I want to blog about my trip to Blue Mountains. I want to blog about my facial hair journey through the month of Movember.

But I CAN’T.

I’m not sure if its WordPress or my blog screwing up my blog layout but as far as I know, my previous entries have been fine. So I’m not sure what’s with the screw up now. Each time I upload a couple of pictures onto a new entry, they appear all jumbled up and without order on the blog.

It’s frustrating. These two entries have loads of pictures and of course, loads of my own random commentary. Not being able to post them up is like having to hold back my own orgasm. Twice.

But I digress.

Anyway, I had a chat with a friend of mine on MSN. After spending hours of futile effort in fixing up the previous entries I mentioned, I decided to take a break when I saw my friend online on MSN.

I knew he was flying back to Singapore the next day (which is today) so I opened up a chat window and asked him what time was his flight.

The next few minutes involved us speaking about the most random thing.

And me committing a big boo boo.

Zareth says: (11:51:56 PM)

what time’s ur flight?

b says: (11:52:51 PM)

55555

Zareth says: (11:53:00 PM)

wth?

Zareth says: (11:53:55 PM)

5555?

Zareth says: (11:53:56 PM)

dude

Zareth says: (11:54:01 PM)

you’re not high right?

B decided to answer my reply with “5555“. Obviously I have to ask what the hell that means and of course, asking if he still have his sanity intact.

I would like to paste a snapshot of the conversation but like I said, I can’t put text and pictures together or else they would appear all jumbled up. Fucking irritating.

Anyway, B replied:

b says: (11:56:44 PM)

hahahahh

b says: (11:56:46 PM)

nah

Then we started talking about random shit like how he recently moved to his new place and something about Hamilton Island. Of course, I still did not what time his flight was. So I asked again:

Zareth says: (11:58:02 PM)

haha, what’s time ur flight? afternoon?

b says: (11:58:42 PM)

yeh man

b says: (11:58:43 PM)

5pm

b says: (11:58:50 PM)

u asked that twice haha

Zareth says: (11:59:00 PM)

you said 555555 the first time

Zareth says: (11:59:05 PM)

lol, it can mean 5am

Zareth says: (11:59:16 PM)

or some code or your flight number

Zareth says: (12:00:22 AM)

that mean’s you reach singapore around 1am?

So B flights leaves around 5pm. Since the flight takes about 7 to 8 hours to reach Singapore, he would reach there around 1am, amiright?

Apparently not.

b says: (12:10:39 AM)

lol

b says: (12:10:39 AM)

huh?

b says: (12:10:39 AM)

no

b says: (12:10:44 AM)

i reach sing at like 9:30

b says: (12:10:45 AM)

lol

b says: (12:10:46 AM)

pm

But I then ask another question, like the stupid idiot I am:

Zareth says: (12:11:50 AM)

4 1/2 hours only?

b says: (12:11:59 AM)

??

b says: (12:12:05 AM)

dude

Zareth says: (12:12:07 AM)

the flight

b says: (12:12:10 AM)

sing time is 3hrd behind

I thought his flight would only take 4 1/2 hours. Actually, it would still take 7 to 8 hours, but since he’s landing in Singapore and it being 3 hours behind Australia, he will land around 9:30pm.

Damn it, I feel so fucking pai seh (Hokkien for embarrassed).

I mean, I should have factored in time difference when calculating the time B will reach Singapore.

And this is coming from a person who travels around frequently.

So I replied:

Zareth says: (12:12:21 AM)

oops, i forogt

Zareth says: (12:12:22 AM)

lol

b says: (12:12:24 AM)

hahahaha

So my screw up resolved, we moved on to another topic.

Zareth says: (12:12:49 AM)

damn, our body clock is going to be slightly screwed up when we go back

b says: (12:13:34 AM)

haha i mien aleardy is

b says: (12:14:03 AM)

i fkin been drinkin every nite for the past 2 weeks…get home in the morning…sleeepp and then drink again at nite

b says: (12:14:04 AM)

lol

Zareth says: (12:14:14 AM)

lol

b says: (12:14:18 AM)

body clock non eistent

Looks like someone needs to lay off the booze for awhile.

I have a non-existent body clock and sleeping pattern too. Usually, I would go to bed around 5am and wake up around 11am or 12pm. This means that in Singapore, I would go to bed around 2am and wake up around 8am or 9am. Not bad, not bad.

But still nowhere near as bad as B.

Anyway, song of the day:

This is from the movie Sex Drive soundtrack. I find the chorus simple and just pure awesome. I’m always singing along with it. You should watch Sex Drive too. Just because.

Before you start reading this post. I want you make sure that you are alone. This means that if you are at work, make sure your colleagues does not see this. More importantly, make sure your BOSS does not see this at all.If you are at school, do not let any student or teacher see this. If you are at home, close your bedroom door or bring your laptop to some secluded place. I’m serious.

I went for a paintball game with Sean and his friends on Saturday.

Sean, who was my army buddy, organized this event a month earlier and invited me along. Sean invited another army buddy along who, to use the Hokkien term, “pang seh” us because he couldn’t make it and as usual, he did not give us any reason or excuse why he couldn’t make it. 

I think he’s probably doing something really important. Something that starts with the letter “S”.

And that would be…

Surfing.

Why, you thought it was something else? Get your mind out of the gutter, you ass.

Anyway, Sean sent me an invited through Facebook (I just love that place) and of course I marked myself as  ”Attending”:

It was originally supposed to be a week earlier but majority of the people couldn’t make it so it was pushed back to 21 Nov. Fine by me cause I had exams during that week too.

Since Heartbreak Ridge was located about an hour drive west from Sydney, Sean told me that he was going to pick me up at 6:30am.

