Inner hands, outer hands, inner hands pull...

Here's a little something for us to really cheer about... Hahah... Enjoy, Merry Christmas...

Presenting SPY Funniest Ship Videos...



Just some of the videos that cropped up... Anyway... the cheer was supposed to be like this...




Happy Holidays, SPYs... Have you made your resolutions?

MERRY CHRSITMAS & HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Hey Everyone,

Just wanna wish all of you a joyous Christmas & a fruitful New Year ahead! I hope all of u have list down all ur NEW + OLD resolutions... Start working on the resolutions ok! Everyone, GANBATTE!!!

Cheers to All,

35th SSEAYP

Bowling Competition Cum Welcome Ceremony!!!

21st Dec marks e day where our starbowlers show their bowling skills at Kallang Leisure Park~ For 35th Batch, we are represented by Tuty, Cecilia, Nim & Rezal. Apparently, they have to come sooo early in the morning to do all e registration etc. Hahaz.. So pitiful BUT all in the name of having fun yet at the same trying to win a trophy! =)

Cecilia with her big grin~

Nimales who forever requires constant reminder abt his turn to bowl! =.="

Master Wugui trying hard to focus to roll e ball & not roll himself in! wahaha.. =P


For e 3 games played, Nim & Cecilia been doing great by getting Turkey & Spares. Oh wells, Tuty & Rezal are doing good too despite Rezal's wrist injured and Tuty's losing her focus due to tranferring of photos.. Wahaha.. Nevertheless, all e 4 of them are doing good. BUT they did better with e rest of SPY's cheering them from behind! Go Nim! Go Cecilia! Go Tuty! Go Rezal! The only lacking is the pom poms.. Just too bad~

Score board for our team.. THE YOUNG ONE 08!!

Though its just supposed to be pure fun, but the pressure to walk away with medal simply push them to perform even better. But thanks to Rezal's last throw which eventually did not hit any pin, we managed to get 4th instead of 3rd! We lost to the third position by a SINGLE pin *everyone stares at Rezal* How could this be possible?! OMG!!!

Nimales, Winnie (representing Rezal), William, Cecilia & Tuty with their trophies! =)

SPY's taking photo with the starbowlers!

But it's ok, we were still happy coz 4th position also walked away with trophy! To make things better, Cecilia managed to do us proud by bagging 2 trophies... GOOD JOB EVERYONE!!!

Cecilia with her trophies~

If you know you can't win ANY trophy, just pose and act like a real winner. =P

That's the update for now folks.. I'll let the photos speaks for itself... Charmaine & Queen (who came confidently in WHITE i/o Black SPY Tee)

boon kian with his 'WOW' hairstyle for the day & Wendy looking at some discreet photos?! hmm!

tuty who keeps running everywhere & not focusing on her bowling game!!!!

asilah, hanzhi & boon kian tried to lelong e SPY shirt but not much buyers.. =(

e SPYs who were there to support the bowlers!

SPYs 08 Rocks~

To top it all, Environmentalists Unite~

WOW! Environment~ WOW! WOW! Environment~

35th SSEAYP Farewell Festival Photoslide @ Dolphin Hall, Nippon Maru

Here's finally the end of our sailing days... To celebrate its end and the start of a new beginning... The SG 'P' (Press PYs) came together to share some photos... Enjoy... Copyright@PressPYs2008.

TOOK super long to choose the darn photos, finally gave up and randomised everything...hahah...

Oh yes... the photo.... Here's some of the belated ones...

This is the first... Ops... need to go off... time to explore Philippines... Will be back with more... Yup... Minutes from one of the Press Peeps... aka Tuty... so is the rest of the previous 3 entries....

Safe in a Crazy World

Hey, I'm back online... and Safe in a Crazy World... This song pops into my head as I read and updated myself with the recent news coverage over the world... It's in a sad state and how protected I felt being in Nippon Maru with almost without any worry besides how much to change in each port and if you can get up on time for assembly... Wanted to blog about today... but things changes as I read of the Singaporean who was killed in the Mumbai blast... Sigh... and the thought of YL stuck in Cambodia without any flight back... The demonstrations in Bangkok... Just look at the news today, it's a sad, sad state... It's been awhile since I last read the news...

