Post-Concert Reflection

It has been more than 2 weeks since I watched the incredible Aaron Kwok live in Malaysia. After the devastating outcome of not being able to see him last year despite braving Typhoon Wipha in Macau, this second chance should have been twice as sweet. Yet, in these 2 weeks when I do recall that special day of being almost within his arm’s reach, the main emotion that kept coming up was regret. 

Let’s be clear: my motto in life is never to regret anything. Any unfortunate event that came to pass in my life shall be viewed as a lesson but I do not allow myself to wallow in that negativity called regret. Eso si que es. Period.

BUT. I had the golden opportunity to challenge my idol, my first love, to Baby Shark. That once-in-a-million chance to chat with him and tell him in person how much I adore him. And demonstrate the effort I put in in the past months to practise this dance. To receive a hand-signed limited edition tee from his hands!!! I let all of that pass because I was shy?!?!?!?! This is so hard to let go. 

Even in the immediate high that very night, all I could think about was our could-have-been-conversation:

Him in Cantonese: Do you speak Mandarin or Cantonese?

Me: (in Mandarin) Mandarin better but (in Cantonese) I like you very much!

Him in Mandarin: So you have supported me for many years?

Me in Mandarin: Since I am 10 years old! I am here with the Singapore Fan Club. My friends and I are all long time fans!!!

And I would express my admiration for him, for his dancing, how he inspired me to pick up dancing, that I am similarly doing chinese calligraphy, how impressive his long list of achievements is to me, especially his undeniable work ethic!

All. The. Things. I. Could. Have. Said.

This is a real regret.

Well, the regret has thankfully dwindled to a smaller lump now. And the lesson I learnt is that shyness and embarrassment are never reasons to back down from something you truly want. Never. Never again. Not sure if I would ever had a similar chance to be in that perfect position to do the Baby Shark Challenge with him ever again. If there is a next time, for any similar situation, I would not hesitantly half-raise my hand anymore. I shall stand right up on the chair and put myself out there!!

That said, 12th Sept 2026 was definitely the best day of my long vacation this year. He was the why this vacation came to be anyway. From the endless phototaking with fellow fans and his standees before the concert to the supper we had after the concert which included an impromptu KTV session of his song, it was all irreplaceable.

Now, where can I catch him next?

Completing a challenge

Have you heard of the Photo-a-day challenge? I can proudly proclaim that I have completed this challenge for the month of November! I decided to take up this challenge as I could sense my mood turning darker along with the increasingly depressive situation we were facing. And I have to say the challenge really did helped to improve the mood. At the very least, it gave me something to look forward to every single day for the past 30 days,

Actually having had a couple of fairly accomplished photographers as partners previously, I had been more used to being in front of a professional camera rather than behind it. But now that we all have a camera phone, I rather enjoy applying my aesthetic eye to capture snapshots of memories worth keeping. (Though I also believe in being fully present in the moment rather than experiencing life through a lens.)

So I really had quite some fun looking for models and objects each day, playing with angles and even filters (since I had been uploading the photos to Instagram) that I would highly recommend it to anyone looking for a fun project to do. Sometimes, just browsing the relevant hashtags can yield some interesting pictures too! It is a bonus that it helped to fill up my rather empty Instagram account. Ha!

Disclaimer: I did feel slightly stressed on some days when it felt impossible to fulfill the theme/prompt given my schedule for the day. Case in point, how to find waves when I know I will be nowhere near the sea that day?!?! I also kind of failed on two occasions even though I did produce an image on both days. On the day that I was to take a picture of something I do everyday, I shared an accomplishment on Two Dots rather than take a picture. On hindsight, I could have taken a photo of me chewing or breathing too. For the day that the prompt was this season, I was adamant to wait for heavy rain which of course did not happen that particular day...

I am already thinking about doing a 365 version one. Perhaps with a twist by including one object that will feature in every single photo.... like Mr Tan Chuan Jin's Parley.... hmmm..... 

 

 

What kind of books keep you up at night?