So the night before, instead of having a good, restful sleep to prepare myself for some ass-shooting and getting shot at, I stayed up watching Korean comedy shows.

The reason for that stupid decision is because my body clock is completely out of whack by now. I usually go to bed at 5am and wake up at 1 in the afternoon. So I wanted to sleep but I couldn’t and proceeded to waste my life in front of the laptop.

By 5am, I was sleepy but decided against taking a nap cause I know I would sleep through my alarm and will only wake at 1 or 2 in the afternoon, and so missing the paintball game (and wasting $70).

So I made breakfast, took a cold shower to stay awake, packed my stuff and by 6:15am, went out to meet Sean at the designated bus stop.

Sean came along with his friends, four in the first car and three in the second car. I was the fourth guy in the second car. So after introducing myself to Sean’s friends, one who was called Sean too and another was Jackson, we joined the early morning traffic to Heartbreak Ridge. On the way, we made a short detour to Happy Jacks for some breakfast.

I would like to tell you about the beautiful countryside and parks and blah blah blah but I can’t because I slept on the way to the paintball place. I was quite exhausted by then and I haven’t even started playing paintball.

I was rudely awaken by very, very bright sunlight and the irritating crunch of gravel. We had reached Heartbreak Ridge.

By then the temperature was hovering near 28 degrees Celsius. It was getting hot even though it was only 7:30am.

The four of us changed in the open air car park. Coincidentally, Sean, Jackson and I wore our white Air Force shirt while Sean the Organizer (the army buddy) wore a brown Army shirt with Air Force shorts.

So after giving an impromptu stripshow in the public, we made our way to the “Mess Hall” to sign the waiver form and get our equipment and gear.

The place was packed with people looking forward to a game of paintball. We joined the queue and after about half an hour of waiting, handed in our waiver forms and got our overalls, webbings and ammo.

I only got the overalls. I didn’t get any webbings and ammo because we would had to pay $20 extra and at that moment, I left my wallet in the car and couldn’t be bothered to walk back to the carpark under the hot sun. So I decided to forgo the webbings and ammo.

BIG MISTAKE.

Why? Cause without any spare ammo, every time I ran of ammo, I was stuck in the middle of a battlefield with no chance of reloading my rifle and ended up being a sitting duck. Next time, I’ll get webbings and ammo.

So after the staff made sure everyone got their overalls, webbings and ammo, we were given a short pep talk on how to operate a paintball gun, the rules and regulations of paintball games and other important stuff.

As usual, I wasn’t paying attention. I only paid attention to the paintball gun part.

After the short pep talk, a staff got my group (which consisted of about 15 people and shall be call Group 1) and another group (which consisted of 5 other people and shall be call Group 2) and told us to gather near a tank.

Yep, they have a tank too. Very boring. 2 years in Singapore National Service does that to you.

We collected our face goggles. It was this part where we were divided into teams based on the colour of our face googles. There were two colours: black and green. I was on the green team while Sean the Organizer  aka The Army Buddy was on the black team. Crap, and we both wanted to be on the same team. Oh well, at least I get to shoot his ass.

Hell, in fact everyone in our group wanted to shoot the shit out of Sean the Organizer.

So after donning our goggles, our group (Group 1) poised in front of the tank as a memento.

I’m still waiting for Sean the Organizer to scan and send me the picture. I quite like the photo, especially my stupid, smirking face.

Anyway, we gathered around near the entrance of paintball area. The guy (we shall call him Screaming Referee) and the boy (we shall call him Screaming Boy) who were leading our group checked our goggles and webbings to ensure they were securely fastened.

The reason why they were screaming because of two reasons:

1) To get our attention as we were constantly talking among ourselves.

2) To get their voices heard over hundred other people voices.

So we went into the paintball area, collected our guns, took some potshots at some targets to test our guns. I must say, I love the sound and recoil of the paintball gun. After that, both groups gathered around Screaming Referee and Screaming Boy before heading to the first paintball competition area.

Another thing to point out, because Sean the Organizer, was, well the organizer of our group, he got to take the cool automatic machine gun. So by just holding on to the trigger, he could unleash a hail of bullets constantly. The rest of us got pitiful, semi-automatic rifles. But I digress.

We were given the rules and the duration of the game before heading off to our respective bases. Since our teams were based on the colour of our face goggles, my green team had a mixture of people from Group 1 and 2. We didn’t formulate any strategies so when Screaming Referee blew his whistle, we all ran helter-skelter and hid behind large balloons that served as barricades and protection.

I’ve always heard from other people that getting shot by paintball bullets hurt like hell.

I got shot in the face, twice.

It didn’t hurt since the goggles protected me but I could feel the force of the exploding pellets. But I then realized that to get shot in the chest, arms or legs hurt.

A LOT. A fucking lot.

We played four rounds before taking a 15 minutes break. After that, we continued for another 4 rounds before ending our paintball games for the day.

I know I’m blabbing a lot here, so I just show you the pictures of my wounds.

First casualty. Sore eye. By the end of the first four rounds, my left eye was completely red. The constant scratching of the googles against my eyes and the sweat from my face irritated my left eye. What worse is that I was wearing contacts, so after 8 rounds of paintball games, I was left with a very, very red left eye.

This is the most painful shot I’ve taken. It happened during the 6th round of paintball games. We were in this makeshift cemetery that consisted mostly of tombstone. Sean the Organizer told me that this was one of the harder rounds and he was right. When you’re stuck behind of tombstone with five people shooting at you, sometimes you feel like you are in the game Left 4 Dead, except the people attacking you are not zombies but people with paintball guns shooting the shit out of you.

