Here's another pic of my new PS2. Next to it is the wireless controller which I bought as well. The controller is on sale in Singapore, but the shops are charging about SGD89 for it. I paid only SGD66 for it! :-)

My brand new PS2! The picture really doesn't do it justice. I put the game case next to it to show you just how small it really is. But when you look at it in real life, you'll realise just what a great designer Sony is. I'm really glad I managed to get it from US. It costs only USD150 which is approximately SGD247. When it is finally released in Singapore, it'll probably cost around SGD300.

Here it is.. my Nintendo DS, straight from the US... fresh from it's launch date on 21 November! The set comes with a demo of Metroid (a first person shooter) and it's quite interesting to use the touch screen to do the aiming as you use the directional pad to move around.

I bought this really nice toy called PIXELBLOCKS from a shop in Berkeley. They are basically like Lego but come on only one size bricks, like pixels. The pixels can be connected side by side as well as built up like normal lego. You can see other cool pics at their website at www.pixelblocks.com

Home sweet home

Phew... how time flies. It's been a week since I last posted and it has been a pretty fun week.

Continuing from my last post, I had a HECTIC time shopping after my course. I can't believe how much shopping I did in the 3 days after my course, before I flew back to Singapore. My BIG BIG thanks to my friends in Fremont who brought me around to the really great spots like Target, WalMart, ToysRUs, Fry's and Office Max. For those who don't know, these are really the places where the Americans go to do their shopping and where there are really good deals. I bought DVDs for as little as $7.50 US which is like $13 in Singapore dollars! I was also excited to get the Nintendo DS on the day it launched! Heh... sounds desperate, eh? I paid the standard US$150 for it and when I came back to Singapore, I found out that the shops are intending to sell it for almost US$235 in December. I just love shopping in the states. I came back with almost a whole luggage of DVDs! Anime... TV series... Scifi movies... SHIOK.

Coming back to Singapore, I had a busy time with a conference and a meeting. I've only started enjoying some of the stuff I bought and I'm pretty sure it's gonna take me the remainder of the holidays (and beyond!) to finish watching everything.

Dunno about the rest of you, but I think the holidays are great!

Work's Over! Play Begins! (or continues...)

Yep, the four-day course is finally over. Learnt many interesting lessons, met many interesting people. It's really refreshing to have a group made up of professional coaches, HR personnel, IT people and Executive VP of a college. It was awesome to hear and learn from them!

Well, tomorrow, it's back to San Francisco... and final shopping! Yeah! Can't wait to get back to Singapore and enjoy all the stuff I am buying!

Back to work...

Yeah... Fun's over... at least for the next couple of days. I'm currently in Sonoma, a little out of the way town in Napa Valley (north of San Francisco), attending the Leadership Challenge workshop. Today was the first of 4 days and 'phew' talk about tiring. we went all the way from 8am to 5pm and I must say it has been quite insightful doing an evaluation of my leadership style. It's very interesting to see what are other people's perception of what my leadership style is. Gives me plenty of opportunity to reflect. It's another three days to go.. then back to shopping in San Francisco! I think I am going to have a problem with my luggage at the airport... so many things to buy... so little luggage allowance!

Ho-hum...

Godzillafest was a letdown. I spent almost 30mins trying to locate the place (which was somewhere in Japantown) and finally found it at some small gymnasium at the Community centre. But... boy was it a disappointment! There were only like 5 tables selling lame Godzilla stuff and one projctor showing... nothing! sigh...

I spent the rest of the day on the public transport. Rode the tram from beginning to end... and to the beginning again! Sounds aimless... yeah... it was. But in a nice, relaxing kinda way.

When I got back, I was really glad to watch 'Adult Swim' on the TV. Relax, it's not some porn thing.. It's the mature Anime programming. It was totally shiok! I watch Full Metal Alchemist (although it's only the third episode, but the English version was really good) as well as half an episode of Ghost in the Shell - Stand Alone Complex... half cause I was so tired I kinda just fell asleep. It's so sad that Singapore has nothing like this. The closest is the new Arts Central one hour section showing some anime (which I wasn't able to watch before I came to US). Sigh.. to have a Sci-fi & Anime channel in Singapore!

Shopping Frenzy

Today was great. I spent the whole day at the Great Mall of the Bay Area. It's a really huge mall with over 200 shops. If I'm not wrong, it used to be a Ford factory. To get there, I had to take a BART (kinda like the MRT) to Fremont then look for the bus to get me to the Mall. Altogether, it took me about 35 mins by train and 25 mins by bus to get to the mall. It was kinda exciting, cause I relied on public transportation to get me there.