Here's a shoutout to everyone reading from SG and Vietnam, we are safe as of erm our homestay... Well, I'm safe and at least NL is celebrating another NL's birthday... enjoying the wireless here... And I hope everyone else is safe over at Vietnam.

Tonight is the last night in Vietnam and I went groceries shopping, hahah... See I remembered to get drinks... Ayano-chan got a SIM card at a super reduced price and we had trouble finishing that up!! WE called Japan and Singapore and Vietnam and tried calling all our SG-mates number... Hahah... It's quite hilarious...And learned that someone had to go back to the ship tonight from my SG. Alright, SG C...4 people down... no more from the rest!! Wow, my sg is taking up alot of cabin in the first floor!

This is just a random post while waiting for Ayano-chan to finish bathing... Need to pack my stuff to head to Nippon Maru...

Adios!! Will be too busy to blog tomorrow... till we meet again at the next port of call!!!

And I'm back... online...

The 28th today... Hahah... I must have gotten the dates wrong the previous time... and I'm back online and not to rushed to finish blogging... Wireless here in Vietnam in my District 3 is FREE, only on the second floor that is!! So here I am blogging and regretting leaving my HDD on the ship...

The homestay in Vietnam is different from the rest of my homestay... In Thailand, I stayed like I was on vacation as I had a well-to-do family where I went to spa on the first day and stayed in a condo apartment...

My Vietnamese house is an interesting 3-storey shophouse-looking one with no shop but technically, you can have a shop there and it's all fine. I shared a room with Ayano-chan, but luckily that I have the chance to have like different homestay and this time shared alot of laughters. BUT I got to really show you the room ... I'm staying on the first floor, the whole room is just below the living room and looked as if it's just attached to the bottom of second floor. But the most fun part and interesting is the way it's constructed... Hahah... I way too tall for my room, the height of my room is really 1.7m and I'm like 8cm taller than that... Hahah... Think Vietnam presents the most opportunities to see new things... Simply because, I'm staying with an average family... with unfamiliar environment... The shops are different than those in Thailand, and those who think that I shopped for random and interesting stuff might be disappointed... Having too much fun soaking the differences and ambience... Made me want to read Vietnam history, it seems that it has loads of historical places... Maybe I was influenced by this book I'm currently reading, a historical triller novel set in Germany (Yup, because I felt like reading up German history and going to Germany next... and I've just read the prologue of the book)...

Like I said earlier, me staying in District 3, we just came back from visiting the REunification Palace and treated with the presidential room and furniture and loads of other PYs and oh... our NLs as well... Hahah... Even when walking to the Notre Dame Cathederal... and the Post Office... I think Vietnam is the place I missed my camera the most...I've always been fascinated by buildings not to mention colonial and renaissance ones... the architecture of the community weaved through times... And to think I'm a chem kid... Hahah...

Me and Ayano-chan had lunch at home... Since I don't eat pork nor other meats to make things earlier for them, they always use a separate wok to cook for me... I had some kind of vietnamese salad crepes called ban-sell (I have no how to spell but it sounds like that!)... A rolled up salad veg with crepe, prawns, tauge, leek and some bean (i think it's pilaf)... Super full... and I didn't know "chomp-chomp" here means rambutan... I was trying to get Ayano-chan to describe to be me but it was kinda futile....

We are going shopping later at the small shop and night market later... Should really avoid the touristy places, not as much fun... Even when I was in Thailand, I didn't go the all the touristy places... hahah... and I shopped as much!!

Hmmmm... it's less that 2 weeks before we depart from Japan... Sigh... oh my, I'll be away for 52 days then... I'll miss the people... and this is going to end soon... sigh... sigh... boo hoo... Time to make the best of the time left... hmmm... and maybe I'll be back online tonight... See ya till then!!

