i just downloaded a whole bunch of books, and i now have a few hundred books, i think. can't wait to read them all~ <3

but sadly, i have to start looking for an internship soon. otherwise my resume would be a blank sheet of paper. =(

really don't wanna leave thailand and start facing the pressure back in sg.. lol.

it is awesome to come back from a holiday on fridays, then you have the whole weekend to look forward to. =D

so.. snorkeling was fun, but after diving, snorkeling seems so tame and boring now. lol.

the first day of diving lessons was terrifying, cos we had to learn lots of skills, like removing our mask underwater and putting it back on and clearing the water from the whole bloody mask. we both failed at that lol. i just... freak out when i can't see underwater and somehow try to breathe through my nose, which is like the stupidest thing ever. and then i choke on the seawater underwater which freaks me out even more and before i know it, I'm bolting for the surface. =.=

but the second day was better, because i was like 12 metros underwater and bolting for the surface was a very dangerous option... so lol i had no choice but to stay calm. i think i perform better under pressure! both literally and figuratively. hahaha.

the diving itself was awesome, saw a lot of marine life really close up. and our instructor was awesome too, you can tell that he really cared about the animals there. and we saw soooo many things! like squids, lion fish, moray eels, trigger fish, ghost pipe fish, porcupine fish, scorpionfish, lizardfish, a turtle(!), sea moths, nudibranches, prawns, lobsters, etc etc. it was super awesome. but also a little scary, cos sometimes we were dangerously close to the poisonous ones.

and the more we dived, the more we got used to it, and the better we became! it was great. haha. can't wait to go dive again. i think we should dive more while we're in thailand, because once we go back to sg, it'll just be too expensive and bothersome to organize a diving trip..

if you like being close to wild animals, i think diving beats a safari anytime.. there are like fishes swimming all around you, and some even swim with you (like the cleaner fish). haha. it is a really awesome feeling. except the part when i worried about drowning. xD

but getting back to bangkok was not so great.. 12 hour bus rides are hell. and when we reached the bus terminal, there were taxi drivers camping around and trying to cheat us of our money. they asked for 500 baht to drive us back to our hostel. which is wayyy too expensive. and when we asked them to drive us to the nearest train station instead, they asked for 200 baht, claiming that it was really far away, and there was traffic jam. luckily we didn't give in to them and we just walked away.

we walked out of the bus terminal, and saw another row of taxis waiting along the main road. decided to try our luck again, and asked them to bring us to the nearest train station. he turned on the meter, which was a good thing. usually we're supposed to leave the taxi if they don't use the mater. terns out it was only 2km away and costs only 47 baht. and the traffic jam thing was bullshit. it was five a.m in the morning and the traffic was so smooth. stupid taxi drivers who tried to charge us 4 times the price! urgh. it annoys me to know how many people have been cheated by them, when there are honest taxi drivers waiting not 1km away. so yeah, getting home cost a total of 250 baht, which was half the price of what they asked.

moral of the story? always insist on a meter! usually those driving along the main roads would automatically use the meter. only those who are camping around popular spots, appear super friendly, speak passable english, would try to quote you a price. and there's no point haggling with them. by walking just a bit to the main roads, you'll be able to save much more. and you get to support the honest taxi drivers who don't try to cheat your money too!

first time i spent so much time planning for a trip! at first, we were only supposed to go away for the weekend, but then we decided to skip school on monday and tuesday as well, so that we had enough time to do all the activities that we wanted.

then we decided to skip wednesday and thursday as well, so that we could learn how to dive. hahaha. i think it's a really beautiful place for a first-timer to dive in, and i'm really looking forward to it! but there's still this irrational fear that a stingray will sting me, or fishes will bite me, or whatnot. lol. >_<

so here's the plan!
friday: take overnight bus to krabi
saturday: reach krabi, take another bus to koh lanta, go kayaking
sunday: take the 4 islands tour, go snorkeling
monday to wednesday: PADI certification~
thursday: slack around, do some sightseeing (there's an animal welfare place there!), take overnight bus back to bangkok
friday: reach bangkok at 4.30am and go to school at 8am! lol. busy busy. xD

won't be able to take underwater pictures though, cos i don't have the underwater camera things..

wheee sounds like a fun trip. hope i won't be disappointed like i was with pattaya..

wanted to go to an elephant park to learn more about these magnificent creatures, so i checked out some notable parks in wiki and tripadvisor. i didn't want to go to those parks with elephants shows and circuses cos let's face it, that's just animal cruelty. so i was looking for those parks that rehabilitate street elephants and stuff.

and the reviews were overwhelmingly good. there were like a few hundred excellent ratings, compared to 4 or 5 terrible ratings. i was reading all the excellent ratings and being excited about visiting elephants when kj asked me to read the terrible reviews to get a more balanced view. and apparently the handlers use metal hooks or sharpened sticks to keep the poor elephants in line. and if they wander of the route or stop, they get hit with the sticks. someone even commented that there was blood and everything on the elephants.

reading those reviews really broke my heart and made me feel very disillusioned about these places. even though they profess to respect the elephants and keep them in a safe environment, i don't think they actually do so.. so now I'm not going to elephant parks anymore.. poor things. and to think that they're thailand's most respected animals. sigh. and i don't think zoos are any better either. why are us humans so cruel? =(

this was usually the stuff of my nightmares. and yes i get nightmares about exams. lol.

