Saville Row?

The last week has been quite a flurry of catching up for me. The strange thing is, its catching up with all the same people.-_-'. Had dinner with Sock and a few friends a few days ago; one of the rare occasions when she's back in Singapore so I couldn't really find it in me not to go, and just yesterday, Sam asked the guys out for some chilling at Balaclava, a place that Brauns once snidely remarked that I will be spending a lot of my time there in future(i don't think so lo).

And then we still have a BBQ thingy planned for tomorrow at Sock's place. It seems 2006 looks like a somewhat good year for the class of 97s8 to get together, or what remains of it. We didn't meet up as much in 2005, 2004, or any other year. Strange thing is, we only seem to want to meet each other and hang out only near the end of the year. I would very much have preferred it if we could have spread out our meetings more consistently throughout the year.

Anyway, today was the first time i went to a tailor. A friend of mine, due to start work as an intern next week at a big foreign bank told me it would be a good idea to shop for workwear together, and he has got a contact of a very reliable and outstanding tailor, of whose services, he is planning on making use of. Now, my impression of tailor-made clothing is quite skewed. I've always thought that people who custom clothes are people with extreme dimensions, or people with weird tendencies or really irrational dress sense, not your everyday salaryman looking for a decent shirt for work. I guess I have a new opinion now.

Anywyay, you can say today is my first introduction to haute couture in its simpliest form. There is the quintessential tailor, with his tradmark measuring tape around the collar,spectacles on his nose bridge, rolled up shirt sleeves and well-spoken English with an accent that i find it hard to place. And catalogues and catalogues filled with all sorts of different materials. As a matter of fact, I was momentarily overwhelmed by the sheer choices of cloth available at our disposal. Anyway, the tailor, whose name was Daniel, was quite a character. There was this young lady who was giving him instructions on how exactly she wants her outfit; the shape of the button-holes, how the pocket's gonna be, etc. Daniel took everything in silently and then said in a stoic voice, " Girl, I know nothing, only fashion".

Well, I didn't know what that was supposed to mean but I thought it was something incredibly corny to say. Though i guess its always reassuring to have someone who knows what he's doing. Anyway, both of us found it prudent to start with 2 pieces each, just so we can find out if he really is suitable for us, and considering one shirt costs us about the same as what we would expect to pay at G2000, I think its not that bad a deal. Now what remains to be seen is the end-product, whether our dear Daniel(not the cat) can really walk the walk as well as he can talk the talk.

97S8. Its been a while.

Yesterday was fun. It was the biggest turnout for our college gatherings as far as i can remember. The highlight for me was the appearance of Chunde aka Axl aka Wayne, an ex-classmate that i have not seen since college graduation. A fact which serves to remind us all of our age, considering that was 8 years ago. We were all curious as to how he seemed to have vanished these few years, despite our best efforts to get a hold of him. Turns out he changed his number and it so happens that none of us have the new one. If it weren't for the fact that Celine accidentally bumped into him one fine day, I don't think I'll even have the chance to catch up with him.

Anyway of the 20(or so, i think) people in our class, 14 were present. Not a bad turnout at all. Everyone was busy digesting information of what everyone else has been up to and that was enough to keep the evening entertaining. Its interesting though, despite everyone not seeing Wayne after such a long time, there weren't any feelings of awkwardness or unfamiliarity at all. It was like we last saw him 8 days ago, instead of 8 years. In fact, Wayne later remarked to me that he was initially apprehensive about coming but was glad that everyone got on so splendidly. In fact, he was so sorry he had to leave early, due to an unavoidable company function.

Anyway, we had dinner at Brewerkz and apparently that proved to be quite an evening for the ladies since all of them decided to retire for the day. The rest of us adjourned to St James Power Station for a second round of drinks and catching-up. We talked about loads of things, from Junxian's impending wedding, Wayne's disappearance, to me and Shouqian's both finding employment at the same time. Unfortunately, we had to wrap the session up early since most of them have work the next day, else i think the management will be hard-pressed to get us to leave the establishment.

Anyway, Christmas is coming. Very obvious, considering the torrents of rainfall I've been seeing the past few days. Other places have blizzards, we have floods. And falling tree branches instead of mistletoe. Instead of sleighs, we have stalled taxis. Not much reason for cheer in this yuletide season. In spite of this, i guess the local people have lost none of their fervor in commemorating the occasion.

Well, I don't particularly think of Christmas as a special occasion, I'm just glad of the opportunity it provides; a chance for me to get to meet friends who has been too busy to just sit back, relax and just talk about old times. Its also a good time to recap, and think about the trials and tribulations of the past year, and look forward to what the future has in store for us.

Anyway, I've been a good boy this year. I hope Santa brings me some pleasant surprises!

Looking to the future.

Woot. Its been about a month since my last posting. I've been kinda busy. Moving house is really quite an ordeal. Even after shifting everything to the new place, the effort required to get everything in its proper place is mind-boggling. And in my case, its not your normal house-moving. Whys that? Because for whatever box i unpack, there might be a need for me to box it up all over again come next year, when our old place is all reno up. That's right, my change of address is not permanent. And that is precisely what makes things a little bit confusing.

Anyway, the initial situation was that I have cartloads of stuff, and i have no idea where to put them. I'm faced with some sort of an anomaly at my new place. Even though in floorspace, this new place is quite a bit bigger than our old flat, it seems we have lesser space.0_o. For example, my room is slightly more than half the size of my previous place. On the flip side, the balcony here is like 4 times the size of our previous one. talk about priorities.=/.

Anyway, now i'm fairly well settled in, with most stuffs that i need at my convenience and most stuffs i don't need jammed packed into every nook and cranny i can find in my confined quarters. After about 2 weeks of living here(if u discount the additional 1 week of unpacking day in day out), I'm more or less used to everything. the only down side is each unit only has one parking space. And ours is not for me. So now I am resigned to parking my car at a place where it transforms into a really sorry sight every time it rains. Which is a daily occurrence if you look at recent meteorological conditions.=(.  I can see no way around this and i guess i need to schedule a polishing session(any lobang?) once i depart from this location for good.

Anyway, readers of my nondescript blog would have known that since graduation, yours truly have been searching night and day(well, more or less) for a job without much fruition. Well, i'm glad to say the exhausting search has been over. Moi has finally found employment. The company in question has extended an offer and most probably, i will commence my duties at the start of the year. Its ironic that this job offer is the first application i sent, dating back to the first of September. Most of the ones in between didn't really work out. It was either i got "regretted" or i didn't like what was being dangled. What really did it for me for this one was was the entire interviewing process, although that very process took about 5 weeks, I'm really impressed at the thought and effort shown in the whole process, as well as the people i have the opportunity of interacting with. Although that is no less what i would expect from such an established company in the business. Well, I'm actually kinda psyched up about it and i guess i will post in more detail once more concise arrangements are made known.

Or u can ask me=)