Been a while since I wrote a book review; Had done a few as an English Language teacher. Check out here and here. Wrote this one for NLB Book Review Challenge (200 words limit 😅) when I chanced upon it while reading the book. Really enjoyed this one. 💖 If you don't mind a preloved book, I can pass on the book to you! And just found out there is a TV movie based on the book!

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"Photography is all about secrets. The secrets we all have and will never tell."

"You can't stop time. You can't capture light. You can only turn your face up and let it rain down."

"A moment was not a single moment at all, but rather an infinite number of different moments, depending on who was seeing things and how." 

The very first thing that drew me to this book was its cover. On hindsight, the beautiful imaginary of the transparent dress perfectly reflects the theme of the daughter who is present yet as good as invisible. I also agree with the idea of photography portrayed as a means of holding memories and find myself nodding along whenever this theme is explored. I especially love the author’s artistry in describing landscapes, scenes, moments, and even the emotions of the characters to the point of making them almost tangible. It had been a meditation like experience for me reading this book as it demands full attention to its vivid description and suspenseful plot. The book was set in the late 20^th century and it is sad to note that the stigma attached to mental conditions and Down Syndrome had scarcely reduced since then. I can only hope that readers of the book may be positively impacted and better empathise with people having such conditions.

5forSG55

August. The month we celebrate Singapore. Usually I get all hyped up when this month rolls round because I am really so proud to be a Singaporean. However this year the feeling is just different. Maybe it is because we are in a pandemic. Perhaps it is the negativity surrounding this year's election that had rubbed off me the wrong way. Or it could be that I was disappointed that the NDP committee had decided to provide a funpack for every household despite designating 2019 as the Year Towards Zero Waste. I guess my decision to opt-out of collecting said funpack also did nothing to add to the usual festive mood of the month. Hmm.... the biggest reason might be the grief of losing a dear colleague most unexpectedly just before the month began. 😢

Regardless of my personal feelings, the country was certainly in celebration mode. Practically every other post on my Facebook news feed was about a National Day promotion or a special 55 related offer or screaming red and white or a gratitude note that I might have written myself. The one post that really got my attention was one with #5forSG55 - a challenge to gather a group of 5 to pick 5 bags of trash from our East Coast Beach as a way to celebrate National Day.

As a diver, I am particularly aware of how our usage of plastic is causing harm to our seas. My first attempt at a beach cleanup was on a stretch of pebble beach in Bali after reading about #2minutebeachclean. There had been news about how the monsoon had been bringing in an incredible amount of trash to our shores and I knew I wanted to help somehow. The challenge just provided even more motivation for me to make this journey to the east. 😂 Thus I promptly joined the telegram group and created my own group. 

I was quite ready to do it solo but *surprise surprise* someone actually joined my group! And between the 2 of us we collected 7 bags of trash in under 2 hours. The best part of this cleanup was being able to encourage a stranger to help out with just our actions! We had been working silently and separately in a bid to cover as much ground as possible when someone approached my new friend to ask what we were doing and then if he could help! I gave him a pair of extra gloves I had and a recycled plastic bag and he went right to work!

A week later, I joined another group to do some "beach forensic examination" during which our focus was to document the source of the trash found on our shores. Unsurprisingly, most of the identified trash came from neighbouring countries but there were definitely some local trash too. In a shorter period of about 45 minutes, I bagged one plastic bag worth of trash. The best part of this cleanup was when 2 young girls approached me to clarify what I was doing. It so warmed my heart to see the acknowledgement in their eyes that what I was doing was not in vain. They started their own cleanup there and then.

Before the month was up, I organised another beach cleanup when some of my own friends decided that they wanted to do their part too!! This time round, I booked the use of Cleanpod 

                    

and really leveled up equipment-wise with a cart, weighing scale, pails, tongs and even sieves! The area we worked at did not have the usual large trash so I made full use of the available sieve and went after the microplastics! After about an hour's work, the 5 of us actually bagged just over 5 bags for SG55! 6.7 kg of tiny plastic and styrofoam kept out of the stomachs of sea creatures! But the best part of this cleanup had to be the ice cold beer we had before we even began work. 🤣

The plastic issue is such a humongous problem. I had been a lot more passionate about speaking against it in previous years. I wonder if I am becoming a little numb to it because you see it everywhere, even in the streets, by the roadside, on communal tables in void deck. Can I collect them all? Do my actions really make a difference? I don't have an answer to that. I just know I cannot do nothing at all.

