Yes, I am disgusted by the gypsies who beg. (Let’s not even mention the ones who steal, because honestly, taking something that isn’t rightfully yours is gross and revolting.)

Firstly, I don’t know if this is considered as judging someone without fully understanding their side of the story, but it is absolutely distasteful if you walk into a church and put a f-cking one euro coin in your palm and go around tugging your cupped hand at people.

Secondly, it’s gross to actually plan the timing of your entrance (a.k.a immediately after mass). And it’s damn right offensive to do it in front of the Priests who are standing at the back of the church, greeting all the church goers with a ‘Good Morning’ handshake, while you go around blatantly begging INSIDE THE CHURCH.

Like, do you even have any respect for the people who go to Church to pray??? Do you even know what a Church means to the...

If you do a quick Google search on ‘growing up quotes’, most of them are probably written by old hags who hate being old. Because honestly, growing up and growing older has to converge at some point in your life. They’re correlated and nobody can escape the purported horror of the two. And yet we fear them like the plague.

Today, not only am I one day older to becoming 23, I have also grown up into an adult! Because MY MOMMA SAID SO….

Side track: Please check out this video where kids will literally stand up for whatever their mommas tell them. And I actually resonate with these kids.

So today the Sun decided to peer through, while the thick clouds that have been covering our blue skies decided to be blown away. And just when I was talking about the sombre weather yesterday… God chose to bless us with good weather today, yay!

I started the day slow and sluggish which was an...

One week ago, Beat and I were in Munich :(

This thought depresses me so much. And it does not help that I study in a University town such as Leuven… (Probably a Pulau NTU equivalent) Everyone was hurriedly pulling their luggages and headed to the train station since MORNING. And after I ended my afternoon class, the city was literally a dead town. The hustle and bustle that kind of dies down after the end of a performance. Then the winds kept sweeping through my bones, and that tinge of sadness crept in once more. The same gloominess I had prior to my Munich trip. Didn’t help that the Sun was barely peering the past few days. I think I finally understand what they mean when they say “Winter seasons can be depressing”, and why all the Europeans/Westerners love the tropics so much.

BUT hey, at least I am getting the hang of it now! I am growing up already. No more crying, promise.

So...

(Sorry, I’m just trying to brush up a bit on my Dutch to feel a little more inclusive)

Ha, who am I kidding. I only know ‘Dank You’ in the entire Dutch dictionary. But nonetheless, classes have indeed started this week and I just ponned my first class today. BRAND MANAGEMENT. As I quote the wise words of Tan Fei Fan, “Obviously the Prof has failed in his area of expertise.”

I’m not actually proud that I skipped class but I was really dozing off in the lecture hall that seemed so vast. The entire lecture hall (or auditorium, as they call it) had wooden chairs and tables, and wooden floors that creaked whenever someone walked up and down. The musty smell of the hall obviously lacked decent ventilation. And they used YELLOW lighting which is obviously sleep-inducing. So I honestly don’t think anyone can blame me for leaving the lecture hall after 1 hour. Yeah and the lecture was poised to...

Yay I finally have internet in my room! :‘) the old school way of course, with an ethernet cable. I can’t help but constantly draw comparisons between Europe and Asia sometimes. Here we chinky-eyed 'ahhh-shi-ans’ think that being in the West is so much better. With state of the art technology, best food and the latest fashion. Well, yes and no I suppose. But in general, when it comes to gadgets and technology stuff, Asians will be the first to throw their money at it and wipe up all the most up-to-date devices. Whereas the Europeans throw their money at eateries with good food and beer/wine. Oh, plus they would pay a premium if a restaurant has a good ambience. All of which, uhm, kiasu and aunty Cam will not do. But it’s nice to take note of this subtle difference.

So anyway, it’s been one whole month breathing European air. Truth be told, I miss the dense tropical air in Singapore. But...

Confession time: I hate being alone.

As horrible as humans are, as smelly as assholes will forever be, and how I always longed for some ‘alone time’ in SG, it’s true humans need each other to survive. Nobody can do things alone. Go ahead and quote me but it truly is worse when there is no interaction with any other living thing for a good 24 hours. storyofmylife

I’m not here to write a sappy, pitiful story such that everyone starts to Skype me immediately, so let’s not go there. The main focus of this post is how we always say “The grass is greener on the other side” and truly that is so. We are in a constant search for an easier life, a happier one. But what’s a rainbow without a storm? Just as how this article points out,

“Because if you want the benefits of something in life, you have to also want the costs.”

I happened to chance upon the article above when it was making its viral...

Water.

Source of life, and it makes up 75% of our bodies. (Yes, so you’re not fat.)
I’ve been boiling tap water in Leuven via the Student Residence’s electric kettle that is made of plastic. And there was this white residue in my cup after a while. Being paranoid by nature, I didn’t want to die from some melted plastic overdose or something, so I switched to an ordinary stainless steel pot to boil my daily dose of water. But likewise, I get a weird whitish residue floating all over my cup. I even tried using a non-stick pan, which coming to think of it now, is so silly. But hey, at least I tried.

I really should have just Googled earlier. Oh right, but I couldn’t do that because of the internet problem! Thanks a whole load, KUL. (Okay I will stop being a sour grape now)

And so BBftw on chemistry.stackexchange.com says this:

It’s likely that your home is supplied with “hard” water...

Yeah so I’ve been stuck here in Leuven for the past week. (Wow has it been a week already?!) So far, it’s been both a pleasant and well, distressing one…

Firstly, DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO LIVE MORE THAN 24 HOURS WITHOUT THE INTERNET???? I’m not even addicted to checking Facebook and the likes but let me tell you that it’s painful. Pure torture. Which leads me to my next point about having to face the 4 walls in my student residence hall which isn’t pleasant either. I have no Wifi. I have no rights to borrow a library book from the Public Library nor my own school library. Everyday FF or Beat texts me asking what I am doing, and the common reply would be “staring at the wall”. And that is not even an exaggerated statement. I meant every single word.

Secondly, I’ve raised this point up before but Asians in Europe will forever be second-class citizens. So deal with it...

Hungary - Budapest (22-24 Aug)

So we stayed in the beautiful Budapest for a mere 3D2N which to me was one of my bigger regrets of this trip because there were simply too many sights and sounds to admire in this awesome city. Trust me when I say it’s awesome because initially Beat and I were told that Budapest was going to be just like Prague… Which kind of crushed us. I’m glad that wasn’t the case.

The audacity to even compare Budapest to Prague! :O

Hungary has a rich history where she got ‘engulfed’ by both the Nazis and Soviets in both World Wars. It’s sad when we went to feed our brains at the torture museum (pun) but I’m glad they managed to finally break out of all the horrible fighting and become independent again. Speaking of which, there was this once when the 2 Asians in Europe (fyi: our exclusive hash tag on instagram) happily popped by a random church along the way as...

Czech Republic - Prague (20-22 Aug)

So I apologize for my absolute dino era in most of the things that I do… But it has been tough to find the time and also good WiFi to blog. Did I mention that my fat fingers aren’t exactly blogger friendly on my LG phone too? (yes I finally have a phone that’s smarter than me)

Anyway, here are some of the miscellaneous things I’ve learnt from my trip to Prauge. Which has indeed been an eye opener thus far.

1) Being overly paranoid of your surroundings and every single being who passes you by kills the fun of exploring not just for you but also for your travel buddy which is not fair to them. For that, I shall admit it now and do a public apology to my travel buddy. I’m sorry Beat for worrying unnecessarily!

2) Meeting fellow Asians in a foreign land provides some form of relief (esp in Europe) and this shows me what it feels like to be a...