it's always a choc party @ my apt

i'm back at iglu again, for y1 sem2. my winter break spent in singapore has been none other than superduper trooper amazing. (and the only processed food i ate was 2 blocks of ritter sport which is such a milestone considering i ate when i was bored and hungry. and bored comes often since it was the holidays. buying ingredients like coconut milk and cream, bananas, medjool dates and veges made it easier for me to keep to my preferred lifestyle. truth be told, i'm very weak in the face of food)
and i've cycled a lot too!! unfortunately the wheel of my blue bike burst a few days before i left.... need to get that fixed heh
oooo and the weather here in aussie is really pleasant, probably because of the additional thermals i brought over and thanks to the thick comfy home socks i bought when b + j came over.
speaking of which, after bathing when my mirror becomes all misty, i found an outline of a cock yes that disgusting little girl jolene drew it on my mirror i was appalled.
*

this time i'm delving deeper into the vegan cookbooks (aka instagrams and blogs) and striving for a fully plant-based, unrefined whole foods lifestyle ~*not diet~*
fortunately my trusty blender did not have any travel mishaps and arrived here in one piece (together with me the human)!!! now i get to make all the vegan goods i want yet not spend so exorbitantly on it at vegan cafes!!!! the basic elements are all i need. that and a little bit of time. nuts, dates, buckinis, coconut oil, fruit, coconut shavings, flax and chia seeds, gojis, cocoa powder and i must foray into the lucuma and carob unknown ground too apparently they taste seriously amazing.

speech has gotten all full force upon day 1 of week 1. everything came like wham bam- already at the first day of school we tore through neuroanatomy and 2 days later, had a 2-hour prac for which we were supposed to prepare for, with the assumed knowledge that all the lecture slides are registered in our brains. beautiful.
i do love neuroscience though!!! and by psychologically bringing myself to love it, hopefully i'll have greater motivation to study it.
everyday i feel blessed that i get to study super relatable and interesting stuff and that i get to do it with great friends too. i constantly get afraid that the more i say this, the more the situation gets jinxed but
it's time for me to stop and get my shit together because i don't want to get back into a pity-party mood ever again. never ever again please.
this is who i am and i'm not afraid to show it k k k k k k k

so many things i wish i got to record here yet the internet lags terribly on the mobile app
my first aim is to keep a food log and recipe list of my meals for future reference in case i run dry.
OOOOO i love soups and week 1 of uni was all about soups (fyi i had some 2 month expired soups which i froze beforehand and fortunately it was all alright except that one time in lecture i had to go... hurhur) then after my expired soups i moved on to make a huge pot of broccoli, carrot, potato soup with quinoa, barley, chickpea and lentils!!!! it was 4 serves which makes it super quick to prepare, it's almost a miracle considering i waited an hour for 1 serving of veggies to roast. (bc i was madly into roasted veg the previous semester)

peace out & do yoga!!!!!!!

sydney trooping with dem b00bi3z

ARE WE ASIAN ENOUGH FOR YOU (maximum breadth: 0.01cm) (too sunny)

got to ride the world's steepest tram ride again at the Blue Mountains w my two breast franzxzx *left and right*
and that video that showed us sitting on a stationary one and shaking vigorously as if to make it seem hardcore... well i'd love to see that soon hurhurhruhrr

MY SCARF DID ME GOOD *even though it has swept the grounds of melbourne toilets and sydney pavements* so poor thing i think everyone was too cold and i can stil remember how i was worried they would overpack. well darn they underpacked. 

~LET THE TOFU FLOW~ bren thinks i love tofu (quite true lah) so ya lor take picture sua 

jolene z poofy pink cloud

brenda vomited thrice that morning but we still went to dreamworld and we walked to Wiggles world and she slept and Jo and i walked around the area taking pictures of kiddy things *hence the cartoony flower on the white wood wall*

forcing the sick girl to take photos ahahaa too bad here already so just take photos 

octopus buttocks yummmmmzos

at the beautiful beach at surfers' paradise and :-) unwinding with me fave thing to unwind with :-) and also sitting on newspapers bcoz we has no picnic blanket. (nor do we have blankets but it was purrrrdy chilly)

SAND DUNE LOVE!!!!!!!!!!1 didn't know we'd find camels and soft fine sand but both we found here, at the outskirts of sydney. and whenever we talked there was a *crunch crunch* from the sand particles heh

5EVA WAKING UP EARLY so i get to take many pictures of them sleeping (and it was all so terribly cold oh my) *that's jolene and bren sleeping on an inflatable mattress in my living room*

and those little shits got back and took much airplane selfies wimme sleeping BUT SRSLY I WAS SO TIRED I EVEN REMEMBERED DROOLING AND DREAMING and i was also glad i got to put my hand on the armrest and preventing jolene to put her arm on the same armrest
i like armrests.