Please stop trashing our planet.

 

How are you? Are you really ok?

<<I was challenged by a friend to raise awareness for PTSD earlier this month. I didn't feel up to that particular challenge 🤣 but I do want to speak out for all who may be suffering from mental illnesses and/or anxiety disorders. So here is me rising to the challenge in a different format. >>

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression are anxiety disorders listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), the principal authority for psychiatric diagnoses. They are recognised conditions by experts so first and foremost we need to understand that people with these conditions are REALLY unable to just "get over it".

There are many good online resources explaining the details such as this one by SingHealth. Or you may prefer to watch the TED Talk video on it. Interestingly, almost all the Google search results and resources from Singapore focus on identifying symptoms and recommending treatments while the top result from a non-SG website is Time To Change whose focus is to end mental health discrimination. 

Time To Change has great suggestions for people who want to help and even an entire section on Personal Stories for people with mental conditions to share their experiences. It is also where I learnt to ask twice when checking in on people you are concerned about, hence the title of this blog. In Singapore, we have the Beyond The Label initiative by NCSS which I was only reminded of from Berni's Facebook post. So yes, raising awareness for this greatly misunderstood condition is the why I am writing this blog post.

Here are some of my personal experiences with mental conditions.

I have always been a rather emotional person. When I was younger, breaking up was so devastating to me emotionally that I probably slipped into depression a couple of times. I remembered distinctly one particular episode when I was working as The Little Gym instructor. To be professional, my job requires me to be energetic and approachable in front of full classes of up to 24 adults and children for 45 minutes stretch. I would be able to execute that, holding back tears and emotions when they threatened, and then totally break down behind closed doors right after the end of a class. Oh yes I handled it, if you call that handling it. I lost my appetite, grew really thin, and somewhat functioned in a zombie-like state. My dad, at a loss of what else to do, for the first time in our lives, wrote me an encouragement card in Mandarin.

Once, when I was eating a meal by myself, a stranger asked to join my table which I agreed. We started chatting but it became increasingly uncomfortable. When I tried to leave, he refused to let me out of his sight, put his arm around me and touched my bare skin. I was horrified and felt totally helpless even though it was broad daylight in a shopping center. It was only when I walked towards a security guard and voiced my objection did he let me go. I was shaking and crying as I recounted the incident at the police station, my best friend by my side. It is only today as I read this HealthHub webpage on post-traumatic stress reactions am I able to put a name to all that I felt and experienced for that period of time. 

During my career as a secondary school teacher, I shed tears on many occasions. Sometimes they were due to difficult students in challenging classes. There were moments when I felt ineffective in helping those under my charge. And there were times it seemed nothing I did would or could ever make a positive difference for those who I care deeply about. I am aware that I am a sensitive person. Pastoral care sessions in school were often my undoing. But I generally attribute those salty water to my disposition and in fact believe they are beneficial. However, one of my supervisors became concerned and suggested psychotherapy. So I received treatment. Initially I was slightly affected by the stigma and did not tell anyone about these sessions. But hey, now you know, I needed help to manage my emotions and those sessions with a certified psychologist really helped me.

A close friend of mine had turned to me when she was suffering from an anxiety attack. For a while, I held space for her, listened and supported her. As much as I love her, when the frequency of these distress calls kept increasing, I became impatient with her and even wanted to distance myself from her. Not proud to admit that I had judged her negatively in her time of need. Yet, it is also important to recognise that caring for someone with mental conditions is not easy and I have to acknowledge these mixed feelings I had towards her. Still love her!

Wow... quite a catharsis for me in penning this post. Then again, writing often is. But I hope I have also achieved my aim to raise awareness for PTSD, and mental conditions in general. Let's do our part to end mental health discrimination. Be kind to one another and spread love. 🎔

how about a journey down down down under?

