Jolly Folly, Mighty Morphin'

GONG XI FA CAI DAWN! And to all the Chinese descendants of the world, enjoy the love!

Chinese New Year this year made me realise that I am still very Chinese at heart, still very Singaporean Chinese in my core. The Chinese invented the idiom "People Mountain People Sea" to describe overflowing crowds you see at Chinatown, and the beauty of this language is amazing, because the imagery is majestic and dramatic. I loved and hated the squeezing, in the reunion dinner-induced stupor and daze amid the streams of people. I loved and hated going to the temple to get that huge joss-stick on the altar, leaving with runny eyes from the bad air. Immersing in the sounds and the sights or even the smell of sweat, and being part of the festivities, simply beats sitting at home watching a TV box.

I'm kind of tired. It's getting mundane again. Cereal and milk for breakfast, classes, lunch, classes, nap, rowing, huge dinner, work.

I'm getting kind of sad. I haven't been rowing well lately, hate to disappoint coach. Yet I'm tired. I'm sore. Pulling hard everyday is becoming an uphill task. My classes... well, some are interesting, some honestly aren't, I wish I could take a short break, ironically coz I just returned from one.

Man, what am I doing with my life?! Some days, I'm super-motivated and ask so many questions in class like I eat cake. Some days, I'm just like, shut up, leave me alone, I'm out. I don't know, it's getting hard. I'm sick of having to be responsible already, of having to be independent day in and day out. I don't even know what the term 'friends' mean anymore. People here move in their own trajectories and directions, pursue their own lone dreams, talk in the most I-me-myself language that it's hard to follow.

O and that feeling that everyone surrounds you when you have done well and wants a bit of you and your knowledge, and the same people turn away when you pass them on the sidewalk when you're down. Mobile worships, I call it.

Tonight, I wish I could close my eyes, and see nothing.

Posted by Brandon at Wednesday, January 28, 2009 | Permalink

Hey mum and dad, I'm ok, just have been busy with the start of the school term, so haven't been updating my blog. I'm still trying to figure out a good schedule by trying out different classes, so yep, everything is under control. As always. I'm taking an awesome classes.

Scribblings at the Florida airport

I’m sitting on one of those bar top tables that face the runway of the airport in which I have been waiting for hours. I see the long shadows of the aerobridges cast softly on the large expanse of concrete in front of me. Surprisingly, it’s still and quite empty, but if I could tape the happenings on the runway and fast forward it, it would be a bustling port. I feel myself surrender to such sights and muses, I am captured by its unassuming clockwork. It’s finding some substance in a void, and yes, I am waiting for one of those flights that just couldn’t take off on time.

Florida training has finally come to an end. With as much anticipation as I approached the training, I am beginning to feel awkward to be on land, on one of these beautiful sun-soaked afternoons when I could be plying boats with those long, outstretched oars, into golden streaks of calm water in the distance. I love those idyllic country-style docks that litter the shore, and the wispy, tall cattail slanted in the direction of the wind. The peace is contained. The intensity of rowing pours. With bursts into spurts, slitting glances to the sides, bending the oar till it breaks, no forgiveness for defeat.

My calloused palms and panda tan are but the smallest gifts. Have you gone to bed after just being knocked empty of your senses and energy, to feel like you’ve just had the best sleep ever? Or had a hot shower after a damning rainy day? Ephermal sensations sometimes make such lasting impressions – people just keep seeking it. A bunch of 40 year-old men was sitting beside me at Starbucks just now, all raving about the marathons they had just completed in Florida. Wrinkled and gnarled skins, and hair white as sheet, what drives these men to conquer the seemingly impossible?

Maybe just something as simple as a sip of water at the end.

Posted by Brandon at Sunday, January 25, 2009 | Permalink

This must be the last day of the year because suddenly, it's all bright and sunny and I'm feeling hungry to start afresh. Boom.

I'm reading this book, THE AMATUERS, and it has been my main motivation to head to the gym once or twice a day to row on the erg machine. Rowing alone without your team-mates is probably the WORST, especially for extended periods of time. I cannot imagine the boredom, the unshared pain, the silent suffering that scullers (single rowers) go through in their tough winter trainings.

The book goes, at the height of its brilliant writing, "No one knows the internal world of a rower. He spends the most time training, 10-12 times a week, twice a day, but spends the least time on the water compared to other sportsmen. Rowing is nowhere close to being media's darling, because camera angles are hard to manipulate, it is not commercial and people are more interested in outward expressions of athleticism than a crushing manoeuvre of pain on the inside. In the world of rowing, pain is a requisite, and rowers negotiate it everyday in the most inexplicable ways."

Well, I paraphrased that. Absolutely hits the core of what rowing is all about. "You've got to be a lil nutty" to be doing this. It's kind of "demonic". In a perverse kind of way, the unattainable is more alluring than the easy catch. And rowing challenges me in that aspect, to climb higher and reach further in human limits. Florida is coming and I've worked MY BUTT off, and I just hope something good comes out of it. It's on.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!~

Posted by Brandon at Thursday, January 01, 2009 | Permalink