New Year Resolutions

Usually I don’t go beyond thinking about New Year Resolutions. Maybe I’ll just refer to it as my plans for 2005:

1. Buy fewer CDs & related stuff
Hope to cut down by exercising a bit more constraint. 2004’s tally was a little shocking…

2. Guitar skills
Yup, I want to be able to play a decent piece. Hocc shall be my inspiration!

3. Calligraphy
Try to write once a week. I’ve been lazy but I do want to improve my writing.

4. Pick up new skills
New language (Malay? French?), Photoshop, HTML, I think I’d be lucky if I could manage just one of them!

Tsunami

Southern All Stars had a hit song with this title. Harlem Yu also had one (Chinese song with a different melody). But this word now holds a totally different meaning. My heart goes out to all those affected.

Sharing Meat

The first of the four music award ceremonies in HK took place on 26 Dec. But it was really terrible! 104 awards given out in total, what are you doing, Hit Radio? No wonder the singers didn't look excited at all, for everyone ends up with at least one award as long as he/she attended.

Oh well, good to see ah C anyway. She was one of the few who really made effort on her image and who ended up looking good. I didn't expect her to be in black, though. I was wondering how she was going to sing "艷光四射" (Glamorous) wearing that long black dress with a clumsy skirt, but in the end she sang the slow version. Her voice is great! Best of the night, apart from Deannie Yip, who's sort of like half-retired from the scene anyway. She only appeared because her duet with Andy Hui won some awards.

Some Highlights:

Good to see Joey and Hocc together on stage. Both had heavy eye makeup on (I think it must be quite uncomfortable!), but in contrast to Hocc's dress, Joey's look was quite casual and she even wore jeans. She seemed to be in a daze when she forgot which song she had won the award for, and couldn't recall the composer/lyricist for her Mandarin song. But then you can't deny that she is a good singer and she was rewarded with seven awards.

Candy seemed to be having a bad cold and I was worried that she might sing very badly. Fortunately she managed all the high notes and there were just one or two minor hiccups.

Kary was so impressive! I think Ping Pung's rock style brings out the best of her voice, and she has definitely improved a lot. Don't know if she may eventually leave Cookies for Ping Pung. It must be really tiring to juggle both together.

Speaking of Cookies, I think Theresa is singing better live now, but Stephy sounded rather shaky that night. Her voice seemed very unsteady when she was singing with Alex Fong.

Poor Edmond has not recovered from his leg injury yet. So sorry to see him hobbling around, but his singing was certainly not affected. He is one of the best male singers around, but why is it the two Andys who won so many awards?

Anyway, looking foward to 903 Commercial Radio Awards. It's usually my favourite and the awards are much more respectable. Difficult to get, yes, but definitely there won't be any 'meat-sharing'!

Ice Rain

The weather forecast says that it's 23-27 degrees C today. Quite rare for it not to hit 30 degrees in Singapore, isn't it? 27 degrees C is actually a very comfortable temperature, except that it gets a little too cold for comfort in air-conditioned places. I don’t understand why so many buildings here set their thermostats at such a low temperature. What a waste of energy! Then again, some people are afraid of the heat; some afraid of the cold, so it’s pretty hard to please everyone.

Dy told me that the temperatures dipped to something like –15 degrees C in Canada! And it wasn’t even officially winter there yet! Omg, I think I won’t be able to survive that! It was bad enough battling the wind and snow in England (and that wasn't even in the minus region yet). And there was once when I was in Japan, the ice had melted so the pavements were so slippery that I had to walk like a penguin (or whatever)! I was also laughed at by my friend when she saw me wearing so many layers. Well, not enough insulation!

Christmas cards

Think Christmas cards are taking a longer time to arrive this year. I sent some to overseas friends in early December, but Dy who lives in Canada told me it took about two weeks for him to receive it. Think the ones to Japan got there a bit faster.