GOOD MORNING, VIETNAM!!

The SPYs arrived Vietnam the morning of 27 Nov 08, after spending a day floating over the blue, blue sea... All safe and sound as we departed from Thailand... News had it that there's been a travel advisary to Bangkok, due to the travel situation... Lucky us, imagine if our YL got stuck in Cambodia and can't fly back to Thailand... Maybe we might an extra night... Sorry, no photos this time... My HDD is on the ship and happily hidden away...

Like always, the day we arrived at the port-of-call is welcomed by welcoming ceremony and port of call... And with an unforgetable dinner as well in a Cantonese Restaurant that had half the SPYs having instant noodles and smuggled sushi (Thanks to Mr Postman & Gang), way past the 11pm curfew...with all the stories of course...

Soon, 12 pm came, and I've yet to pack my things for home... After 4 homestays, I'm getting better and faster at packing my things albeit it's always a little on the heavy side. So I packed my things and then head off to my usual room, yup... room 441 (that's not my room)... For the first time, all of the 441 roomies were in 443... It has became an almost a nightly thing, the getting together that part to share the daily snippets of life onboard...

The morning of 28th, we huddled all our belongings for a 2 night stay in Vietnam. Yup, yup... and I have since taken a stance if I forget anything, i'll just buy... We had an intitutional visit to Bemark ( ops, i might spell wrongly here) and a lunch hosted by them... Way, way better than the dinner the night before... before heading to visit the Tyre company...

The visit to the tyre was company and I was impressed at how "Tuas" the place looked in terms of vast space and the manufacturing ambience and yup at how closely it looked like my company outlook in Sg... But too bad, I was disappointed by the fact that the visit was only 20mins of looking... Sigh, how short my expectation plummeted! And there's no like proper introduction of the manufacturing process, we could do with some diagrams...

Sigh... that was quite a disappointment... Anyway, next was the homematching ceremony... which took quite long...
Anyway, that's wasn't much to say but I super like my Vietnam house!! eSP MY ROOM!! it's 1.7m talll... hahahh...darm... need to go off already... will continue soon...

12 Nov - Nippon Maru sailed into Tanjung Priok Port, Indonesia at 10am.

National Leaders taking photo with Dr Budi Setiawan

Our first stop was to the House of Representatives in the city of Jakarta, to make a courtesy call on the Deputy Speaker. It was our privilege to be seated on those plush cushioned chairs meant for elected representatives of the various states and cities of Indonesia, listening to the Deputy Speaker of the House deliver his speech.

Us at the House of Representatives… Lucky us!!

The next stop was the ASEAN Secretariat where we were given an interesting lecture on the goals and vision of the ASEAN.



13 Nov – We started that day at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Angklung, a traditional musical instrument of Indonesia was given to each PY as a gift and we played to the tunes of “I have a dream”, “You raise me up” and many more after a quick lesson. This was such a great way to introduce the instrument to us and I could tell that many PYs enjoyed the session.

Just before we were released for our lunch break, Colonel started walking around the front of the hall at an extremely slow pace… gathering the top of his hair with his five fingers in slow motion! That was the sign! Our first test for the “fall in” gesture… (inherited from the SAF)… worked when Colonel gathered us after the first half of the session. I have to say Colonel is really quick with his thinking!

He quickly jumped into action and suggested that as a show of appreciation, the Singapore Contingent should include a short performance of Singapura, using the Angklung during the home-stay matching ceremony later that evening, in addition to the originally planned performance. SPYs were all enthusiastic and agreeable to it and when the decision was made, Charmaine immediately sprang into action and started penning the notes of Singapura.

We gathered after a really quick, boxed lunch… and started our practice. In fifteen minutes, we were almost there with Charmaine conducting us and the melody sounding just right.

Tickled by Colonel’s comical and innocent bluntness on stage, all of us enjoyed ourselves putting the act together =) Well, the performance that evening turned out great and we were delighted that everyone appreciated our gesture as we received cheers and applause.