How I got the bruise on my shoulder was quite epic. My team was winning and the black team only had a few members left, so we were trying to take out the survivors. I was at left end of the field when I saw this guy hiding behind a tombstone at the right end. So trying to act heroic, I rushed towards the other end and hid behind a tombstone. I planned to take the guy by surprise so counting to 3, I jumped out from the tombstone and started firing a hail of bullets

Unfortunately, he saw me jumping from the tombstone and returned fire.

We spent the next 10 seconds raining bullets at each other cowboy style. By some weird luck, neither of us was hit and we continued to dance around and shoot each other.

Then it happened.

I got the first bullet in my shoulder. Because I was standing so close to him, the impact of bullet against me was so strong that I actually staggered backwards.

I felt searing pain.

Then I took another bullet in the chest.

More pain.

Finally I got another in the stomach.

Damn it, will this guy not stop?

Defeated, I raised my gun to indicate I had been shot. Fortunately, the guy saw my signal and stopped shooting at me.

I still have the bruise on my shoulder. FML.

You can see there’s another bruise on my chest. I don’t remember how I got that bruise but all I know that I was always shot in the chest. I don’t know why people like to shoot me in the chest, it’s not like I have some advertising logo like this guy:

I remembered I was standing at my base waiting for someone to be ‘injured’ so I could go back into the game when I took a bullet right in the chest bone. Apparently some asshole thought I would make a nice, easy target. 

I don’t remember how I got this bruise. But notice how close it is to my nipple. If that person had aimed a few inches higher and to the right, I’ll probably lose a nipple.

Another bruise on right side. Getting shot in the stomach is one of my favourite past time. I got this during the last round of paintball games. I was hiding behind some oil wells when this guy tried to take a shot at me. We exchange some shots until I got hit in the stomach. 

Leg shot. Got this during the cemetery game. When I was running towards a tombstone for cover, I got shot in the leg. It hurts a lot.

Mud/paint splattered shoes.

So after the final round of the “free-for-all” game (I didn’t join in, its too fucking painful) where Sean the Organizer was shot a hundred times from five sides, we went back to the mess hall for lunch.

We had to wait for about an hour and half for the pizzas cause they only arrived at 1pm. So majority of our group decided to leave and went to Ashfield for lunch. Sean the Organizer, Sean, Jackson, Weslan and I decided to stay put to get our pizzas. After all, the pizzas were part of the package.

We did not have anything to do so we spent an hour or more entertaining ourselves by picking up gravel and throwing it into empty bottles or boxes and basically just stoning in the heat wave.

Lunch came at 1pm and I was extremely hungry since my last meal was my 5am breakfast. Boxes and boxes of pizzas came and we all got one each. I can’t remember what pizzas I had but mine had a lot of green peppers and veggies.

I was in pizza heaven.

Since quite a few people left before taking their pizzas, we took the leftovers and I got a box of pepperoni pizza. At last, dinner solved! I don’t have to make dinner. After almost seven hours under the hot sun, I don’t think I would have any energy to cook dinner.

Hmmm, pepperoni pizza for dinner. Just for me.

Finally, the last shot:

You are now looking at my…

… butt cheek.

That is why I warned you to make sure you are completely alone when you are reading this.

You see that red, angry welt on my butt? Well, there’s a story of how I got that. I said earlier that during the last round of paintball games, I was hiding behind some oil wells and got shot in the stomach. After I got shot, I stood up and raise up my rifle in the air, indicating that I was shot and I was leaving the game.

However, that asshole decided that his itchy finger did not have enough and shot me in the ass when I was walking away. It hurt the shit out of me. I almost wanted to turn around and decorate his family jewels with bruise and blood. That guy was lucky I didn’t do it.

If that bruise was a few inches below, I don’t think I can shit or seat for the next three days.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you. I dropped a lot of subtle hints by using the words ass, shit, and crap.

Why, hello there, dear readers!

I am very happy to see I have *somehow* surpassed the 100 hits  mark! Well, it might not sound like much for most of you out there, but for me it is a great achievement, seen as I haven’t even divulged this blog that much yet!

Aye, but now that your dear blog author (A.K.A.: Me, who else?) is done posting the chapter I of [Unnamed Saga], what will he be doing the next month?

Let me reveal you my situation and my plans:

• This be November, and at the start of this hospitable month the aut— err, I, will be busy with ultimate tests of doom. ’tis okay though, the worst one is coming tomorrow – ’tis Maths. Maths, say Hello!

Maths: The probability of you failing the test is quite high, given your pathetically low I.Q.!

Err… hello to you too, Maths *raises a skeptical eyebrow*

• I will become much less busy after the 10th day of the present month, though, and as such I can focus on something else. Can you guess what it is?

Well, what did I call November again? Hospitable, was it? What the hell? It’s cold and rainy and boring and dull and full of dark clouds and commercial n00bs and… Now why would I do that, why would I find it minimally appealing?

(Choose from the following four options! TELETEXT!)

1. You’re on drugs;
2. You have a pathetically low I.Q.;
3. Your brain was eaten by Maths – OHH YEAH, P(A|B) = 1-P(A’|B), INTERCOURSE!;
4. NANOWRIMO!

If you chose 4, you’re stupendously RIGHT! If you chose 2 and 3, you are also RIGHT! About 1… erm. I don’t do drugs… unless you consider tea a drug… *takes a sip of green tea*, yum.

That’s right, this month me and my writing demoniac surges will be aiming towards the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), just me, my “brain”, my mug of tea, my folders of epic orchestral music and my newfound allies – the post its!

