first and foremost. spring break was AWESOME. i'm too lazy to update with pictures from alternative spring break down at Miami Florida but you can check out the pictures on facebook. hahaha
so basically i was "fortunate" enough to be on the bus with the newbies since like half the team came from previous trips and were already buddy buddy enough and hoarded themselves onto the first van. the lucky newbies consisted of all international people from columbia, Puerto rica, the 3 koreans (sang, aidan and kimchi boy. hur hur) and the singaporean and 2 americans. it started off as a slow and quiet ride all the way from savannah to florida with everyone except me and the driver of course sleeping throughout..hardly any conversations with anyone but we started talking after that. the bus ride was surprisingly very comfortable as we got the better van and less people so it was not just comfy but very spacious too. it was just.....boring. thankfully i had naomi who was also stuck and bored in florida at her grandparents and she decided to call me to keep me company though i dunno who is keeping who company in reality. I dislike having phone calls if you don't know me by now. my mind just wanders and i think i just can't be bothered after a while.
anyhows. the hostel isn't fantastic and we longed for the comfort of our dorms, with all of us spoilt silly. the weather was still cooler than singapore nonetheless, but way warmer than savannah and people were complaining about how hot it was and the some girls were very tempted to sleep naked. among the 18 of us....there were 3 private toilets, 2 for the advisors and 1 for 2 girls sharing a private room and the remaining 14 of us had to share 2 bathrooms among the other hostel customers. sounds like fun no? it was hard to shit because u felt stressed by the time limit cos u had to be considerate and hot showers were rare (i only managed to steal ONE hot shower the whole trip) because of the limited hot water in the hostel. nonetheless, we survived. life in the hostel was pretty fun and though we had only 1 computer to share among the WHOLE ENTIRE hostel with 3 other schools there, we managed to spend time chillaxing with books, games of catchphrase and best of all, filming our james bond movie.
Filming the james bond movie (part 1 & part 2) has to be one of the best parts of the trip i must say, and it was definitely one of my dreams of doing while i was here at art school. I longed to do something as fun as that and i finally did with the help of crazy josh as james bond and our wonderful director and cameraman keith, the ever serious film major. that guy was so serious he had a color card every where he go just to adjust the lighting for his camera. the irony was he wasn't a photo major yet he was more serious than the ACTUAL photo major and all he had was a basic point and shoot and he had his tripod everywhere he went. how crazy is that. he called me unprofessional for refusing his offer of borrowing his tripod for my pictures. haha. oh well. here u are....the crazy serious film majors. my role in the film was james bond's boss, M. , and i sure had great fun with that role. no one else had power over bond except me. haha. i could boss him both on screen and off screen and it was just plain fun. :)
other things entertaining was one of our very gay advisor (our resident queen bitch who was also the queen bitch in the james bond movie) who would seriously DANCE like ballet dance in the carpark whenever a piece of classical music was on. there was once where he said that he thinks he is a rather straightforward person and the only thing that came to my mind was the fact that he probably isn't straight. our advisors for this trip must have been the weirdest people to select. they hated the outdoors and were scared of animals...which were basically EVERYTHING we were going to do :S nonetheless, it was also entertaining watching the 2 of them whine and complain and get grossed out. even by the sea. they refused to get wet. *shrug*
work at the outpost (the everglades wildlife refuge) wasn't quite what i had expected or wanted it to be. though there were interactions with the animals, our work mainly involved clearing the plants and cleaning out the shed with encounters of mice and roaches. not my favourite part of the trip but we definitely made a big difference to the place. i got to pet a florida panther who was pretty much just a large kitty that could be walked on a leash and scratched and pet and snuggled. a pretty pregnant white wolf that was like a dog who would whine to be scratched and petted when u past its cage, crazy ostrich, chewy the camel who chewed on anything within reach including u and ur clothes ( a few of the boys got pulled by him. it was gross. camel spit is not the best spit ever), bobo the cute lil monkey who was super friendly, king george the turkey who wasn't afraid of the tiger and pecked at its keeper who refused to let it enter the tiger cage and so much more. oh. the tiger was super sweet too. u can bring it out on a leash for its walks and according to its keeper it's so gay. it will prance around in the meadow and roll in flowerbeds and REFUSE to leave. hahaa. MEOW. we got to meet whacky and intelligent parrots who caught on to our phrases and laughter and imitated us immediately and watched how both constrictor snakes and poisonous snakes attack and devour their prey. all our work and fun were often concluded and celebrated with a cup of refreshing fruit smoothie from the fruit plantation "Robert is Here" where we sat on picnic tables under the scorching sun slurping our ice cold and healthy smoothies. :)
the remaining 2 days of the trip was spent serving in the soup kitchen and helping out at the equestrian centre, grooming the horses, repairing the fences, building a chicken coop and weeding. weeding is a horrendous job. it felt like the moment u turn ur back on ur empty plot of just weeded land, the weeds grow up 3 times more immediately. it was not just painstaking but frustrating. thank goodness the weather was gorgeously cloudy and cool.