so i was lolling around at home and kj got a call from someone. i ignored it until he said things like 'oh, if we leave now can we make it?'and i was like, oh no, why do we have to leave? i checked the clock and it was 15 minutes past five. and the exam (which i thought was tomorrow) started at 5. LOL. but i was in denial, so i continued playing my game, all the while hoping that it wasn't true, the exam wasn't RIGHT NOW.. but it was true. T_T

we went into the exam room 1 hour late, and everyone's eyes were on us when we walked in. i hated that. made me feel very embarrassed. oh and the exam regulations stipulate that no one could take the exam after half an hour, but they made an exception for us, phew. i thought our professor wouldn't, cos he's the type of person who has a stick up his ass.

but urgh. i couldn't focus on the exam cos uh, i havent studied for it yet? i usually study the night before and now there was no night before for me to study! and i was so freaked out of my wits that i couldn't settle down and just focus on the exam.

the worst thing is that i became one of those ppl that i scorned. when i hear of ppl doing this, i think things like, uh, it's your EXAM, how can you not know when or where it is? then i think that they're irresponsible ppl who can't be bothered to check the time and place, and now I'm one of those ppl! T_T idk why i thought it was sunday, for goodness sake.

reminds me of the time when i did both part a and b for the final question in my o levels emaths exam. i used to think ppl who did that were dumb, cos lol you only need to do one part. the other part was optional, why waste your time? and haha I'm one of those idiots who did both parts. why do i always end up becoming ppl that i don't like? T_T

oh but kj is funnier, he did the optional part for fun. stupid math genius. =.=

the hunger games. read it!

sorry i haven't been blogging much, just been way too busy playing games on kongregate. lol. >_<

but i went to pattaya a few weeks ago. it was kinda boring. more of a tourist trap, where everything is too expensive lol. but i saw naked girls. wahaha. and a ladyboy show. oh and they had ripley's believe it or not, which was quite a disappointment, really. maybe because i didn't dare to go to the horror sections. haha.

and the drivers here are damn pro. every time i take a cab, i get really impressed with their skills and guts lol. their reflexes are damn fast, and they manage to have 3 lanes of cars when there's only two lanes marked out. and lol they drive into the incoming traffic lane to cut queues. they wouldn't get away with doing half of the things that they're doing back in sg though. the traffic here is realllyyy crazy and scary. but fun too. haha. and I'm used to sitting on motorbikes now! but i don't do it often, cos the accident rate scares me a little.

today i was stuck in a traffic jam and there was a pick-up truck next to me. the pick-up truck had like piles of pig carcasses stacked up, and the pigs were sliced open, so you could see the ribs and everything. it was a damn disgusting sight. what made it worse was that it wasn't even covered properly, just with a canvass sheet that barely covered half of the pile, and omg we were stuck in a traffic jam leh. imagine the pollution the flesh was being exposed to. and the fact that it would be slowly rotting away.. yucks. i felt really sick after that. lol.

hmm projects are starting to mount up already. a little stressed. idk how i'll manage to escape from ssh for a few days, as it'll mean skipping lessons and idk which one to skip! don't want my group mates to have a bad impression of me.

i took a tuk tuk today! it was.. very bumpy, and i was exposed to all the pollution on the streets, which is horrible. but the guy drove very fast, so it was kinda fun. haha.

oh and during group discussions, i found out a lot more about thai culture. cos we're supposed to come up with a viable business plan to set up in thailand. and we identified a few things, such as vending machines. they have like NO vending machines here at all. so u can't get anything after 8pm, which is when all the mama shops close. but my group mate thought it wasn't a very good idea cos thailand's tech isn't good enough to support it. =/

and we suggested selling second-hand textbooks, but they said that they all pass down their books to their juniors! such nice people. haha.

and urgh i've already almost settled in and i still don't have an exchange buddy yet. what's the point of having an exchange buddy when i've already settled in?

and i need to find some volunteer work cos its part of the requirements for my scholarship, but the school hasnt replied me on that, and all the ones i can find online require me to pay money to volunteer. O_O

so after a day of shopping, we were tired and wanted a massage. we decided on a shop called Luxury: spa and massage. sounded like a nice place, and the environment was bright and clean. but it was located in a hotel and lol they brought us to separate hotel rooms to have our massages in. i felt weird cos it was a double bed and she dimmed the lights for me. but other than that, nothing else happened for me.

for kj on the other hand, the woman asked him to strip completely naked. LOL. he was shocked and asked for a towel to cover his privates LOL. halfway thru the massage, the woman asked if it was his first time here, and told him that this was a place where 'specials' are offered. lol. but of cos he didn't want any, and she told him that the fee for the massage doesn't go to them, and they only earn from the specials. poor things. =(

and she told him, now you come here never mind, but next time don't come here okay? haha. guess she didn't want him there cos she couldn't earn anything from him. she said that there were many other normal massage shops around but when he asked her how to tell the diff, she couldn't answer also LOL.

so... i guess we just have to be more careful and avoid the places that have pretty girls. hahaha. the massage wasn't very satisfying also. =( probably because they specialize in other things. lol.

wonder if they do specials for women, though. interesting thought. haha.