For those of you who still think I’m talking about a really badass brand of biscuit, let me clear it up:

NaNoWriMo is this project which gives you an excuse to sit your ass down on the nearest chair (or floor, at the lack of one) and write for ages and AGES.

The basic conditions are as follow:

- Write 50.000 words;

- Do it in a maximum of thirty days;

- Don’t give a freaking damn whether you are actually writing an interesting plot and narrating things perfectly. Just make sure it makes sense (at least for you) and that it meets the conditions above. After these thirty days are gone by, you can polish it if you want. (That’s what every author should do anyway, the polishing bit, at least, that is).

- Have a lot of FUN!

At the end of it you get a monstruous sense of accomplishment. What? That’s more than enough, believe me!

Oh, oh, I can feel you getting all psyched up and jizzly-jiggly. Erm, yeah.

Well, you can find more details here: What is NaNoWriMo?

Ultimately, if you want to sign up, just press the “sign up!” button at the top of the page!

• What else am I going to do this month then? Haha, other than procrastinating, I’ll try and read some articles on writing novels, they should come in handy for the projects I have in mind.

And that’s it!

About my entry for NaNoWriMo, I’ll be posting the final results of it on the 25th-30th of this month. It will be unrevised and full of incomprehensible gibberish, but I will eventually revise it thoroughly at some point.

As for how I will fill this blog until then… I’ll keep you updated on my status and of course, poetry will take care of the rest!

Take care during that short time, and I hope to see you joining NaNoWriMo! I’ll be signing up as ChromaticCreation, send me a PM if you need some advice or support (if I can even give any, that is O_o)!

Tak można określić w paru słowach tą serię

ALL HAIL ALUCARD !Pamiętacie serię Hellsing? Była zajebista co nie? No to proszę państwa przed wami „nowa” seria, tyle, że tym razem jest na podstawie mangi. Cóż można w skrócie powiedzieć o tym OVA? Ano to, że to jest majstersztyk. I mówię teraz o majstersztyku na wszystkich dostępnych polach, A więc zaczynamy wychwalanie

Audio :

It fucking rocks

Voice Acting (nie tylko oryginalny, ale też angielski Dub)

It fucking rocks

Animacja:

It fucking rocks

Fabuła:

It fucking rocks

No I to by było na tyle xD. Co zdziwieni? Ja też ^^. Nie spodziewałem, że powstanie „coś” co zdetronizuje oryginalnego Hellsinga. A tu proszę .

Now, I don’t like telling people to subscribe to other people’s YouTube channel, because we’d all rather just click on the link to the video of the piglet dressed as a puppy sleeping soundly with a pile of adorable kittens our mother sent us and be done with it, but this is fucking incredible. His name is Zodiac Motherfucker, and he OWNS. Here’s two of my favorites from ZMF (don’t worry, there’s sort of a continuous theme running throughout) :

Get some more over here.

Cause people get crushed when me & Dagg roll around

E’ soltanto un breve scambio di opinioni, ma mi fa ridere ogni volta che lo leggo. Il bello è che risale a lunedì 18 agosto 2008! Ancora non riesco a credere di aver tenuto questo tipo di immagini nelle cartelle di Diablo 2.

Un grazie a Me-Muero per la piccola e “piacevole” esperienza figurativa.

Ok So im Currenty working On My new Duel Arena Ownage Project For d1v3rs1ty2 you can see the vids by clicking here. or simply download my toolbar for updates and more by clikcing here. Please check Out the old one below, the new one will be posted soon DW!

For the latest updates, Achievements & goals Click Here

This is an extra long friday comic. Otto tries to pull a huge own on Carl. It’s just not possible to own a kick ass awesome feline like Carl.

we raga, gg per ieri sera.

abbiamo battuto gente di 5 divisione e un clan molto rispettato in Francia nonostante la lineup a caso e ping merdosi. GG

direi di festeggiare così:

Link all’immagine

GG ancora!

Now look people, I love Japan. Japan is awesome and they have an amazing culture. There are those of us in the states that love their culture…for example, Manga and Anime fans, dude, yeah that’s right…talk about some devotion right there. Anyways, watch this dude get completely OWNED by the soda. Taste the power of Japan.

I’ll never forget this day.

I made myself look like a total and complete idiot.

I’ll take that back.

I probably made George W. Bush looked like a genius.

As per Rajan’s (ex-Pres of SMU Debating Society) recommendation, I joined the Sydney University debating team.

Now, Sydney University’s debating team are one of the top-ranking teams in the world. They even beat Harvard, Oxford and Cambridge at some World Debating Finals.**

Yeah, Sydney U have a lot of argumentative and eloquent people.

Rajan told me to join cause he told me that I’ll have a heck of experience and meet all sort of oddballs. Oddballs in a good way. He asked me to join the debating team so that he could experience it through me. Remember the scene from the movie “The Girl Next Door”? The scene where the protagonist’s friend screamed at him to fuck the girl so that he could ‘experience’ it too? It went something like this:

Friend: “FOR ME, MATT! FOR MEE!! FUCK HER FOR MEE!!!!”

It was like this, except the screaming and fucking.

Anyway, I e-mailed the Pres of Sydney U Debating Society, expressing my interest in joining. I only got a reply from him 3 weeks late, telling me to turn up for the next session at 5:15pm. Which was today. (Technically, yesterday, as its 12am here now).

So on the previous night, I got Rajan on MSN and asked him for some advice and this was what he told me:

Zareth says: (12:14:20 AM)

yo, you there?

rajan says: (12:17:06 AM)

yeap

Zareth says: (12:17:30 AM)

going for the debates tmr

Zareth says: (12:17:34 AM)

got any tips to survive?

rajan says: (12:19:35 AM)

urm, enjoy?

rajan says: (12:19:43 AM)

i dunno. don’t drink too much?

