Sharing my daily life and experiences to remind myself to cherish all people and things, big or small. I hope that through my sharing, it helps or inspires some of you, in one way or another.
Parents' Day 2020 + Walking in the Rain DIY paint + cravings shared with family + 五月天“突然好想见到你”线上演唱会 + 반의 반 + 밀회 + 주먹쥐고 소림사 + 少林英雄 + Sutra + Terrace House: Tokyo 2019–2020 + 谁是被害者 + 하트시그널 Season 1 and 2 + 心动的信号第2季
6/5/20 Weds: Happy Parents’ Day to my Dad and Mum!Have to opt for take-away for zi char that we usually eat, and I went to market to collect the food ($54) after pre-ordering it on phone. We love the 泰式鸡this time, 其余菜肴还有招牌豆腐、姜葱鱼片、蒙古排骨（黑胡椒和美乃滋）和sambal kangkong!
7/5/20 Thurs: My first DIY number painting is done! I spent eight days to complete the painting of 18 colours... an average of about four to five hours a day. It does strain the eyes after sometime and "tested" my patience as well, yet I am satisfied with the end-product! *Ready to be on display at my new place this year!*
14/5/20 Thurs: Staying at home during CB period meant more time on social media, and those food recommendation ads proved to be more than tempting. I ordered two unagi dons, chicken teriyaki don and salmon sashimi from Don Play Play ($53.20) for lunch with mum and bro. Nothing fantastic, but I wanted my unagi and salmon sashimi haha.
16/5/20 Sat: Happy Monthsary to PotaTOHs! Love the vibe here! I'm looking forward to a cozy home of ours to come very soon.
30/5/20 Sat: vitamin supplements from Nano Singapore for my family are here! The 40 billion CFU probiotic worked really well for me, and it’s OOS so often that I'm glad that I finally laid my hands on them again! *Bye bye stomach issues!* Their digestive wellness formula didn’t work that great for me though, probably because I forgot to eat sometimes, or that I cannot remember to eat it 30mins before a meal often. Just begun taking their 15 Day Colon Detox Formula to see if it works for me.*I'm fine, but my bro's been running to the toilet for a bit tsk.*
31/5/20 Sun: Ordered egg tarts (original and pandan-flavoured) and fried carrot cake from Tai Cheong bakery as I gave in to temptations again haha. Their carrot cake was flavourful, but a bit too savoury for me, and their pandan egg tarts were a tad too sweet. The family still prefers their original egg tarts. *Reminder to myself that I'm more of a savoury than sweets person whenever I see ads about mille crepes and teas online again~ lol.*
Caught五月天“突然好想见到你”线上演唱会on facebook that night and I enjoyed it! The members were sincere in staging the concert at a real stadium in Taiwan (though not live live per se), and I could sing along to almost every song in that 1hour haha!*Who says this cannot be the "trend" in future? Online concerts and maybe add in VR/AR/3D aspects to sell it as a fee-paying concert?* Rating: 4/5 2/6/20 Tues: End of CB phase 1 in Singapore. STC cannot reopen till July, so I am still technically working from home. For the past two months or so, I revised simple Thai and Korean languages, did DIY number painting, practised a few songs on ukulele, exercised five to six days a week with the help of Fitbit, watched mum cook in the evenings, shopped online for needs and wants and watched a number of shows. *I'm pondering if I should take up any e-courses now to fill time when I am done with my second DIY number painting, which should be completed by next week. Let's see.* Tried a few take-aways for food which I spent a bit on, but none mentioned above was superb. Even as I had Pho Street's spicy pork shabu shabu pork rice vermicelli and Viet rolls with prawn and pork belly for lunch ($13.90) this afternoon thanks to my brother who went out for job interview and passed by JE to buy it, I was less than impressed. It's the second time I take home the Viet rolls and this time, the skin was torn with much of the vermicelli splattered messily in the box haiz. I wonder if that has got to do with them being short-handed (brother said there were only two staffs on duty) or not? But for sure, most of the time, food are best consumed on the spot. *Shall stick to the usual hawker food for my take-aways now!*
