Sunday, November 16, 2008
sacrifice | 9:05 AM
The key to being a successful intern is what we give up - sleep, friends, a normal life. We sacrifice it all for that one amazing moment, that moment when you can legally call yourself a surgeon.
That are days that make the sacrifice seem worthwhile. And then there are the days where everything feels like a sacrifice. And there are the sacrifices that you can't even figure out why you are making.
A wise man once said, "You can have everything in life if you will sacrifice everything else for it." What he meant is, nothing comes without a price. So before you go into battle, you better decide how much you are willing to lose.
Too often, going after what feels good means letting go of what you know is right. Adn letting someone in means abandoning the walls you've spent a lifetime building.
Of course the tougher sacrifices are the ones we don't see coming.
When we don't have time to come up with a strategy to pick a side, or to measure the potential loss, when that happens, when the battle chooses us and not the other way around - that's when the sacrifice can turn out to be more than we can bear.
Meredith Grey
Grey's Anatomy
Monday, October 13, 2008
games | 7:16 AM
A good basketball game can have us all on the edge of our seats. Games are all about the glory, the pain and the play-back play. And then there are the more solitary games - the game we each play all by ourselves. The social games. The mind games. We use them to pass the time, to make life more interesting, to distract us from what's really going on.
There are those of us who love to play games. Any game. And there are those of us who love to play, a little too much.
Life is not a spectators' sport. Win, lose or draw - the game is in progress - whether we want it to be or not. So go ahead. Argue with the refs. Change the rules. Cheat a little. Take a break and tend to your wounds. But play. Play. Play hard. Play fast. Play loose and free. Play as if there's no tomorrow.
Okay. So it's not whether you win or lose. It's how you play the game, right?
Dr. Meredith Grey
Grey Anatomy
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
just kids | 10:26 PM
After careful consideration and many sleepless nights, here's what I've decided : there's no such thing as a grown-up.
We move on. We move out. We move away from our families and form our own. But the basic insecurities, the basic fears, and all those old wounds just grow up with us. We get bigger, we get taller. We get older. But for the most part, we're still a bunch of kids running around the playground trying desperately to fit in.
I've heard that it's possible to grow up. I've just never met anyone who's actually done it.
Without parents to defy, we break the rules we make for ourselves. We throw tandrums when things don't go our way. We whisper secrets with our best friends in the dark. We look for comfort where we can find it. And we hope against all logic, against all experience. Like children, we never give up hope.
Dr. Meredith Grey
Grey's Anatomy
Labels: babble
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
pundit??? | 11:15 PM
You Are a Pundit Blogger! |
 Your blog is smart, insightful, and always a quality read. You're up on the latest news, and you have an interesting spin on things. Of all the blogging types, you put the most thought and effort into your blog. Truly appreciated by many, surpassed by only a few |
Labels: babble
Monday, September 22, 2008
my monday blues | 11:30 PM
Why is the living room wall orange and not ****?
Why are the bedroom wall colours all wrong too?
Why is the study room lamp sitting on the floor collecting dust ?
So why do shadows appear?
Is it so that we can tell the light from the darkness in the hearts of man?
Whatever crossed their minds to put malamine in milk products?
Do we have to monitor 24/7 in order that we do not get ripped off?
Go figure this out.
Labels: babble
Friday, September 12, 2008
i don't carry a bomb | 10:11 AM
Sorry folks. Last night I just felt so tired after work that I couldn't bring myself to lug my rock heavy day bag to my work room, strip it down to its contents and take pictures of them in various stages of undress.
So here it is. My DAYbag.
That is my cool NIKE 90 leather black carrier which I had bought from a huge shopping mall that makes even Ngee Ann City pale in comparison) in Guangzhou. Yes, it is bursting at its seams. I had bought it just to accomodate my 15.4" ACER laptop and the stuff I carry to my school.
Usually, the items are a jumbled mess in my bag. So this is the neatest configuration my belongings have ever been in and for that, they must be grateful for.
That is my cool NIKE 90 leather black carrier which I had bought from a huge shopping mall that makes even Ngee Ann City pale in comparison) in Guangzhou. Yes, it is bursting at its seams. I had bought it just to accomodate my 15.4" ACER laptop and the stuff I carry to my school.
That's the A-something laptop skin I had searched high and low before finding one I truly like to protect my 1.5 year-old lappy. On top of it is a sports jacket I had purchased from Guangzhou as well. It is so comfortable and breathes so well that you can put it on to jog even in grotesquesly humid Singapore. Don't ask me what brand that Nike-wanabe stripe represents. All I know is that a famous athelete in China owns that label and it is very popular with the locals. By the way, it is NOT cheap, - in case you associate made-in-China stuff as cheap and fake.
Usually, the items are a jumbled mess in my bag. So this is the neatest configuration my belongings have ever been in and for that, they must be grateful for.
Let's begin from the left :
- landyard with attached whistle and workpass,
- power plug for the lappy,
- NIKE bottle - my favourte ever and which I had bought 3-4 sets of after losing them in bizarre scenarios,
- Creative MP3 player and pouch,
- some mint from Marks & Spencer (whose contents were emptied into a side pouch - want one?),
- 2 of the numerous red marking pens,
- small lock for the last minute drop to the gym for use at the locker,
- Samsung mp3 player (which I was supposed to send for repair during the June holidays!),
- thumbdrive,
- a book by John Bevere (to occupy myself when I am absolutely free - which never happens in my line of work - or after I have done my laps in the pool)
- 2 wallets (also bursting at their seams)
- point & shoot award-winning Panasonic Camera
- a small draw string bag containing handphone chargers, transfer cables, rechargerable batteries, extra memory cards.