Zareth says: (12:20:24 AM)

wow, thanks for the sage advice, hahaha

rajan says: (12:20:31 AM)

lol

rajan says: (12:20:35 AM)

it’s your first day

Zareth says: (12:20:45 AM)

yep, first day

rajan says: (12:21:47 AM)

don’t break a leg. because debaters aren’t very good at first aid

Zareth says: (12:22:44 AM)

lol

rajan says: (12:22:54 AM)

if your first impression is “omg, so many weird people” you deduced right. if your first impression is “omg, so cool”, you are a true debater. if both, a smart debater.

Zareth says: (12:23:26 AM)

LOL

Zareth says: (12:23:35 AM)

what a weird viewpoint

rajan says: (12:23:47 AM)

lol

I highlighted the advice the Rajan gave me in bold red. One of the reasons I joined the debates was because Rajan told me that they served free beer. WOW! FREE BEER. If there is one ‘poison’ that can get me talking, beer is it. Actually let’s make that any alcoholic drinks. One beer and I probably debate the house down.

Hell, I know cause at the student orientation party, after drinking a beer, I went around getting phone numbers from people that I’ll never see or talk to again. I even got hit on by a gay Irish guy, but that’s another story.

But at the debates, there were pizzas. Rajan was right on this count. The pizzas were great. Really delicious. Unfortunately we only had 15 minutes to gobble it down before we went on to debate.

But.

NO BEER.

Maybe the debaters didn’t want any raging drunktards arguing. But I only argue well when I’m a drunktard. Cause when I’m sober, I’m Too. Damn. Quiet. I don’t really give a shit about what’s going on in an argument. But when I’m high, I give a shit about everything.

To add salt to my injury, the president gave the topic as “Why the government should NOT play a role in healthcare.” Then my partner and I was assigned to defend the position of why the government should just back out of the healthcare industry. Even better, we were both the opening team. So that means we had to go ahead first.

What the fuck man.

I’m all for the government playing a role in healthcare. I believed its something that the government should do. So of course I was lost for words when I had to put myself in an opposite position.

How? Think, Zareth, think? Why should the government fuck off from the healthcare industry and privatize it??

Then I hit on a solution. Why, of course, let’s follow Singapore’s policy.

This is the one time I love Singapore. If there’s any policies that make Singaporeans lives more miserable, trust the Singaporean government to do it.

The Singaporean government’s stance on healthcare is the citizen pay for their own medical care. As the PAP like to say: “Children should provide for their parents’ welfare. Its filial piety. You cannot always depend on the Government. We don’t follow Western ‘models’ of state welfare. We Confucian society.” Something along this line.

Since I was brainstorming with my partner, I shared my ideas with him. I meant everything. Which, in hindsight, was not a very good move.

As the opening government (team), my partner went ahead first to give his opening speech. He was a very impressive sight. It was his first time debating too and he managed to make a very eloquent and fiery speech. Of course, whatever I wanted to say, he said EVERYTHING! Oh crap, what am I going to say?

Next up was the opposing team opening up their side of the debate. Now, these people are real pros. They spoke fast, really rapid fast but you could still understand what they were talking about. And their arguments had real structure, meaning and all the bullocks. After the girl finished her speech (and shot down a few opposing questions from my team) it was my turn.

“All right Daer, it’s your turn,” the adjudicator turned to me.

That’s right, I’m now known as DAER.

How did this happened?

Well, when the President was typing everyone’s name onto a Excel spreadsheet, I got this typical response:

Me: “Zareth”

Pres: “Sorry?”

Me: “It’s Zareth. Z-A-R-E-T-H”

Then to my horror, I saw on the screen as he typed out “DAVER”.

Me: “No, no, no, it starts with a Z”

Pres: “Oh,” and he proceeds to delete the V and hence, “DAER” was born.

I couldn’t be bothered to correct him cause I was in the middle of a lecture hall and I would have to walk down to the front and changed my name to the correct spelling in front of the entire debating team. So Daer it was.

I’m fucking irritated by this. Zareth’s a cool name. But whenever I S-L-O-W-L-Y enunciate my name, the next party will go: “Eh? Jared? Gerad? JEIETH? JEDI?” Even when I spell out my name, I have to do it 3 fucking times before the other party get it.

Hey buddy, pay attention.

______________________________________________________________________________

I got up to the front and calmly cleared my throat. And then I made a fucking lame introduction: “Guys, this is my first time here. Yeah, so don’t have too high of an expectation of me.”

Meanwhile, my partner was rooting like crazy for me.

I like that guy.

While the other side of the house was ready to pounce and tear the flesh from my bones.

Shit.

With that lame introduction, I make a total fiasco of myself. For the first time, I had stage fright. I actually experience what stage fright was. I couldn’t get the words out. I mumbled and 3 minutes into my speech, I gave up and just went back to my seat.

Our speech were supposed to be 7 minutes.

To describe how bad it was, I’m going to post a clip of George W. Bush debates:

Go to 1.36 of the video. Now imagine that, but 10 times worse.

That’s how I sucked today.

Oh well, they know me as Daer. 

And Daer never existed.

** Rajan told me that Sydney Uni Debating Society is THE BEST, not one of the best.

I know I said that I won’t update my blog until the weekend. But I’m seriously in no mood to study and just witnessed something quite, quite amusing.

I came back from a rooftop BBQ that ended a few hours ago. It was organized by my hostel management to help us get to know our neighbours and hopefully, make a few friends, even though we (tenants) all know that we’re probably never see each other again after our six months contract end and we move out to better lodgings.