Watched "반의 반" because of정해인. 문하원 (정해인) is an AI programmer who cannot forget his first love and he developed a voice-enhanced programme that could mimic the way she would respond (when later she tragically died in the cold in Norway where the two grew up together) and that he could talk to when she's not around. Preserving the voice and conscious of a love one who is dead.. intriguing concept but I doubt the AI world could do this yet? Personally, I don't know if I would want this... doesn't it mean that it could be very hard for you to let go of them even as time passes? Sadly, the viewership rating got poorer for this show, and it was eventually shortened to 12 episodes. However, the music and general feel of it is really calming in such times. They are mentioned in someone's review I found: https://koreandramaland.com/a-piece-of-your-mind-kdrama-overview/ Rating: 3.5/5
A dangerous relationship developed between piano teacher오혜원 (김희애) and gifted student이선재 (유아인) in this k-drama "밀회". 유아인is a good actor, and he played those classical pieces so well... just like a prodigy haha. 김희애is also the female lead in the recent much-vaunted k-drama remake "부부의 세계"... which I could not bring myself to finish as the revenges seemed to never end in there.
Rating: 3.5/5
I enjoy "주먹쥐고 소림사" so much that I'm watching it a second time now! Korean comedian김병만first bought김동준, Niel, 장우혁and Yook Joong Wan to嵩山少林寺in winter to learn Shaolin martial arts from the武僧. That was only a one-episode special but I thought both김병만and김동준has pretty good stamina! How I wished the latter joined in the full Summer series that was aired in 2015 though. For the full series, six male artistes (김병만, 김정환, Yook Joong Wan, 박철민, 온주완and CN Blue's이정신) and seven female artistes including the late Goo Hara, UEE, Fei etc went to北少林and南少林respectively to learn martial arts. I found the segments at北少林aka嵩山少林寺nicer, in the sense that the masters looked and sounded friendlier somewhat as compared to those at南少林. *In saying that, I am still very impressed with理亮师傅's水上漂功夫though.* Training was very tough (I tried to do some moves but failed~), but the male artistes showed utmost seriousness in learning, and sometimes also made it funny with their impromptu acts, especially Yook Joong Wan who had to struggle with his weights. The highlight of the show for me wasn't the artistes though... but the masters at少林寺! *师傅个个法相庄严啊~当师傅实力和脸蛋都是必要考虑的条件吗？哈哈！* My bias was延波师傅because he has a warm smile and the way he talks sounds like he is from Southern China (saw somewhere someone mentioned it's福建省）, so the accent is closer to ours haha! However, he looks pretty stern when when he was lecturing释小琥、释小淑和释小涵in“少林英雄”. A pity he's no longer active on Weibo and IG, but I am following延岑师傅、延咨师傅、延炫师傅、延荻师傅on Weibo~
Much as they are young people like us (80ers and 90ers), they have been through a different path in their lives, and from the way they talked on the show, their belief and practice in禅宗has definitely taught them good principles and values. 我欣赏延岑师傅说话周到、圆滑。延咨师傅感觉比较安静、腼腆，延炫师傅有“少林梁朝伟”之称haha~ 延荻师傅看来白白净净的，有点像“唐僧”呵呵。 Rating: 5/5
I am never big on variety shows with kids in them, but I decided to watch this first and foremost because延岑师傅、延波师傅and延咨师傅appeared on the show as the main teachers in a few episodes. *赵文卓and young monk释小松made special appearances too.* The kids were between four to 10 years old. Besides the three I mentioned earlier, the others are释小翔、释小彬、释小沄、释小王、释小乐and释小扣. Kids that come from cities and villagers began their two months of life-away-from parents in Shaolin monastery together, and they learnt to be independent, to trust people, to earn money for themselves and to cooperate etc. Each individual had their own temper and personalities, but they learnt to grow up a little by the end. *I am rather amazed by how well kids nowadays could talk! How do I handle them omg!?*
They even sang a theme song for the show and I liked it a lot! The Shaolin experience must have been a precious learning experience that they will cherish for life. Rating: 4.25/5
