The new AMK interchange is officially open today (28th April), and that caused me to miss my terrain run in Bedok Reservoir. After waiting at the bus-stop opposite Jubilee for 20 minutes and not see my bus 22 at all, I looked at the signboard and was annoyed to see that only buses 159 and 265 use that bus-stop still. What a way to start a Saturday. Ended up 1/2 an hour late and didn’t get to run.

Anyway, spent the entire afternoon teaching my ex-students math. XY, your brother is not as bad as you described!

Evening time, before I went home, I took a walk around Cityhall and snapped some pictures using my newly bought digital rangefinder. Life’s been so fast-paced that I had to constantly remind myself to stop thinking about work during my lone stroll. Here’re some of the pictures that I’ve taken.

Taken as I headed towards Esplanade from Peninsula Plaza. CBD and Supreme Court. 

Near the bridge, another shot of CBD. 

On top of the bridge, a view of the durian twin. 

Esplanade. 

Hanged around here for 1/2 an hour to see the live band "Fatskunks" play. They’re quite good. 

Exhibition on some abstract art series put up in the underpass that links Esplanade to CityLink. One of the exhibitions that I enjoyed viewing.

Another view. 

Last shot. A place that break-dancers and stunt bikers hang out.

Hope you’ve enjoyed viewing!  

After joining SGRunners for quite a while, I had been thinking of initiating a run around AMK/Bishan region (since there’s no existing organised runs around my neighbourhood yet). So I started a thread sometime back to seek for interested runners to start such a gathering.

And after 3 months of talk, it finally happened. Today would mark the first AMK group run, as 3 other runners and I met to do a 10km round. Earlier on, I was worried that the heavy downpour would last all the way through the evening, but luckily it stopped at four plus. Although the turn-out wasn’t great in numbers, it was a good start nevertheless. Certainly looking forward to every Monday to participate in this group run.

No lucky goals from Chelsea. They couldn’t take advantage of Man Utd’s draw last night!

It has been 2 days since our school Band competed in the SYF 2007. Many bandits may still be feeling upset over not being able to get a gold. It was a well-known fact that this year’s judging was much stricter than two years ago, and a lot of other "gold" bands have also dropped to a silver instead.

I doubt there are many bandits that will chance upon this blog, but to those who happen to get here, this is what I wish to say to you:

Do not feel despaired over not getting gold. It has been a very stressful period for you girls in preparation for the SYF, and anyone who has gone through so much would’ve felt terribly upset and disappointed with the result. But, do not view this result as a failure and allow the gruelling experience to take away the joy of playing music.

For the past few months, you all have been working hard during band pracs, enduring the harsh training under the instructor but yet still staying motivated in hope to play well and do the school proud. Apart from the 3-4 band prac days a week, we’re aware that many of you also initiated to stay back for self-prac on certain days.

All these factors are enough to conclude that you are very committed to the band, and wouldn’t display anything less than your best for the band. And this is when the colour of the award doesn’t matter that much anymore. On paper, we’ve gotten a Silver. But in your hearts, you know that this Silver award is a priceless one, achieved through the sheer hardwork of everyone as a team.

This is when a Silver is better than a gold. Cheer up

Another week has passed by, and it’s finally weekend again. Unfortunately, I’ve fallen sick and I don’t think I can enjoy the next two days very much. Went to see the doctor in the evening to get some medicine, and hopefully they can create miracles to help me recover before Monday comes.

Anyway, I had been reviewing my "favourite" youtube clips the past 20 minutes, and I happened to watch a couple of the Korean MVs that I’ve saved last time. I wonder how Koreans are so good at creating these tear-jerking videos (not that I cried) such that they will touch your heart in just that few minutes of music.

Just want to share these 2 clips (that I personally like quite a lot) with you people.  

See the reflection disappear here 

I’ve a problem with reflections. The partial reflection scares the hell out of me some nights. And most of the time it’s just plain inconvenient.

Couldn’t think of a better title, so there. It’s not been a very smooth week, there’re definitely a lot of things that I have to follow up and improve on in order to have a better time for the rest of the year, not just for me, but for people around me as well. Shan’t mention more.

Anyway, some positive things that happened this week are that.. firstly, it’s a short week! Also, I finally bought a second-hand roadbike from a nice person, who is coincidentally an ex-sngs teacher. This means that I can start training for my Duathlon event (and hopefully Triathlon too) soon!

And this Saturday night ended with a 10 km run. I was quite happy with the timing because it’s been quite some time since I hit below an hour. And this run sort of lightened my mood too. It’s a good way to defrag my brain system as well. Haahhhh…

Anyway, I’d acquired this special paint that enables invisibility. I tried taking picture of myself after applying the paint on my body, but it obviously showed nothing in the picture since it is an Invisible Paint. So I donned on a wind-breaker, a pair of berms and socks to display its effect. And IT WORKED!!

Cool right? I’m now brainstorming things to do while in this layer of paint..

Yah right. 

I received a chain email full of interesting pictures from a friend, and this particular picture interested me.

Caption says: The bridge (or should it be called tunnel) goes under water to allow movement of ships. In order for ships to pass, this bridge is half under the water. You drive down in the water and then come out on the other side. Truly a marvelous piece of engineering!! This bridge is between Sweden and Denmark. Picture taken from the side of Sweden.

Upon googling for more information about this bridge, I realised that there doesn’t exist such a bridge linking Sweden to Denmark at all. Nope, it is not a digitally manipulated photo though, because this bridge does exist in another part of the world.

This bridge, called Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-Tunnel (or MMMBT for short), is a 4.6-mile long combination bridge-tunnel system connecting two Virginia communities across the mouth of the James River. MMMBT opened in April 1992 after seven years of construction and a total cost of about $400 million.  

A further search online reveals that there is actually a similar bridge-tunnel linking Sweden to Denmark. Oresund Link (name of the bridge), comprises a 10-mile link between Copenhagen and Malmo, and won the IABSE Outstanding Structure Award in May 2003.

Oresund Link Bridge

Anyhow, these are only two of the many bridges in the world that show some amazing and innovative architecture. This link will show you even more breath-taking pictures of bridges around the world.