Unless we go to the same school. Even then, we’ll probably not see each other unless we are in the same faculty. Even if we were in the same faculty, we will probably be doing different courses. Even if we were doing the same course, we will probably have different class schedules.

So the chances of maintaining friendships are quite slim. Unless we become very chummy during the next six months. If we even bother to meet up.

During the BBQ in the cold, crisp night air where I enjoyed piping hot Aussie BBQ and music from a live band and generally, just soaking in the atmosphere and enjoying myself, there were quite a few rowdy people. No alcohol was provided and it was strictly BYO (Bring Your Own alcohol, for those uninitiated). So a number of people bought their own beers and liquors.

And it was a lot.

I decided to abstain because frankly, I rarely drink on weekdays and I hate Wednesdays (another topic). So I got myself a Pepsi and just waited in the long line for my hot dogs. A few Australians came up to me and joked with me that about the no alcohol, no hot dogs policy. I joked back that I had one Heineken in my fridge (I do) but didn’t want to lose my place in the line. It was just some bantering around to get to know each other. They were very friendly guys and they offered me beer. Of course I accepted their offer (even though I decided to abstain) but they later forgot about their offer.

I didn’t want to bother them about it because after all, its their beer and they were the ones offering me it. Anyway, after I got my hot dogs and stood in one corner devouring it, two girls from my floor, whom I knew, came up to join the party. They didn’t want any hot dogs so we stood that chatting. To be more accurate, they chatted while I was watching this girl.

This girl had a beer and was talking and giggling with a group of people near us. Let’s call her girl A. Now, Girl A was a little boisterous and was being a social butterfly, flittering here and there with her friends. As I was at the BBQ earlier, I knew she had a Heineken previously and so just assumed that she was high.

Well, I was wrong.

The two girls whom I was with decided to head back to their rooms and so I followed them. But after a few minutes of moping around in my room and acknowledging the fact that I was in no mood to study, I headed back to the BBQ alone to just enjoy the festive mood.

I recognized one of the Indian dudes and started chatting with him. When he remembered I was Singaporean, he started to look around for another Singaporean guy he met as he wanted to introduce us. Thankfully he didn’t (See “Secret Societies and NDP” for reason).

Meanwhile, Girl A was now very boisterous. She was staggering around, laughing and talking loudly to every person she met. One of the guys who was subjected to her constant laughing told us that she just had one beer.

One beer? Really? I thought it was two or three?

Girl A generally made a fool of herself. She grabbed and pawed at this French guy (I assume, because of his angular face) who did not look please and told her to stop it.

The rest of us just grinned and laughed at her antics.

Someone mentioned that she was Malaysian. But I could be wrong. She could be Singaporean, Thai, Filipino or something else. Anyway, her nationality is not of great importance.

Her friend was trying to calm Girl A down and at times, had to drag her away. This farce continued for the the next 10 minutes or so, Girl A talking to people, being very chummy and friendly, laughing and hopping around and her friend following her, desperately trying to calm her down.

Then for some unknown reasons to me, Girl A broke down and cried.

Girl A started shaking her head violently every time her friend tried to talk to her and later, Girl A sat on a bench and continued sobbing.

Oh, has the beer haze lifted?

Girl A’s friend bought her water and after a few minutes, Girl A calmed down sufficiently. I think the reason why Girl A broke down was because she realized she just embarrassed herself  in front of half the hostel tenants, not to mention the staff too. I can’t confirmed this because I was just standing at one side watching the whole drama. So its just an assumption.

That was one reason why I abstained from any alcohol. If you ever want to impress anyone and give a great first impression, the first rule is: DON’T GET DRUNK. DON’T GET DRUNK. Have one beer to loosen up, if you must. But DON’T GET DRUNK.

Especially when you are in front of a group of people who will bump into you in the lobby for the next six months. It’s okay to get drunk with your group at a pub or club. Because it is a pub/club and they’ll be 50-100 other people drinking their heads in. But at a get-together BBQ? Sure, it’ll be fine if there was a group of males (and females) playing beer pong and having a drinking competition.

Unfortunately the rest of us were sober.

Note to Girl A (If she ever reads my blog and identifies herself): Its okay to get drunk. I get drunk. Sometimes really, really shit-faced drunk. And those times are not the times you would want to be around me. Unfortunately, you were the only one drunk/high/tipsy and the rest of us were not. But don’t take it to heart, take it as lesson learned, ok?

P.S. Damn, Aussies can really drink! I saw a lot of empty beer bottles but no one seemed out of control (except Girl A).

Taunting is funny. Taunting is ejaculating semen composed entirely of ownage into your opponent’s face and eyes. There’s nothing more satisfying than beating your opponent into stun then taking the few frames of complete safety to taunt and then continue the beating.

Conversely, there’s nothing more embarrassing than slightly miscalculating how many frames of safety you have, taunting and then having your opponent wake up from stun at the last frame of taunt, only to beat you down and win the round.

Now I don’t know about you, but with me, taunting is like a destructive vice. I taunt way more than I should, often leading to egg on my face, cake on my shirt, faeces in my backpack – whatever you want to call it. I tell myself “OK, NEXT ROUND, NO TAUNTING” but then then an irresistible opportunity comes up and I do it again. What a clown.

So what is taunting for exactly?  On the surface, you would think :

• To show off how badass you are.  Waving your cock in your opponents face leaving them confused, angry and slightly excited.

• To highlight what a scrub your opponent is.  You’re basically saying:

“To whom it may concern,

It has come to my attention in the recent minutes of our meeting that your abilities are at best, limited.  I fear not your advances for I do not believe you possess the necessary skill to defeat me.  In light of this, I have decided to make several of my frames redundant, confident even with this disadvantage, you still will not be able to defeat me.  I do not respect you.

