances:

• Pause your mp3/ipod/whatever music gadget you have your ears on
• Pause your online games
• Pause the vcd/dvd/pre-recorded show/pirated-downloaded movie
• or you wish you can pause the tv show’s most exciting part while you take a leak

A voice was panting right beside me: “Pause! Pause! Pause!…” A boy, probably around 10 was playing catching with a couple of other kids. I thought the last time catching was ever played was like years ago! These days, we hardly see kids hanging around the HDB void decks and taking the whole vicinity as playground! I did. I remembered those good old days when we ran round trying to catch each other.

Pause was extremely familiar for me! Hahhaa…being a fatter gal, I always had to pause myself so I can catchup or hide not to be caught for that matter! It was really a refreshing sight for me to see these kids playing catching! Somehow, it brought me down memory lane…but all was not as pleasant as it was when….the “pausing” kid went into the lift, after somewhat catching his breath, and left me outside the lift looking like an idiot trying to get in…so much for pausing…but then again, that’s the whole purpose – Pause to catch your breathe!

I started to appreciate Chinatown more, regardless of the fact that I am so in love with the food there! hahaha…Just that morning when I went to work, I saw something which most of you won’t get to see. The early morning version of Chinatown when the sun shines on the streets and all is quiet…that’s what starts my day off. Ain’t that beautiful?

3 shophouses away from my office, there’s a rooftop bar on the 4th storey. I went there once with my friends to while my birthday night away. The alcoholic drinks there are at about $5 per glass. Its a neat cosy little place that can accomodate at most 20pax. From there, you get breathtaking view of the streets of Chinatown with the night lights illuminating brightly. But you will have to survive 4 storeys worth of long staircases! Hahaha…the boss is kind enough to give you a pat on the shoulder for making it up to the bar by pasting: “Congratulations, you have made it” sign at the entrance!

I have always hated working in town. I really dread it especially so during peak hours. The human crowd is argghh!!!! And you know what, I am actually working in Chinatown. The 1.15 hour bus and train ride is not something I enjoy always, much less the more expensive travel cost as opposed to if I am working 1 bus ride away from my house like my mum.

Chinatown is a very diverse place although primarily, the type of food you will find there caters to Chinese and there’s a lot of other Chinese shops such as the bak-kwa stalls, medical halls, accupunture, etc. But you get to see many kinds of people – Eurasians, Americans, Australian, Japanese, Koreans, HongKongers, Indians and many more. It’s kinda amazing…and it’s so hard to believe that a place, with part of it refurbished while most part of it still retaining its beautiful Chinese culture, could be such a beautiful tourist attraction.

This photo was taken at Pulau Ubin. The independent shophouse that you see here are the authentic zinc roofed kind. Like the good old times, the photo depicts a kopitiam at the 1st level and perhaps, a living quarter on the 2nd.

These days, the kopitiam has been pretty much modernised. But here, you will get to have a taste on the 60’s ambience – non-properly litted kopitiams with a few food selection and probably the uncle or auntie you knew from around the corner of your house.

During this time, I am very sure the Coke that was delivered to you came in glass bottle! Don’t believe me, ask your parents!

The wooden platforms are forever shaky and sometimes, I wonder how these “kelong” houses can actually hold the weight. The wood, amazingly, doesn’t get mouldy and weak and then everything collapses.

As a fishing village last time, Singapore used to have many of these “water houses” or the so called “kelong” houses. Today, you can only get to see them at Pulau Ubin. And not many of them are left too. Many are actually left for storage purpose.

I personally will enjoy the process of fishing just by the window in my little cosy wooden cabin and then taking a long stroll along the “kelong” path, while feeling the breeze in my hair and of course, trying my best not to plop into the water beneath. Hahhaha!

You don’t get to these around much these days. Apart from the plying services at Changi Jetty – to and fro Pulau Ubin and Penggarang, Malaysia, you will get to see them only at the Singapore River as River Taxis.

Singapore River is right at the CBD area but how many a times are you willing to spend that $12 to just take a 45min cruise down Singapore River? I have done that, with someone I fancy too! So that feeling was perfect! The view and scenery is simply amazing…not breathtaking but amazing.

Otherwise, you can always just pay $2 to hitch a ride over to Pulau Ubin and another $2 back, of course. The total “sea” journey travelled will be approx. $4 for about 40min, thus making it a much cheaper way of “indulging” in the bumboat experience.

Think of it another way, isn’t it nice that you are actually creating better job income or opportunities for those tanned uncles whose hands are filled with calluses from the hauling and pulling of the thick ropes to anchor the bumboat? Something for a thought…

This is the offshore island that Singaporeans may think of when they want to get close to the raw nature, cycling, fishing…A mere 20mins boat ride is all it takes. Pulau Ubin once used to be a hustling and bustling kampong with frequent opera plays, crowded festivities celebrations, etc.

These days, Pulau Ubin is decreasing in population as more and more residents move into mainland Singapore. What’s left there are the nostalgic folks who still find kampong life mesmerising… I still go to Pulau Ubin nowadays to struggle on the 2-wheel bicycle simply for the fun of sight-seeing, soaking in nature, admiring the flora and fauna and the simplicity of non-city life…

This is not some garden or red carpet aisle. Instead, it’s a part of a “kelong” house extension. At the end of this wooden aisle, you can imagine yourself sitting down on it with your lover or childhood friends, both of you dangling your legs in the air and chatting as if there’s no tomorrow…