life on this service trip is super relaxed as compared to what we have in Singapore. our work sessions were mainly from 9 to 2pm and the rest of the day was recreation, with visits to the alligator farm where we sat on an air boat ride which was AWESOME FUN travelling through the marshes and tall grass at 40 miles per hour and turning at sudden angles. it felt strange when the vibrations from the speed of the fan sent chills down ur spine and in your ears through ur ear muffs and sometimes wind was rushing at such a speed in ur face u could hardly breathe. but it was sooooo enjoyable :) i would do it again if i could :) we also tried alligator meat there which isn't really very yummy though it is very edible to my stomach. it tastes like chicken with a half fish half chicken texture. the other recreational time were spent down at the beaches. one at the fake beach where we had a cook out. fake beach because it was really a segregated natural swimming pool with seaweed due to the presence of crocodiles in the area. so swimming the proper wave waters were prohibited. due to the disappointment of the team the advisors decided to bring us down to miami beach 2 days later. the sand at miami beach is coarse like singapore but the water was a GORGEOUS blue. it was too cold, windy and wet for a beach day and i do wish that it could have been warmer out. i was freezing in my tee and fbt shorts. the wind was so strong even the seagulls got blown backwards. that was pretty amusing watching them flying or rather...getting blown away.
during this trip i got to know kimchii boy alot better and lo and behold, i fell deeper in love with him. he led us in a time of worship on sunday when he randomly played a song and the christians started gathering around him and we started sharing about our spiritual walks and he shared with us about his dreams and goals. that was nice. and his humor is so my kind too. haha. and he is soooo gentlemenly and sweet and and and...he plays the drums, guitar and piano. what's not to love??? the scary part is the two of us are so alike in our mischievousness and awkwardness around strangers. sadly, i found out that he is attached to a fellow korean girl and he shared about her with all of us and i was kinda broken hearted. but they are so cute together i can't bear to break the 2 up. not that it would ever cross my mind, but it definitely helped to make me kill my feelings for him. I still do feel for him though. oh well.
anyhows. i got to take quite alot of photos this trip and have enjoyed and gotten used to poking my lens in people's faces even if it was awkward and now i'm itching to get a proper DSLR camera. still thinking about it and i need to check with my muther if it's fine. i'm going to need one anyway when i have my photog and graphic design classes :)
ok. the remaining time of my spring break was spent with naomi since no one else was back except her and we sat in my room watching death note 1 and 2 which is seriously awesome in terms of plot. not effects. that was horrible. had her sleeping over with me too :)
had some time off meeting with a fellow singaporean student who has sadly graduated from scad and is leaving in may :( we finally met up and headed down to the oakland island wildlife refuge centre which was a great disappointment because the animals were either too far away in the ginormous unkept enclosure or they were hidden from sight. it was a pretty badly maintained zoo. even the everglades wildlife refuge was better. the crocodiles at oakland island
were so small they were practically the size of my keyboard -_-'''
anyhows, together with her 2 taiwanese friends and one ang moh friend, we headed down to the Crab Shack at tybee island where we had our spread of boiled seafood sample platter. alaskan crab legs, crab pincers, crayfish, prawns, mussels and corn, potatoes and sausages. that was a crazy amount of seafood. i can't believe it was a platter for 2. that's INSANE. the ang moh left and all was left were us asians and we headed down to metro to have bubble tea where we just sat and talked and just chilled. it was a good time, reminiscent of times spent back at home in nice little cafes like grapevine. though it wasn't with close friends, it was definitely a good time being away from people all so familiar and meeting new ones, hearing my all so familiar chinese and singaporean accents and getting tips and tricks from my fellow singaporean here. oh joy....dun leave yet!!!
so there u go. my awesome spring break was a wonderful time developing old friendships with naomi and getting to know many new people and expanding my social circle of friends. happiness :D
and now. on to my housing saga. if you've been reading my blog, you would have been aware about my frustrations with michelle and her emotions, my filthy roommate and her possible drug issues and my oh so frustrations about rooming with them in a house for the next 1 year. God being the AWESOME God came down to save me. Michelle's mum came down to view the house and she disliked the area so she had to pull out and it was a perfect excuse for me to pull out of my rooming with my current gross roommate. but now that i pulled out, maggie doesn't want to stay anymore either cos she doesn't know my roommates (yes yes...all that drama). SOOOOOOO....since naomi has a roommate issue now that her korean friends MIGHT not stay on at scad anymore, both of us have decided to stay with her. yes. naomi and i have bonded over the spring break and i've found not just someone who i'm comfortable with living with, but also an accountability partner whom i can trust and rely on. dun worry pacey, you're not replaced, but naomi follows closely after u in terms of accountability for my spiritual walk while i'm here away from u girls. our only issue is that naomi is really fussy about the housing and the location. i can't afford anything too expensive and she wants something close to the school buildings where we can catch the buses and most are too expensive to afford and those affordable are too far. i'm having such trouble house hunting. grrrr.
such great frustrations. classes this quarter ain't fantastic either. i'm frustrated with illustrator and it's stupid gradient mesh, which is similar to 3d modelling. i'm not used to coloring an object using a 3d mesh and i just keep wanting to draw it like in real life. it's frustrating me so much. then there's 3D design. another acky thing to have. and then i have english. possibly my least favourite class. ARGHZ. i hate this quarter. sucky sucky sucky :(
i hope i dun lose my scholarship. boo hoo.
so there. updated.
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