Sincerely,

Your Pwner. “

But of course, taunting can also be used for mind games.  I know that when I get taunted, my play just goes out the window.  I’m just thinking “FUCK I GOTTA GET THIS GUY TAUNT ME EH I’LL FUCKING SHOW YOU YOU’RE JUST A FUCKING SCRUBBY KEN SUCK MY DICK AND CHOKE ON MY SHIT AW FUCK I JUST GOT ULTRA’D AND LOST FUCK THIS GAME I HATE KEN SO MUCH“.  So sometimes I also use taunting at unsafe moments just to bait the guy into doing something stupid, knowing that that’s probably what I would do.

Does your play go out the window when you get taunted or do you keep a steady head?  When do you use taunting and why?

Well, I’m going to go play some SFIV soon, and I will NOT be taunting.

Stay aggravating,

Ken doing what he does best

- Mehorn

Ok, where were we. The last time we checked in on our fair city, the Jews were pissed that they were being forced to adopt Greek culture, so they rebelled and became the capital of the Hasmodean kingdom. The Hasmoneans were nothing to write home about, it lasted for 103 years until 37 BCE, when the Romans rolled in and calmed things down. To put this all in perspective, Julius Caeser was murdered in 44 BCE. The kingdom was marred by the normal things that plague a hereditary monarchy, fratricide and regicide. There were varying blocks of civil war until the Romans rolled back in in 27 BCE.

Finally in 19 BCE, Herod was installed by the Romans. He married a Hasmonean princess to make himself seem more legitimate, and then murdered all of her relatives. To his credit, he built a huge complex around the Second Temple. He also greatly expanded the minting of currency in the city. After he died in 6 BCE, Jerusalem and the Judea came under direct Roman rule.

Siege and Destruction of Rome by David Roberts

Without going into details, we know that Early Christianity began to evolve in the city at this point in time. Jerusalem was allegedly the site of the original crucifixion, and was where the Apostles really started preaching the Gospel. The Romans tended to be decent about letting a race keep its culture once it was a province of the empire; however in 66 CE, the Jews revolted in opposition to the Roman taxation as well as cultural imposition. The soon-to-be emperor Titus brought in 60,000 troops, and beseiged the city, crucifying the thousands that attempted to flee. Finally he broke through and destroyed the Temple and the better part of the city. Only a section of one wall of the temple was left, what is now known as the Wailing Wall.

Jerusalem remained a relatively unimportant colony of the Roman and Byzantine empire for nearly 600 years. During that time the city was rebuilt, and the Jews rebelled unsuccessfully against the Romans two more times. In 335, the emperor Constantine built the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, turning the city into the epicenter of Christian worship. It is worth noting that Jews were banned from the city during this time.

Things really start to get messy when Muhammed allegedly ascended into heaven from Jerusalem in the mid 630s. Islam had spread through the Arabian peninsula, and they wanted to take over their holy city. The Jews, as they had been banned from their holy city for nearly 600 years allied with the Muslims in their conquest. In 638 the Arabs overwhelmed Jerusalem, slaughtering everyone who was garrisoned there. 60 years later, the calphate built the Dome of the Rock, on the spot where Muhammed allegedly ascended into heaven. The Dome would come to be the second most sacred site in the Muslim faith.

The Dome of the Rock

Jerusalem did very well during the early years of Arab rule. Christians and Jews, were treated as somewhat second class citizens. They could not practice their religion, but for the most part were tolerated, which was very kind of the Muslims if you ask me. This all changed in 1009, when the acting Caliph ordered the destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, started killing clergy, and harassed pilgrims. 30 years later his successor tried to make it right by allowing the church to be rebuilt, realizing the the reason Jerusalem was doing so well was because of the pilgrims.

But the damage was done. In 1095 the Byzantine Emperor and the Pope called for all good Christians to take up arms. This was not 100% religiously motivated, the Arabs were weakening, and Christianity in general needed some good news. But, the crusades had begun. The Crusaders reached Jerusalem in 1099, tired and hungry, a fraction of the size when they had begun. The Jews and Muslims did their best to keep the crusaders out of the city, but in the end they didn’t stand a chance. The Crusaders murdered as many Muslims and Jews as they could get their hands on, and burned all the synagogues and the mosques oftentimes with their respective worshipers inside. Please keep this in mind next time you hear a politician use the phrase “crusade”.

The New Christian Republic of Jerusalem lasted until 187 when Saladin took it back. He went out of his way to make it known that all religions would be tolerated under his rule. This was unacceptable to the Christians, and another crusade was lead by Richard I. At one point on his trek, he took over a city by telling them that they would be spared, only to massacre the residents when their gates were opened. Richard made it to the city walls, but never took the city, instead arranging a deal where unarmed Christian pilgrims could come to the city whenever they wanted.

For one reason or another in 1219, the acting caliph destroyed the walls of the city, rendering

Badass statue of Saladin in Damascus

the city completely defenseless. 10 years later the Germans came under control of the city, and tried to rebuild the walls, but they were again knocked down 10 years later when their lease ran out (no joke). Again in 1243 the Christians took control of the city, but ended up staring at a massive army of Mamluk Turks that easily took over the city and murdered all but 2,000 Christians and Jews.

Jerusalem is so vulnerable at this point that there is a possibility that Mongols periodical wailed on the city from time to time during this period. There is no evidence to support this, but the general area was always on fire it seems. The Mamluks did their best to rebuild the city, but eventually in 1517 the Ottomans took it over. And that is where I will stop the summary.