Caught a kungfu stage play called "Sutra" with延波师傅、延炫师傅and延咨师傅in it. It was a well-thought collaboration between choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, sculptor Antony Gormley and 19 Buddhist monks from Shaolin Temple, and has been in running for 10 years or so with many shows around the world. The play explores the philosophy and faith behind the Shaolin tradition and its relationship with kungfu within a contemporary context, as well as from the "East meets West" dilemma to coherence in the end. I may not be able to comprehend the whole abstract idea of this, but at least at the "visual level", the monks worked as one with the wooden boxes onstage and showed off their unison in the martial art moves... solid yet fluid and totally breathtaking. Rating: 4.5/5
Terrace House: Tokyo 2019-2020 has been cancelled after 42 episodes due to the recent death of Hana Kimura, a 22-year old pro wrestler on the reality show. She succumbed to cyberbullying. It's not easy for these non-celebrities sometimes as keyboard warriors can sound really harsh in social media. The amount of stress they have to take is unimaginable, especially in the case of young Kimura's. Fame comes with a price. May she rest in peace. Much as it is easier to be said than actually done, I hope people can learn to take words in the virtual world lighter than they are, as your own mental health is the most important no matter what others has to say about you. Everyone has to have a strong inner self to be able to live their lives well, even if it means being shameless and tactless at times, what's more important than protecting your own life? Rating: 3.5/5
"하트시그널" is Korea's experimental reality show in which three non-celebrity guys and girls (one more guy and girl added halfway into it) live under one roof for a month in the aim to get them to date. They were not supposed to reveal their age nor occupation on the first day. No guy stood out for me in Season 1, but the lawyer장천has a pretty nice smile. He ended up with shoes designer배윤경 (now an actress!?) in the end, while musical actor강성욱paired up successfully with 2nd runner-up of Miss Korea 2016신아라. I didn't like강성욱right from the start because I found him too talkative and there wasn't much substance in his words. Alas, he was sent to jail for sexual assault not too long ago. Rating: 3.5/5
Korean medicine doctor김도균was the first to go into the house in Season 2. He's not super good-looking, but he has this "weird quiet charm" and I actually liked him. The other guy I enjoyed watching was chef김현우, who was quite the talk of the show as he ding-dongs between Microsoft employee오영주and student임현주. 김도균was rather persistent with임현주as well, even after fashion curator김장미appeared... the love triangle formed haha. 김도균's quite meticulous in many ways, and he certainly was not as boring as he seemed to be as we discovered later into the show. Sadly for the공유look-alike, 임현주and김현우chose each other in the finale, while COO of Spendwallet정재호won the hearts of aspiring actress송다은whom he liked right from the start. Rating: 4/5
China's version was called "心动的信号" and I only watched Season 2 that aired last year because none of the participants in Season 1 grabbed my attention lol. *All eight participants are 90-ers omg!* 仔仔cum萧敬腾look-alike吴翔威 (某香槟品牌中国区品牌大使) caught my eyes the minute he walked into the house in his suits haha. The love triangle between him and杨凯雯 (玩具设计师)、赵琦君 (投资经理)began from a rather "fierce battle" to a calmer one as he took the relatively milder yet not-all-passive approach towards dating the girl later. He's very meticulous and transformed into a cute guy in front of the girl he likes, and tried his best too but just wasn't able to stop the other two from becoming a couple still haha. As for another couple陈奕辰 (在校学生兼职英语老师) and 张天 (影视制片人), I didn't like the guy from the start... not his looks even if he was almost always the "chosen one" among three other ladies on the show. News has it the two broke up in a rather ugly manner not long after the show ended, and that陈奕辰has got plastic surgery done blah. 分享感受而已。真假看了就算。我只是嗑瓜观众。 Rating: 3.75/5
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