I LOVE the shops there. Although I spent close to 6hours there, I barely visited half the shops! But, I've got to the critical shops like BIG DOGs where I stocked up on new T-shirts. Also managed to get some shoes. I simply love the shoes here, BIG sizes to fit my BIG feet. I was spoilt for choices unlike back in Singapore where I had to hunt for size 13 shoes.

Tomorrow, I plan to go for this Godzilla festival.. sounds fun, eh!

Raining in San Francisco

Finally here... San Francisco... It's been more than 4 years since I visited the US and I must say I was very excited about coming to the US after all this time. The long plane ride here was really quite bearable, thanks to the improved Krisworld system on SQ. Wow... I was quite impressed that we can now start the movie any time we like instead of following a fixed schedule last time. There were so many movies to watch and Nintendo Gameboy games as well. Must say this is quite an upgrade!

Visiting San Francisco is almost like going to a familiar place. I've been here so often that I find it quite easy to find my way around the place without even a map. Unfortunately, the weather has not been kind and I am getting a bit of jet lag so although it's only 6.20pm here, I'm pretty much ready to sleep.

I'm looking forward to visiting the Exploratorium tomorrow and I have to see how I can mak a trip to the Great Mall of the Bay Area... my favourite mall in California.

Well, think it's just abuo time to hit the sack. Nite!

Camps camps camps...

The CCAL camp was not too bad. Gave me the chance to get to know some other Sec 3 leaders instead of just the prefects. But I will be frank and admit that the lectures were a little overwhelming. There were many things which we wanted to do with the CCALs, but I think sitting through hours of lectures really makes it tiring and sleep-inducing. Well, it's the first time we're covering the Leadership Challenge model and I guess we're learning how best to teach it to the CCALs. I'm sure next year will be better.

Prefects' Retreat from 6 to 8 Nov was really fun. I had a good time there too. I think it was a nice balance of fun activities and serious ones. I think I haven't laughed so hard in a long time. I really laughed until I had a bit of a throbbing headache! Generally, this batch of prefects are a really fun lot. Hope they really enjoyed themselves as much as I did.

Then we had PSL training today. I thought this year's training was pretty good. It was relevant and I think we covered more topics on how the PSLs can handle the new Sec 1s. I do feel sorry for the prefects... three camps in a row... CCAL, then Prefects Retreat and PSL. Phew.

Well, as for me, I'm finally off to my favourite country.... USA! I will be leaving on Thursday morning and will be staying there until 24 November. It will be fun for me to try and log on to talk more about my trip. Hope I can find some time and a nice Internet cafe to do it.

Hope everyone is findig time to relax and do things differently during the holz!

I Hate Games.

Yep. You heard it right. I hate games.

I hate them cause I don't have time to play them.

I hate them cause when I play them, I don't have time to do other things which I am supposed to do.

I hate them cause when I start, it's so hard to stop.

The holidays have started and yet I haven't even turned on any of my consoles since then! Last Saturday, I actually tried playing a demo of Warhammer: Dawn of War and once I started, it was 2.5 hours later that I stopped! And that was only one level! Sigh. Where got time to play?
Sigh. I hate games.

Holidays? Heh... Not quite yet..

It's been almost a week since the 'holidays' started. Believe me, the quotation marks are well deserved. I can't believe how hectic it has been since the holidays started. Yeah, you heard it right... HECTIC.

On the same day that the school ended, I had to attend a meeting from 2pm to 6.30pm. The next day, I had to attend meetings from 8am to 12 noon then 8pm to 10pm. On Friday, guess what? Another two meetings! One from 8am to 1pm and another from 2pm to 4pm. Exciting eh? Meetings are fun. We LOVE meetings! Of course, on Saturday, there was the Parent-Teacher Meeting, which didn't go too badly actually. I was pretty much burned out on meetings.

This week hasn't been much better so far. With the CCAL camp going on, my first two days were spent taking part in it and burning late night oils to prepare my session for the camp. Not sure if it was interesting to the CCALs. Tried not to make it all talk talk talk... hope i was somewhat successful.

Well, another three days before Prefects' Retreat. I'm kinda looking forward to it cause it's supposed to be one where everyone gets to relax. I don't think things will ease up until the end of Nov.