Living in Jerusalem was seemingly a death sentance in the 1500 years after the death of Julius Caesar. Some of the worst atrocities in the brief history of humankind were committed during that period. At this point now the Muslims are the top dogs in the region. Next time we’ll start with the Ottoman Empire and take it to our modern period.

Sharni came to visit at the beginning of this month. She came because I asked her to, and that’s good enough for her. I decided to have a housewarming to celebrate my new unit which I just bought. The day she is due to fly in I get a call from Fast impressions, asking if i would like a free ticket to christian speed dating that night, so I ask if they have two. I unfortunately leave work late, get delayed by traffic on the gold coast freeway, end up being late to pick up sharni, then late to the speed dating, but we got there just as they were starting. Christian speed dating is weird. If anybody says people that go are normal, just say that I went, that will end all doubt. I am not christian per say. I believe in a god, just not jebus.

When it was all over Sharni pulled me aside and said quite vehemently  “I -hate- you”. Apparently one of the guys asked how I knew Sharni, so I said the truth, we both dating the same guy. So he gets around to Sharni and accuses her of stealing my boyfriend. lol. Anyway there was also a guy that made sharni stand up to assess her child bearing hips. “Do you clean? Do you cook? do you sew? Good. You shall make a fine wife”. Yeah… no. It was a fun night anyway, free alcohol, snacks and we did meet one sane guy Matt who we both thought was a good innocent guy but when will I learn there is no such thing. He came to my BBQ and yeah, not so innocent.

I kept leaving missions for Sharni to do during the day while I was at work. MASSIVE FAIL. Lazy ass bum wouldn’t even get out of her pj’s. Well I suppose it was her holiday. But by the end of the week I was sniffling and I was quite sick during my BBQ. Alcohol really clears up the sinuses though. I had to have help with the cooking. For starters no one showed up until after lunch, like 2-3pm. Invitation said 12. ie lunch bbq. Then the dratted thing wouldn’t start. Jason managed to reset the circuit breaker and away we went. I now have way too many sausages and alcohol because I invited over 150 people and about 20 showed up. All of my neighbours. The entire point of having a housewarming. 50 units. And none of them showed up. Well I lie. Sharni spotted a group having a bbq of their own on their balcony and yelled over to them to get them to come join us. So I got to meet my crazy biker neighbours. They may not have been bikers, but they looked like you wouldn’t want to mess with them. I should return their Hackey sack before I get whacked.

Sharni and I had made jelly shots the previous nights. So I managed to do jelly shots -in a syringe- infront of an 8 year old child. Good work drunken Mandy, great example. But the jelly shots were a hit. Jewelz boy had one two many and jumped into the pool and then climbed on the roof to yell at the top of his lungs so that someone called the police. Made for an interesting night. Those two crazy kids are expecting a baby and are now engaged. Woo hoo.

The night before was also interesting. Liz and her friend Sam came over for a few quite ones and then to stay for the party on Saturday, but Sam had an epletic fit on my comfy couch, which was lucky it was my comfy couch because she didn’t hurt herself. And it was lucky that Sharni was there to check her airways and pulse and make sure she didn’t die. We eventually called for an ambulance after Sam went into a second round of fits, and after all the excitement we didn’t feel like drinking anymore and went to bed.

I was all sickly for the next week while Sharni was there and had to go into work to fix stuff on the Tuesday, which made us late for Dracula’s down on the gold coast. It may be a global recession but that place was packed out to the max man. yeah man it was packed as. We were staying in the casino that night so we could drink to excess and binge we did. We made a friend in the bar while we were madly getting autographs from anyone scary looking. He wasn’t in the show but Sharni made him sign our photo anyway. He came to the casino with us, where the bar staff suggested politely that I should have a glass of water instead of more alcomohole. It may not have helped my cause when i asked for a drink in a glass shaped like this *does hand gestures of funky cocktail glass*. Yeah, maybe i was a little drunk. The next day we went for a dip in the casino pool which was freezing and then in the spa which was awesome (gotta get me one of them) and bummed around the gold coast until Sharni flew home. I have the most awesome picture of Sharni being scared shitless in the Dracula’s haunted house. I didn’t make it home that night though. I was so sick and so tired and couldn’t keep my eyes open that I rang Sarah and stayed the night at her house. I didn’t see much of her because i went straight to sleep. But I am ever so thankful.

<Many uneventful days of being sick then recovered then sick again inbetween>

Then I flew down to Sydney and caught a train and a bus out to Mudgee for Sharni’s birthday. We went and played games at a LAN the whole weekend. I was the Queen of Fodder, and I took to bunny hopping around the maps in Call of Duty 4 to make dying more interesting. The next day I actually tried and kicked ass, wiping out the whole of the opposing team in one fell swoop in Team Fortress 2. I may not of been the greatest, but I wasn’t the worst, I am glad to, this once, be that cursed word average.

I would have liked to go down to Wollongong to see my friend Kylie who also has a baby bump but alas, the timetables did not leave enough time for a 4 hour round trip to Wollongong. Next time gadget. She is actually considering moving up here to Brisbane, if she does it will be fantastic. I’ll volunteer myself to be baby sitter. So long as the baby comes with a man page. So many friend’s being preggers. My high school friend Suzi is also expecting. I just think it is the greatest thing in the world. Oh no, I’m all clucky, best to avoid any unnecessary trips to target and walking down the aisles of those tiny cute little itty bubby shoes. Snap out of it Mandy! Babies are evil. Babies, the other other white meat. Ok now I’m back.

Going for drinks soon with Coral and Jason. Can’t have too many, I have to drive home.