Our performance using Angklung


15 Nov – My (Venetia) home-stay in Jakarta was an experience for me. Baby from Lao and I was matched to a young, simple and down to earth couple who were host parents for the first time. They lived simply and were loving people who took time off from their work on Thursday evening and Friday to receive us and show us around.

Myself and Baby together with our foster parents

I say that it was quite an experience for me because I had not lived such a life for a while I guess, and it took me some time to get used to it. Amenities were unlike what we have in Singapore. The entire experience made me realized that as I aged and the more independent I become, comfort has become part of my way of life. It also made me realized how I have taken some things for granted. This home-stay had made me appreciate the way things are around me... How, my government had done so much to ensure that the standard of living for us was constantly improving.


One thing which I really enjoyed when I was in Jakarta was the food! Yum! I was lucky to have been able to try Javanese and Sumatran food, thanks to my foster parents. I had not eaten so much rice in my life!

This is not Homestay Part 2...Just to say that we sailed safely from Nippon Maru!

Hahah... okay... I'm sure that you will be expecting the part 2, nope... you won't be getting this now...as I happily hijacked this flow of entry and I'm sure Asilah don't mind... So here I am with Internet in Brunei... Brunei, folks... So glad that Alf's here to welcome us... So sweet of him!! Hahah... THANK YOU, ALF!!!

It's been like 19 days since we left Singapore, OMG... Nothing... Days been going zipping super fast... We all had a safe 6-day cruise from Japan to Brunei. None of us really get seasick except for Desmond... It's been fun, relentless and the ever-so-looking-forward contingent meeting with Colonel...

Ops... I have to get out of here... I'll continue posting new photos okay....Be right back...Hahah...

Homestay Part 1

Wooohooo our NL was out in the local news in Kobe Prefecture representing SG K! coolnesss~ Besides SG K, SG B (Asilah & Boon Kian) which is in Fukushima Prefecture was also out in the news! Double cooolnesss!!!

news extract from Kobe local newspaper

Everyone enjoyed their homestay with the Japanese family. Each of us was treated like their own sons and daughters by their host family. They provided with everything that we need. Indeed great hospitality by them. Applaud~ we get to try loads of Japanese food and I think each one of us GAIN WEIGHT!!!!! time to exercise SPYs~ *looks at Kai Fen* Oh ya, besides food, we also get to seeee LOTS of CUTE Japanese guys and gals!!!!! *eyes everywhere*

Rezal's, Cecilia's, Violet's experience @ Niigata Prefecture: (quoted by Rezal)
- We did a courtesy call to Vice Gabernor of Niigata prefecture. We get to interact with the Local Youths (LY) and we get to learn how to make sushi and rice balls named Onigiri. I think when I go back S'pore, i'll start making sushi!!! Besides that, we were divided into smaller groups and we were brought to the different interst places of Niigata. =(

Violet, Rezal, Ms Niigata, Cecilia

I get to go to Northern Cultural Museum, Hakusan Shrine & shopping with my host family, Asazuma. I felt soo like home with their care and concern and I kinda miss my Mom back in Singapore~ How i wish i could have spent more days with my host family. =(

me with my foster mom and dad

the spread of food that my foster mom prepared for us! *burps*

me together with Takumi and Faizal (BPY)

I guess that's for today! More updates will be done soon. Stay tune everyone!!!

TOKYO HERE WE AREEEE!!!!!!

YAY!!!! We finally reached Tokyo safely after 7 hours of flight~ *wipes forehead*

Before that, everyone had to report to PYSS for last minute packing and helping e loggies to bring all the cartons of stuffs to the lorry.. what a tiring morning to start with!! but things went so smoothly that we left PYSS by 5am. a very good achievement! hehex.. when we reached airport, things also went as planned.. we got our stuffs and luggages checked in etc all thanks to the precise instructions given by our dear Rezal, Winnie & Venetia. =P

Finally its time for us to checked in and we had the Alumni's who came down to give us their well wishes. Grace (SIS) was sooo sweet by giving everyone of us a photo with sweet words! She has been one of our backbone who help us along the way. Touched can?! =)

Nevertheless, let these few photos says our feelings... Enjoy ppl~

Our group photo before checking in to departure hall.. E big smile!!!