A friend who has been helping me keep a lookout for sustainability related jobs forwarded the Antarctic Sabbatical link to me. A special program organised by Airbnb and Ocean Conservancy. I have to say it both excites and scares me a little. I mean what an opportunity this will be! It will certainly be a great stepping stone into the industry I have so much interest in. But I am one of those who would rather die of heat than cold and the idea of working in such extreme conditions is daunting. 

Well, you will never know till you try right? So I gamely took up my friend's challenge/recommendation and applied for it! I definitely meet all of the basic requirements and I also needed to pen a less than 500 words essay about why I want to be part of this program to investigate the presence of microplastics on the most isolated continent on Earth. 

I spent quite some time crafting it so have decided to post it here although I have also just received confirmation that I had not been selected for the program. I am kinda glad for that. 🤣

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For an ordinary someone from a tiny country located close to the equator, the South Pole in Antarctica feels as unattainable as space travel. I am certainly not immune to the beauty of Antarctica – magnificent glaciers, mysterious icebergs and that vastness of ice and snow. But being familiar with its reputation as being extremely remote and harsh, I have never considered the possibility of setting foot on the continent, until now.

I have a wanderlust which sees me travelling out of my little red dot at least twice a year. Surprising to most of my peers, I have a preference for roughing it out while trekking in Nepal and Bhutan – two destinations on my bucket list – compared to luxurious vacations in Europe. If I am selected for this expedition, Antarctica will become the third place I never knew was on my bucket list until I was made aware of this sabbatical. I love the outdoors and being surrounded by nature. Having spent most of my life in sunny, warm and developed Singapore where the closest I can get to nature is a rustic island named Pulau Ubin, Antarctica will be a drastic but an exciting change of environment for me to reconnect with nature. Perhaps that is exactly what I need, a 360 degrees switch to experience nature in a different and deeper way.

Besides riding snowmobiles and seeing penguins in their natural habitats, what excites me the most about the expedition is the opportunity to apply my training in Science Communication and contribute to scientific research that will make a positive difference for our planet. I am that friend whom others refrain from using plastic when I am present. I am often the odd one out rejecting plastics and bringing out my personal reusable items at a social gathering. Some times my friends ask me for opinions and insights relating to environmental issues. In fact I would not have found out about this expedition if not for a friend who knows just how concerned I am about the plastic problem plaguing our planet right now. Being an avid diver, I have seen first hand the negative impact humans have on our oceans. But one can only do so many clean-up dives and I know I can contribute much much more. This expedition feels right up my alley.

There had been times when I felt one individual’s effort cannot make a difference to the humongous crisis of plastic we face right now, but I now truly believe every small action by any individual in the right direction steer us closer towards the path to sustainability. I have always try to lead by example; I hope this will be the most impactful example I can show the world. Finally, this might be my only chance to see a whale up close and personal!

My comfort zone

I think it started when I joined Dance Synergy in my uni days. The awfully shy and quiet girl took the plunge and signed up to potentially embarrass herself on stage. Maybe it was because no audition was required but I really do not know what made me do it, I did not even had a friend to attend the first session with. But there was no turning back from then.

Dancing liberated me in so many ways and taking that first step out of my then comfort zone seemingly destroyed the entire concept of comfort zone for me. It seems nothing became too scary or out of the norm for me. I travelled alone, became a The Little Gym instructor, drove in Europe, picked up pole dancing and performed in public places, slept in an airport, tried cliff diving, went sky diving, juggled work and studies to earn a Master's, cycled to work, roughed it out in Nepal, Bhutan and India, swam with tiger sharks without a cage, broke my own iron bowl to become a certified yoga instructor, started learning a new language at nearly 40....

I considered myself to be fairly adventurous and pretty adaptable. I dislike routines and enjoy making small changes such as taking a different route to a regular place or answering friends' query on what to eat with "surprise me!" and accepting invitations to events spontaneously. It has been a very long time since I thought of myself as stuck in my comfort zone.

Until I was in Jai's yoga class.

I have been practising yoga for about 10 years and am definitely more stretched and flexible than when I first started because I strive to be so. During my YICC, I was also more at ease in achieving most of the poses compared to the rest of my coursemates. No, I am probably nowhere near the standard of yoga gurus or professional yogis but I would not think that I am stuck in my yoga comfort zone.

