Blessed am I

I was in my ex-campus where I spent 7 good years studying or mugging one late afternoon.... I gave a call to one of my good jie mei who is working there now, earning BIG BUCKS and check if she's had her lunch yet... oh boy, she's busy, no time to come down for a quick bite with me.

Oh well, I might as well just quickly settle my lunch before rushing off to another appt.

Suddenly, it dawned upon me that for my 7years in campus, I never had to lunch alone. NEVER! Can you believe it? I was always surrounded by my classmates or labmates or friends.... How blessed was I.

In my 1st year, I had a bunch of crazy guy gang whom I hang out with, then the lectures were all mostly mass lectures of more than 300 pple, I get totally lost in the crowd if not for this crazy guy gang... they were always full of nonsense and have something to laugh about over lunch. It was light and enjoyable. FUN!

In my 2nd and 3rd year, we started to speciallised into different areas, so I spent less time with these crazy guys and had more time to bond with my classmates of about 30. We would spend our before, inbetween or after lessons times sitting on benches outside the LTs and poke fun at each other. At times victimizing some of our classmates as well... I remember a funny "experiment on PAIN tolerance in women before and after their pregnancy" hee.... we never really had to try it out though, but we always had a good laugh when we talk about it! Markie boy... u the winner of jokes & story-telling!

After lessons was always the BEST part of my campus life... because its the time when I go and meet up with my friends from other faculties. We spend endless nights on Dai Di and Bridge and many sabotages in the pool hee.... how fun it was then...

Came honors year.... each day was spend dragging our feet from the lecture rooms to the canteen and back... cos lessons stretches for the WHOLE day... just nothing but sit down lessons... super tough, as the class size shrank to about 10 only, it was hard to escape the glare from the lecturer for falling asleep, we developed a sweets culture amongst us.... each day we try to entertain each other with different sweets hee... too bad for those without a sweet tooth...

Towards the Mid of my 4th year, I met this bunch of biologist who would not stop at simple jokes... intellectual jokes peppered with wisdom flew the skies each time we had lunch together. At times, the lure of work was not as inviting as the conversations of the group. Here, I met some really extraordinary people who would go out of their way just to help someone without expecting any form of rewards. Here, I learnt what is humanity (see which was such a struggle, because where I come from, most of the people do not even know what humanity is!)

When I decided to further my studies, my world got confined a lab space, where I spend an average of 10-12hrs each day churning out experiments and chopping up fish. I got my first encounter working with foreign talents and found that my peers in the lab has their own sense of humour and are truly fun people. I had great fun immersing into their dumpling culture, the happiness of making a meal together followed by a game of cards (gong zhu) was almost like a traditional ritual of each gathering. Simple yet meaningful. I recall having to go round getting each persons' birthdate and making a point to celebrate them each month. One of my ex-labbies, in his late 30s commented that it was the 1st time anyone celebrated his birthday with a cake! Imagine that! I was so happy that our simple get-together meant so much to him.

During these years there were tough moments where my humane friends like the otterman, robina, alvin, cyn etc got me together by helping me to analyse the situations, ensure that I get fed during lunch and provided the much needed support.

For 7 long years, I had the blessings of great friendships, lunch buddies and wonderful memories that will last a lifetime.

Thank You dear friends!

Thank You God! =D