End of Term reflections

Okay so I know I've previously posted that I'm going to retire this blog, but dayre is a crap alternative for long posts. Also, nothing has changed, I still write horribly so read at your own risk.

The past 11 weeks (10+1 orientation) has been nothing but exhausting. There's just so many things for me to learn here, be it academic matters or basic things about myself I never knew. I'm finding a suitable place to start so I'll just do it chronologically perhaps (like I said, I'm a bad writer).

First few weeks mainly revolved around missing home, learning to cook and deciding which societies to join. Homesickness hit me like a speeding truck I swear. I didn't expect to feel that homesick, but there were just some nights I would mope around in my room and end up in a silent crying fit (because walls are thin and you know, flatmates are around). Other times the crying fits will start when I read something touching online, or re-read a letter my mum wrote. But I always feel better after dealing with myself, like I would think, yes I've dealt with my emotions, time to move on. Cooking wise, I can safely say that I've managed to cook decent food for myself so that I wouldn't have to eat out (expensive and tastes like shite). The strange thing about cooking for me was that initially there was a strange excitement about cooking for people and trying out new recipes. But by week 5, shortly after I fell sick, the excitement and eagerness for it just died completely. My friend said cooking has become more of something I'd do for survival and its not really about trying something new anymore, which I think is quite true. Before I arrived, I made a promise to myself that I would continue dancing, because it does make me happy. So I did, but after 7 weeks, I stopped which was quite disappointing.

There's tonnes more to say but given this blog isn't privatised anymore I shall limit it. Basically, I realised what I really need here isn't a bunch of solid friends. Truthfully, it's only been 11 weeks, and the friends I've gained and lost doesn't really mean that much to me, because it's still in its infancy. A lot can change in a matter of weeks, and I've got three years here so I don't wanna be to desperate to make that many friends so soon anyway. Nonetheless, I'm not belittling the importance of good, reliable friends but think what's more important right now is to be my own anchor. I need to be able to commit to my own promises, not let myself down, get my shit together. I need to take better care of my body and my mental state. To do that I need to have a routine. Once I fell sick in week 4, everything went haywire. I stopped cooking nice meals for myself, I made excuses not to play the piano in Church on Sundays and I started to fall behind on my work. It's really easy to make excuses for yourself over here when parent's aren't here to nag at you to sleep early (although they still lovingly do over Skype) or to eat your vitamins in the morning and all. It's entirely up to you to decide how you want to get through the week.

Term 1 was exhausting. I've done many things I'm proud of myself for doing (i.e., cooking, visiting the doctor on my own, first dance performance i've managed on my own), but there're also a lot of things I wish I'd done better. There's always term 2 to get more things done. This isn't how I really expected uni to be so it's obvious I need to change the way I deal with myself and things around me.

Family is coming up to visit me in 7 days and I'm so stoked! Wish I'd gone home for many many reasons, but this shall suffice.

okay i've set up an alternative blog
time to retire this one

www.dayre.me/nicolettewjj

Hello,
Read no further because I'm going to stop posting on this blog (and it will be deleted by 10th October (nice date don't you think?)
I'll be switching over to dayre for daily / weekly / monthly updates if you're still interested.
Link will be posted here soon!

"But the absence of fighting or hatred or desire also means the opposites do not exist either. No joy, no communion, no love. Only where there is disillusionment and depression and sorrow does happiness arise; without the despair of loss, there is no hope."

—Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

ohmygoddd spent half an hour watching ballet videos to cheer myself up what on earth !!!!!!!!!!

Skip to 18:00 for the guy's routine (i still think there's legit room for improvement on the outfit tho)

Having lunch alone today at a salad place in town and they were playing all sorts of alternative music and this particular one caught my attention 

I know that I have made mistakes

And I swear I'll never wrong you again

You've got allure I can't deny

what the shit i can't decipher the handwriting on the answer key

Cambridge can go kiss my ass _|_

I got all I need when I got you and I

Yesterday was my kind of perfect day

After taking half day to collect my SGC, Alex and I headed down to Raffles City to have lunch with Alyssa at Din Tai Fung (which did not serve har gao walao). Then we headed down to Cloud Dome and Flower Dome yayyyyyy
So anyway I think Cloud Dome is way nicer than Flower Dome possibly because the Flower Dome didn't have a very nice display going on - it was Fairy Tale themed and I can't really appreciate those anymore. We've just missed the Tulips display shucks.
Ok idw to describe anymore but here are some photos taken using my phone which camera sucks under low light (other than that its working fine)

So this is what you first see when you walk into the Cloud Dome - I spent a good few minutes just staring at this massively beautiful structure. See how the glass ceiling curves around the waterfall? Absolute perfection I swear. 

And this was a lego display of a venus flytrap hmm i think it was a bit out of place tbh 

So this is evidence that my camera sucks under low light conditions BUT just look at the architecture omggg I almost did spaz. 

So there were many holes in the wall where you could look out of? And the water coming down in this photo is not from the waterfall but I think it was mist. Like from a sprinkler or something. Anyway very cool in real life but not really in this photo oops. 

And this was a river looking thing which looks like black ink :( Leading somewhere I think it's just a massive drain hahaha. 

And this is inside the Flower Dome! I'm obsessed with the architecture oh my god it's so beautifully crafted. The way the sunlight streams through the glass ceiling also so perf!!!!!!

So yes this is what I meant by sunlight streaming through the glass 

Big and fat baobab trees - its name is really suitable hahaha

Flowers slightly disappointing tho - some looked a bit dead / dying 

And that's about all the photos I took, no point posting the rest cause they weren't quite nice oops! I'm going to miss this skyline when I head abroad 

look at the silver lining around the clouds, and the sunset along the horizon sigh

But it was such a perfect way to end the day 

One of the best birthday celebrations so far tq friends much love muacks

All the photos have been resized to fit my blog so some didn't turn out looking quite nice :(