Until Jai instructed us to do Chaturanga in reverse, challenged us to perfect the basic Utkatasana (chair pose), guided us to perform Surya Namaskar (Sun Salutations) with Kumbhaka. My limbs were shaking, my steady breath was quickening and it was definitely fear I felt when my lungs screamed for oxygen, reminding me of the time I was at Tulamben. Jai could see we were all struggling and he pep-talked us to constantly confront our limits, to go further and not stay in our comfort zones because yoga is more than just the poses.

Wow. At that instant, I realised I do have my own comfort zone and I was very reluctant to step out of it. What he was asking us to do was really difficult and practically impossible for me to do and made me want to just give up and go straight to Savasana. I realised that precisely because of all the seemingly "uncomfortable" things that I had done in the past 20 years, I conjured up this false belief that I do not have a comfort zone when nothing is further from the truth. Once again, yoga helped me learn more about myself.

Then it was not hard to see the boundary of my comfort zone in other aspects - career, relationships - it is a revelation. And after I recovered from the initial shock of the discovery, I learnt it is not a bad thing to be in your comfort zone. It is an essential personal safe place for each of us to retreat to when the world gets too much to handle.

I am thankful for my comfort zone which, well, has expanded quite a bit with every "uncomfortable" thing I did achieved. I am probably still not ready (physically and mentally) to accomplish all that Jai expects of us but I am pretty certain that the competitive edge in me will not allow me to just settle. But it is good to be able to acknowledge to myself that I do have a comfort zone and have a clearer idea of where my limitations lie so rather than trying to eliminate it I can further expand it.

Plastic Free July

So for the whole of last month, I decided to put a focus on plastic. The #plasticfreejuly movement has actually started way back in 2011 but I only heard about it on 1st July this year through one of the many environmental advocacy groups I follow. Although it felt late in the game but the idea of being part of the solution really resonated with me so I joined the challenge!

Since embarking on this journey to reduce waste, especially plastic, I have seen enough responses and reactions to know that my efforts will not always be appreciated. So it is certainly a challenge - not so much the actions of reducing plastic but to be prepared to be rejected or even ridiculed. But since the decision was made, I committed to it by changing my profile picture and cover page on Facebook and basically made an online declaration about it.

I do like this year's logo which included a turtle. That video of a turtle suffering with a straw in its nose was probably what started me off on this journey in the first place. What better image to use as a profile picture right? And for the cover page, I applied my creative juices on Canva once again to design my very own with a slogan to boot!

Initially I really thought I would be posting and hashtagging every single day but as I wanted to be authentic and only to relate something I personally do, finding something to post everyday was not easy at all. But I tried my best and really made an effort to at least set some time each day to consider what I could share and managed to post something on Facebook 13 days out of 31 days.

Perhaps because I was conscious of the possible backlash, the text accompanying my posts are "mild"? Well, I am always super conscious about what I post online anyway... I hoped I came across as encouraging rather than imposing and more often than not, I included my failures and shortcomings in my attempts to show how this journey will not be easy but not impossible. Because (see image)

Where I held back in my written stories to the images and posts, I was consistent in the hashtags that accompanied them. #plasticfreejuly is a given. #byobsg and #saynotosingleuseplastic are almost always relevant. #consciouschoices is one I came up with as I realised it was exactly what most people are not making which contributed to the problem. And finally #motherearthisworththeinconvenience is one I thought up last year when I posted about my experience reducing waste for a camp in school because our mother earth really is worth it. 

I am really glad I did it though I was not sure how much of an impact I made. For most posts, I received a range of 5 to 14 likes, usually from the same people. The most likes I received was for a post on OCK [19 likes] - was it because many people liked OCK or the way to avoid plastic using a silicon bag was the easiest to implement? And I received almost no comments at all save for the last one on supposedly zerowaste items I bought for home. I received one comment. So I was not able to start conversations either.

I suppose all these are within my (lowered) expectations. And like a teacher who will never know the extent of the influence he or she has on students, perhaps, hopefully I have planted some seeds of change in some minds in this short time of a month.