symphonic overture

was clearing the junk in my comp when i found the mp3 clip of "acjc band_symphonic overture_syf2001" and "acjcband_starsandstripes_syf2001" . listened to both. brought me back to that night of syf finals at VCH to compete for the top jc band. got beaten to the best band award. i remenbered mumbling, those rjc assholes, lol.

we were the people's choice for the award but unfortunately, our crowd pleaser entertainment value didn't go down well with the judges. think they preferred rj's abstract piece. in audience terms, hey that's boring man, yawn.. anw, aint it ironic. i'm now under their conductor at that time at ntusb, haha.

anyhow, back to the songs, lol, actually its nice to hear the shit again. its the best i tink we have ever performed together as a band. played 2 songs for the finals. we opened up symphonic overture with a trumpet and trombones fanfare, introducting the fast-slow-fast style in which the alto sax and horn played romantic roles with their splendid melodies in the slow part. and we finished the piece with a recurrence of fanfare, followed by a brilliant, vivace final. i reckon the fanfare can do a very good job of startling someone into spilling coffee all over.

and the next song, "stars and stripes forever" did a damn glorious end to the finals since we were the last band to perform. with the lively 'stand up and dance' atmosphere, we ensured the audience a really entertaining, fulfilling, energizing, refreshing, challenging, irresistible, enriching, exciting, exuberant, exulting, elating, rupturing night. the piccolo playing the obbligato during the trio with the lower brass joining the piccolo to emphasize the counter melody later on. woah, we really made the audience up to a high.

then again, we got criticized that it was too much of a 'pop concert' type, it doesn't fit the 'serious' nature of the competition. nevertheless, it was an uber insatiable night for acjc band. haha, jason and his " 1, 2, 1 2 3 4" to kickstart the piece.

found this article, it was after the whole finals. and in the picture, tt's our band major lisa presenting the award with jason at the mike.

jason, our student conductor remarked in the article,

"On Thursday, 19 July 2001, our Concert Band took part in the biennial SYF JC Band Competition held at the Victoria Concert Hall. The Concert Band booked its place in the finals by clinching a top five placing out of seven bands which attained the much-coveted Gold Award in May.

Under the invaluable guidance of Mr Lee Tian Tee, we surpassed ourselves tremendously in the finals and elicited the loudest cheers. We were dubbed the Band with the greatest entertainment value and even had the Guest of Honour, RAdm Teo Chee Hean, Minister for Education and Second Minister for Defence, clapping to our pulsating rhythm. Though we were not awarded top placing due to the judges' preference, we definitely put in our best effort to earn the rapturous applause from a most appreciative audience."

nuff said.. i miss that night ;)

hmmm............. should be a good way to spend a scorchin hot day.

my hall 16A #03-04

jz when emmy and geri blogging bout their big move to hall 16 for the next coming sem, i have to most reluctantly to move out of there. didn't manage to get re-admission into hall due to lack of eca pts, sigh.


still remenber that time, hall 16 was spanking brand new. it was so not very attractive due to the $240 per month for a double room which aint cheap. but me yinkai decided to apply anw for we desired tt hall stay experience. and cool, we did get Hall 16 in the end. and our allocated unit was #03-04.

haha and we tried a 4D punt on 0304 but it came out 0404 first prize instead. omg! and since then, we have been 'blaming' the unit above us for hindering our golden luck. lol.

suddenly feel like im being rolled back the past. whenever i pass by hall 16 now, i will be reminded of my prev 2nd home. the usual walk back frm my school to hall, used to grumble on the slope up from north spine back to hall (lol) esp during scorching hot weather, den thro the gate (yeah, hall 16 is like a prison. everywhere is gates, only accessible by an electronic card), past the lift and back to my 03-04.

but some things made hall 16 special. the close distance to my school (i could wake up at 0820 and still make it to lab on time at 0830), the fresh new smell of the hall plus the convenience of staying out late and return back to hall anytime. Numerous mahjong sessions on my bed and the start of my increasing dislike for Jurong Point. Continuation of my running habits at ntu during night time, wearing of any lock cock clothings to classes without bothering how i look.

and 2 things stood out the most for me during my stay there...

1) the development of something special for geri.. i got to know her more and grown to like her more. lots of memories, like the rooftop, nightly walks/runs, distance to her was jz 300m away =) its been a long endurance race, even if i had to suffer heartbreak in the middle of the race, i didnt mind.



2) the strengthening of frenzship bond with yinkai. those laughter, those jokes, and those horsing ard whilst doing daily activities.

i've heard people complaining bout their roomie, but i've nothing but praise and gratefulness for him. he's such a neat guy la, doesn't throw things about, or jz simply mess the room up and most importantly, doesn't mind my frens staying over.

brought my tv/xbox to hall to entertain us when we r bored. it was kinda funny trying to adjust the external antenna frm the window always! to get the most perfect reception. see how we have to position the antenna in such an awkward manner. and our usual mee goreng for supper.

heh, laundry time. most of the time, i'm pretty lazy to go and wash. so i will jz conveniently dump my dirty clothes into the blue thingy (wads it called anw), dirty clothes holder? haha. anw yinkai is ever so kind to help wash our clothes by making a trip down to the washing machine point and hang out to dry thereafter!


heh, those cleaning stuff needed for maintenance of the room and yup, i got 2 other chairs into the room to accomodate my friends. places to go in hall include the pantry and the comfy tv lounge where we spent our nights usually to watch good frequency TV. oh yeah, took a photo with the cleaning auntie of our block also. she's so damn nice la, never fail to greet me at anytime of the day.

so after one semester of stay, its finally time to leave. had quite a tedious time packing up my barang barang and stuffing them into cab b4 dumping back into my house. look at the difference between the fully filled room and the vacant one when we first arrived into the room. cya hall 16, block 16A, unit 03-04.