The ppl who just can't wait to get to the airplane n fly to TOKYO~ *weeeeee*

even a public phone in Japan can make Kaifen, Violet n Siti filled with excitement.. hmmmm~

one of the street that we walked past when we first land our feets in Japan! yaynessss~

Tmr (22/10) will be the day where we finally get to see the other PYs after few months trying to know each other via sseayp world!! How exciting.. I'm pretty sure everyone wants to make new frens and get to know each other better..

Meantime stay tuned to our blog as we will update u with our interesting journey!! Cheers everyone~

gosh!

it's less than 48 hours to go....

at 580kgs, hopefully we won't blow...!

1 check-in, 1 hand carry, 1 hand bag each

don't forget your passport for the 52 days trip!




ANA flight 112

last call last call for 26 PYs

get on it after you hug goodbye..

gonna miss the singapore rojak and sambal "eng chye"!




sushi, brani, rendang, tom yum, sticky rice, halo halo

yen, dollar, rupiah, dong, baht, peso

+81, +673, +62, +84, +66, +63
do you remember where we're supposed to go?


adrenaline rush through our spines
don't forget our cheers, songs and lines
daily exercises at 645
the journey will be over in a blink of our eye!

GOOD JOB SPY's!!!!

CONGRATSSSS! We've done a good job during our pdc~ All e rehearsals really paid off!! I believe ALL of us had fun dancing our hearts out.. hahahz.. it's really a burden off e shoulders (for e moment) *big hugs*

Cheer: G-Double-O D JOB (GOOD JOB, GOOD JOB)
G-Double-O D JOB (GOOD JOB, GOOD JOB)

Now, stress moments coming up, and if we can do it once - we can definitely do it once again~

quote/ IMPOSSIBLE IS NOTHING! JUST DO IT! /unquote

Fun-Filled Madness~

Happy Belated Birthday NIMALES~ (just to officially wish u on e blog! hehz~)

Nimales with his bdae cake.. =p

Thursday was e day where we first had our practice at SOKA.. it was basically getting to know where exactly we should stand etc. Realised that, the stage was really, really elongated instead of wide! how to dance like tat?? but we managed it well (i supposed)..

since there isn't exactly backstage, all our small talks or should i say whisper (did we whisper?), hahaz.. more like laughing and joking merrily.. it can be heard clearly from the front! i didn't know that our sound can travel all e way to e front!! o_O" due to tat, for e next practice we are given 'warning' to keep our mouth shut~ the perfect time to train our mouth to smile widely.. oh wells, just in case any 'paparazzi' were to take any unglam shots, e smile will cover it all.. hehehe *big wide smile*


having fun at backstage.. weeee~

we den played sparklers at Ong Ping Ping's CC all thanks to Tuty who kindly bought it just for kids (US!!) to play and jump around happily and also to Siti for being so kind to bring along kuehs for us to eat!! yumss~


a happy sotong with sparklers... *spreads its tentacles*

FRIDAY was pretty great tooo! Few of us went to KTV to sing their lungs out till 3am~ they still had e energy to do singing after dance practice! energetic bunch of youths... =)

a perfect example!


when craziness starts setting in~

Before that, both charmaine and cikgu had to do photoshoot at pasir ris station. We were basically walking so fast just to ensure that we can get to do a train scene BUT we are just in time to see the board says: "Train service ended!!" *fainted* and e officer already want to close the gates and eventually got her to have it open till we finish our photoshoot.. how nice of her.. =)
courteous singaporean helping one another!!