- plastic carrier - now branding MPH until it disintegrates and that's me playing my part in recycling and where most of the above mentioned small items take shelter.
- MISSING - there is supposed to be a pouch containing my DVDs of PG-rated and cool TV recordings to entertain my charges with at work.
So there you go. The secret is out. Saint2 does not carry any explosives nor pirated items (I have repented a long time ago!). Although if you do piss him off, he will send this 1-tonne of a DAYbag flying your direction and this garantees your direct passage to the next world.
Labels: babble
Thursday, September 11, 2008
What's inside Saint2's bag? | 4:42 PM
The Handbag Meme
I was tagged by writer Eastcoastlife for The Handbag Meme.
Here are the rules. Find a safe quiet place free of significant others, nosey meme makers, priests, nuns, all things religious and men in general. (If you're a guy just reverse this process to male and tell us about your wallet, tool box, briefcase or metro sexual accessory.)
1.. Dump the contents of your handbag in a pile
2. Take a photo of your handbag and the contents
3. Be brave and 'splain to your fellow bloggers what lurks inside the handbag.
4. Tag others who might want to embarrass themselves
5. Answer these questions:
Describe the contents of your handbag.
What's the most important thing in your handbag?
What's the most embarrassing thing in your handbag?
What's the smallest thing in your handbag?
Is there anything illegal in your handbag?
This is just a teaser. The real delicious contents will be revealed tonight, after I am done with my work which I'm drowning under.
Labels: babble
Monday, September 8, 2008
MM #133 | 4:55 PM
If you could choose only two movies to watch ever again, what would they be?
I would pick the sci-fi movie, Gattaca, and the ever-entertaining, The Sound Of Music.
What have you found to be the best way to relieve tension?
Nothing beats good old fashion exercise. I try to swim 10 laps daily to keep stress at bay.
If you went to a beach and it turned out to be a nude beach, would you stay and go swimming? Would you swim nude?
I wouldn't stay because I am only human and would rather not subject myself to temptations. Haha. I also wouldn't swim nude in the sea because I dread stings from the jellyfish. Ouch!
Labels: babble
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Manic Monday #132 | 5:04 AM
If you were to name one thing you have the most compassion for, what would it be?
That would be dogs. They are the most selfless and the most giving creatures that walked on this earth. I only know the extent of my sentiments for dogs when I had to put my own to sleep - I wept buckets uncontrollably - never so for anyone in my entire life. Now, like a friend puts it, that experience makes adopting another difficult.
It's been said that, "The best things in life are free." Do you think this is true?
I used to think this is true but more so I think even among close friends and relatives, you have to deposit into each other's emotional bank (a term used by some relationship guru on The Oprah Show) in order for reciprocity to continue. Perhaps the only 2 situations I can think of is that of a relationship between a parent and child and that of a dog and its owner. The parent and the dog give love freely and sacrificially; in my opinion, in view of many dysfunctional families in our troubled times, it is more so the latter.
What is the most valuable thing you own?
I would want to say my previous dog, January but she has passed away. I guess that would leave me my new pad? I have splured almost my entire savings on it and would be paying for it for a long time to come.
Labels: babble
Monday, September 1, 2008
outrage?!! | 9:16 AM
31 Aug 2008
'It's fine to bury immoral women alive'
Now, I'm sure that got your attention because it sure did grab mine in my groggy state (thanks to a bout of cough which I'm curently battling) on a Monday morning by the couch reading yesterday's newspaper. Am I complaining? No. I do remember that there are many of you out there who have bigger battles to fight at work on a Monday morning, so I will just stay here to cough my lungs out and not complain about it.
Yes, the immoral women. Read on.
Islamabad - A Pakistani lawmaker has defended a decision by North-Western tribesmen to bury five women alive because they wanted to choose their own husbands.
'These are centuries-old traditions, and I will continue to defend them,' Mr Israr Ullah Zehri, who represents Baluchistan province, said. 'Only those who indulge in immoral acts should be afraid.'
The women, three of whom were teenagers, were shot and then thrown into a ditch.
They were still breathing as mud was shovelled over their bodies, according to media reports.
Mr Zehri told a packed and stunned Parliament on Friday that Baluch tribal traditions helped stop obscenity and then asked fellow lawmakers to stop making such a fuss about them.
Several lawmakers stood up in protest, describing the so-called 'honour killings' as barbaric.
AP
How does one respond to a piece of news like the above? In the past, enraged women would go out onto the streets to protest. I was told in the university by some professor that some even burn their bras to declaim their feminist views. Where does that leave the rest of us - modern civilised individuals, some of whom are just beginning to drown in the sea of problems like being stranged in Phuket, dismal childcare leave for fathers, discriminated singles (and worse, if you are a single parent - thanks to ECL for highlighting that!), rising inflating costs and that plate of friend rice costing 50 cents more?
Frankly, my mind is in limbo now. Maybe it's because of I have grown callous to violent and sexual issues after having been subjected to them all the time on the telly and radio and in the cinemas non-stop. Or perhaps it's just my cough-spasm ridden body calling out for more rest and thus shutting down my brain when I refuse to cooperate.
This is madness. I mean, my pathetic breathless state. No, I seriously meant that my cough got aggravated after reading about what they did to the immoral women and some teenagers. There were TEENAGERS???!!
Branding women immoral and burying them alive simply because they wanted to choose their own husbands? Now, that's inhuman.
Perhaps (note, I'm not very coherent now) we should just bury the whole community alive so as to wipe out these barbaric traditions altogether? Afterall, thousands, many innocent, did die brutal deaths during Iraq war?
So you decide. You judge. All I'm hearing now are the voices in my head saying, Who named you acuser? Who called you a judge?
Like many out there, I should just move along with my life.
Labels: babble