Perhaps big countries like Canada and the USA would probably take a longer time to sort out and deliver their mail. The Sammi EP that Dy sent earlier took around two months to arrive!! That seems like a record, even for surface mail. He also sent me a Hocc magazine around early Dec but I guess it would take a long time due to the busy Christmas period. Hopefully it arrives soon. He sent me a pic of it and it looks really good!

As Jy mentioned, the trend nowadays is to send e-cards, but I’m glad that there are still friends who believe nothing is better than a good old-fashioned card. E-cards aren't quite the same. Jy will be going to Cambodia for a couple of months soon. Think we’ll only get that class gathering going again next year.

Special Thanks to…

Actually I’d thought of making an English Hocc site about 1, 2 yrs ago. Most of her sites then were in Chinese and even though I can understand it, it takes me a longer time to read or type Chinese. But I never really progressed beyond ‘thinking’, no thanks to the lack of IT skills and being overwhelmed with work and other distractions (and excuses!).

Hocc’s new site is finally ready! Special Thanks to Rp, for providing the impetus, initiating the whole thing and teaching us so patiently! And to Cg, V & An for making this possible. I’m really glad to have the chance to work on this and to have gotten to know the four of them. They helped me fulfill my sort of forgotten dream :) Never thought that I could end up as one of the moderators of a web-site!

Untraceable Evidence?

'Every contact leaves a trace', the famous Forensic Science quote. How true! I tried to delete my previous posts but somehow one of them is still lingering around...

Guitar Lesson

Tried picking up my old guitar again recently. Come to think of it, I’ve had her for 15 years already! But I’m just too lazy. Decided to start with “Shampoo” as it seems to be one of the easier songs to work out the chords. D major seems to work fine but I need more practice. I must try to practise every week! But have to sort out the chord variations - minor, 6, 7, 9, suspended and what not. It’s tough without a proper teacher or lessons but I shall make it one of my NY resolutions :)

Hey, surprisingly "艷光四射" (Yim Kwong Sei Se or Glamorous) didn’t seem too difficult! Was just playing around with the chorus bit. I’ll have another go at it again maybe tonight. Someone posted the chords before but I think it’ll be more challenging to try figuring them out on my own first.

Good Morning! Manhattan

Finished watching “Good Morning! Manhattan”. Hmm, some people said that the plot was a bit difficult to understand. I didn’t really read their comments as I wanted to form my own opinion and interpretation. But now that I’ve watched it and have some questions, I can’t locate their posts anymore! Some people also said that certain parts were violent and disgusting, but I found them okay.

There were quite a few twists in the plot especially towards the ending. Was hocc’s character in cahoots with the waiter or what? Sometimes the actors spoke so softly that I couldn’t follow their lines. Would be better if there were subtitles. Think I have to watch it again. But it was good just to hear hocc sing! I love track 5 (愛與仇or Love and Revenge).

Too bad that for “Summer of 19 ½ floor”, there was only the CD and no VCD. For last year’s “Camp David”, there wasn’t anything at all. Wish that I could watch the both musicals.

Revival

I had really neglected my blog. The last entry was in July this year! With 2004 coming to an end, I’ve decided to revive it. Deleted all old posts and will start afresh. As V said, keeping blogs is a good way to let your friends know what you are thinking without having to repeat the same things when talking to different people.

Saturday was a good day. Was watching TVB8 music awards ceremony when I got a call from V. That was really a surprise cos I didn’t expect it at all. But I appreciate it; she’s been helping me so much. Hope the auction person contacts me soon so that I can do something for her.

Anyway, didn’t get to finish watching the programme as I was going to meet some JC friends for dinner. We’ve been meeting up every few months or so, not too bad a frequency I suppose, but could be better. The sandwich at Olive Tree was quite good though I chose the wrong bread – my teeth and jaws had to work very hard! Would have enjoyed it more if I hadn’t had a stomach upset earlier and didn’t have much appetite. Three friends had changed jobs within the last 6 months. Yeah, must move on if the old one is getting boring, annoying or even too comfortable (as IL said). Another friend is re-locating to Japan. Originally she was going to HK, but think she got a better offer.

Got an early X’mas gift from HT. HT, that was so sweet of you, thanks! :)