Saturday was a trip to Cikgu's house which is FULL of CATS~ I really mean it when i say tat! i think i can have heart attack even while sitting.. cikgu's cat will just sneakily walked under the chairs and appear out of no where wriggling its tails at my toes!! omg!! the heart almost popped out~ but nevertheless, his cats are damn cute~


stare what stare?! buey song ah?


us together with Nadira & Nabila.. hmmm *looks at Cikgu cheekily*

Sunday was fun toooo.. We went to Tuty's house! hahahz.. i think ill let the photos speaks by itself.. =P


does it look like father and daughter or couple? u decide.. hahahz..


e art of forgiveness comes from within the heart~


dad and his daughters~

I guess its time for me to chaoz, but not before ending this post with the most glamorous photo ever! i present to u........................................................

maybe a saree suits him better than a kurtha's? *wonders*

Netball Saturday and Big Balls Sunday

Sat was pretty ok as we only had discussions and amazingly, NETBALL to end our day! Even though we played under the torturous hot sun, it was all worth it. Nim, managed to shed a few pounds, and together with Venetia battled the 2 attackers, Tuty and Chiku. On the other side, Rezal partnered with Hafizah to battle against Colonel and Siti. The score was tied at 2-2 at halftime. Rezal, being a tchoukball player, was not used to throwing balls into nets. he missed SEVEN times. But after being challenged by Queen, managed to start scoring on the eighth try onwards!


Sunday was definitely the most knocked out day for most of us! omg~ die can?! oh wells, apparently everyone still survived.. =) y do i say we can die?! we had to do so many rounds of the whole storyboard with only ard 5-10 mins of rest after completing one set of the story! the legs all becoming like jellyfish after doing loads of dancing.. hmmm.. very tired lehhh~


nevertheless, each dance group improved alot especially the bhangra dance! *sings the nimales song - Nima, Nima, Nimales~ they are getting so good and i think Wendy is dancing like a pro bollywood dancer! *feweeet* butttt, Rezal is forever knocking Mumtas while dancing.. when can he ever stop doing tat?! -_-" Not forgetting, Boon Kian's expression whenever he dance (so comical!)



during the first few rounds of the practice, we did no recording.. but for the last round, we did a recording and we manage to see each others mistakes and how to improve the dance to a new level!


watching the video is really very funny!!! Desmond was commented for having big b#**s! I think that is very MANLY of him, don't ya think? *ahem...haha! oh and we anticipated and waited, and anticipated and waited for Boon Kian's solo move only to realise that as soon as he jumped forward to start his solo, he was not captured within the camera's angle! HORROR! not forgetting Tan Charmaine who went up the stage with one fan for her chinese dance. and then went frantically backstage to get another while the rest waited with their pose!! this is slapstick comedy at its best!


next training onwards will be at SOKA! it's getting very close to our PDC!! *bites fingers* let's pray we put up an excellent performance.


Lastly, to the muslim SPYs, we wish you SELAMAT HARI RAYA! Maaf zahir dan batin!

The day where we showed what we were capable of.....

20th Sept was a day of labour intensive session....It was the day that was a little unusual and at the same time it was a day that unveiled the 'other side' of some individuals. Stay tuned to find out more......

This is the group involved in the making of the contingent board assisted by the laundry group. It seemed like the most easiest activity among the 3 ...... but it definitely was not. Kudos to the team which persevered and made the perfect boxes for everyone. Esp to Tuty and Hanzhi who slept very little the night before...hope you gals are sleeping right now... :)

And.....our beautiful backdrop for our contingent board. I shall say it now before anyone does....ours will be the best contingent board on board. :p

The group involved in the repacking of the goodie bag taking a well deserved break. :)

The team in charge of laundry who gave it their all. I must say that we did a great job. Well done!
Make a guess who this might be! :)

Our dearest dance guru Nim, getting down on his knees....this time not to propose to Wendy but to do laundry. Impressive rite....

Our dearest boon kian seriously at work the next day. Hmmm....now given my height of 1.5+ metres, what should i climb on? :p