Kuala Lumpur Road Trip!!

so here we are, on our MPV road trip to Malaysia, KL.

had some problems with the car initially. lack of engine oil or rather zilch, to sustain us for the trip up north. had to stop by a petrol station b4 entering causeway to get nitty gritty stuff settled. car's air con n sound system, aha seems a bit screwed. the back guys were complaining coz the speakers at the back were pounding their ears so bad tt they cant really hear a shit on conversations being made in front.

at malaysia checkpt, we were without those white travel forms n kudos chongwei, for safely negotiating his dribbling skills past the checkpoint lanes to take from a office on the other side of the road. finally we are on our way. had a pit stop along the way. played this word game to kill off boredom. stopped to pay never ending tolls. the whole expressway was pretty smooth n before we know it, we have arrived in kl n got stuck in the congested traffic.

time to look for a hotel to stay. Swiss garden intl was too ex, swiss garden inn was super booked, furama was closed down permanently, but we managed to get this cheap, reasonable hotel which i stayed b4. somewhere near chinatown. And that hotel is 'Mandarin Pacific'. after we have settled down in our rooms, we took a stroll round chinatown. had our dinner at a back alley. the best part was the coconut drinks hooha. we told the auntie 3 coconuts coz the other 3 dun wanna drink. but the auntie assumed 6 coz she saw 6 of us there and chopped 6. damn and she insisted that we were the ones who din make ourselves clear. wad a rip off. in the end, we had to buy all 6, haha.

the chinatown night market is similar to the pasar malam we have. haha, if u dun mind the not so real stuff, there's always cheap bargains to be found. we stopped by this jersey stall. the fake jerseys, it was bout A++ replica man. quality feels almost like the real thing.

while contemplating buying Brazil jerseys for everyone to wear during soccer games, the stall owner kept reducing the price down to make our decision easier. but in the end, b4 we got to a conclusion, he chased us away, chiding us for being so 'ai mai ai mai' and blocking other prospective customers. heh

wanted to watch Germany Vs Argentina on tv tt night, we stocked up on snacks, icecream and eagerly sat down in front of our room tv, expecting to watch some soccer but to our agony, all the tuning of tv stations yielded nothing. how screwed. we consoled ourselves by feasting on the snacks. how ironic eh, that the whole group of us came up together to watch soccer only to stare at disappointment in the end. k anw, we got to see the highlights during the next morning news. haha

2nd day... morning, we made a trip to petronas twin towers to go up dunno how many storeys to see the whole of KL skyline. instead of driving, we chose to take the local train system there. hmm kinda confused, din know where we supposed to stop initially. anw, good experience la, after all, first time riding it too. feels much like our own MRT when its crowded. at petronas, sadly though, tickets were limited and by the time we got there, the security guard had sealed off the queue so too bad. next place to visit was Batu Caves as recommended by Jason.

BATU CAVES
woah, there's quite a huge number of steps up the caves. haha, me and yewshih kinda shagged halfway while jason and chongwei had some mini race up the steps. quite amazing caves. how does nature ever does that man. interesting.


besides the scenery, we were spending the rest of the time trying to ji siao the monkeys living there. there are really lots of them la. expert pickpockets too, they will take wadever you have hanging around you loosely and mess with it. the monkeys there, some r pretty smart, but some r simply dumb.

The Monkeys
we tried feeding them empty peanuts shells, some were tempted and they did took the bait but threw them away immediately in a fist of 'tamade', lol. leaves, branches, stones proved to be useless charms.

anw, while we were walking down the steps from the caves, i got to witness this incident. haha, this monkey suddenly grabbed a gal's waterbottle and tried to figure out how to open it. soon, a crowd gathered with all the video cams and cameras. the monkey has become a mini celebrity! jz as we were thinking, ok, this dumb monkey doesnt know how to unscrew the bottle when it did it and started to drink from it. and u dun expect it to return back to the owner politely. it jz slammed the bottle down onto the ground.

the remaining part of our 2nd day was spent walking around Berjaya Times Square. its a real and fake world over there in KL. if u wanna real stuff, haha.. jz stick to Berjaya and KLCC. a night of disappointment as usual. no soccer to watch.. missing out on England Vs Portugal, watched the match highlights as usual on the next morning news. haha

3rd day.. out of KL and onwards to Malacca

haha of coz, before checking out of our room, there should be a bit of Tao Poking done. first up was freddy (oh, happy birthday fred! haha), followed by chongwei. it wasnt a easy task. one's stronger and resilient than he looks, the other's loud and ferocious which belies his usually 'man of few words' image.

off to Malacca den.. stopped by this mr lim factory, u know that guy who produces all those durian stuff that we always buy back frm malaysia. yeah, tts him. had durian chendol there, plus buying of the traditional food stuffs back.

tried to find this noodle stall recommended by jason somewhere there also, but the search was fruitless. tink it has moved or closed down. the whole street looks mafia-ish. a street where u can imagine punks having fights and wadever. haha, almost all the shops there have graffiti on it. bypassed the famous church landmark and tt ship.


Back to Singapore... after deciding to skip Johor for seafood dinner, it was cheong-ing all the way back to sg via Tuas second link. free of traffic with no jam, thanks to the $$ tolls $$. finally, we are Home! quite a fun trip actually despite missing out on live football on tv. yeah, tt was quite a damper.