in my defence i was demn tired and didn't sleep the whole day *this was goldcoast-> sydney*
when they showed me these pictures i lmfaod w/ tears too bc i did rmb i was in a deep sleep it was prbs REM stage

waking up early on flight day to get a cuppa @ BLACK STAR PASTRY home of watermelly cakes and nice ambience

home coming feat. paper chicken of parkway food court HEEHEE
in rebellion to jobrens idea of my being vegan 

this trip has been amazing and i did feel so very homesick because they were part of my idea of singapore but after much internal convincing i rly had a wonderful time!!!!!! (if you overlook the battling of winter etc)

it was like us three again, all of us (our past selves, our church selves, our JC selves, our current selves in one single being, in a whole new setting, doing new things) it was still the same us. 

are we growing up and growing old ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

SINGAPORE REVIEW

i  made a list of things to do during this winter break................ OK 

REVIEWING FOR THE FUN OF IT

× i get to adrenalin-run against the wintery cool breeze in the morning 

× pancakes- spinach pancakes with eggs and cherry toms sound splendid 

✓ GoLd CoAST. GOLD COAST WITH BREN JO. RIDES! BEACHES! ah ma and ah gongs! (we are planning to stay at an airbnb place run by a lovely little old couple bc cost is everything for the college kid)

נi wanna plan to do a coldplay parody �� they recently came down to play at newtown, near where i live, and i didnt go bc of exams... had two the next day. their official vid for sky full of stars was taken at newtown itself!!! so it'd be fun to do it like they do (sans confetti)

these nights i've already been dreaming of singapore & its lovely lovely people!!!! 

✓ runs at east coast to catch the sunrise of course 

✓✓✓ sashimi 

cheap nuts at bugis (prince albert?) for raw cakes!!!!!!1111

✓ mom's birthday cake 

× penny board 

✓ nua-ing 

× playing with PAWS ^ included 

✓✓✓ sashimi???

✓ tj + friends. :-) 

✓ making big batches of granola!!!! 

but holey smokes. this has been amazing. this new outlook of doing what i want and errthang!!!!! fitting in things i would like to do for eg telling my momma i'd rather go out to run than have dinner outside, maybe i would make my own meals thank you--

speaking of which. i cannot get enough of pounding the pavements all over my usual jogging spots. the vjc-beach route is one of those lovely spots. and also along titans route for those quickies. run until blisters come out but not regretting a single bit because it gets dark only after 7 and i can never take that for granted ever again man!!!!!!!!!!!!! i feel so so safe here everywhere i turn i see raven-black heads and the occasional silver/baldies. and oh the wonderfully familiar humidity smell mixed with a hint of car smoke and that ever so slight breeze... clearly i sound like a desperate person 

and maybe i am a desperate person.

camping out in the cold has its pluses like reusing your clothes for maybe 7x before washing, bathing 1x a day and not having a single drip of perspiration

but it's the painful nights of the irregular heater that makes it rather unpleasant. i can never sleep properly and the bed makes my back hurt and i have three blankets on my bed and none of them keeps me warm!!!!!

over here is just *bliss* especially with the air-conditioner making the surface of the bed sheets cool to touch (and perfect for tucking in for that long night's sleep) ♥♥♥

 

having plant food but not food made in a plant ☝️

just can't let the food industry win, y'know. it's ironic, how pharmaceutical companies keep trying to keep us sick and the global food companies put incomprehensible chemicals into food because it is viable for them yet overlooking, of course, the welfare of the consumers. i've grown very interested in this paradox and am trying to find ways and means to resist. i've been thinking of making a post as to why i turned vegan... actually it isn't that i turned vegan but more like

i'm trying to make a conscious effort to choose plant-based foods over processed foods. it's not hard for me and this shouldn't be for anyone at all, because it is all still equally delicious ❤️ while it does take a much longer time for meals to be made; think about this

why are we choosing to rush for time so much? meals are important: each day, we have three votes- breakfast, lunch and dinner to prove to ourselves and our bodies what our values are. 

honestly the past few years of my life i've been throwing in the towel. i overeat store-bought biscuits laden with milk solids, vegetable oil, wheat flour and burdened with mounds of sugar (sometimes there'll be nutella in the mix too) i'll feel terrible and sorry for myself and it'll just be this vicious cycle. i dont think anyone has seen me like this before even though i'd wish countlessly that one day my parents would walk in on me and ask me why and maybe have a decent conversation, but that never really happened.. i know i wouldn't have survived life in a singapore uni, because i know things would be the same; acting okay and at night, feeling as if the whole world is against me, and my reaction to it would probably be secretly bingeing and feeling disgusting and maybe to negate that input, i would run to make myself feel better. 

sydney was that push for me to discipline myself and make me independent. it let me know that i have choices and i should make good ones each day. there'd be no one to walk in on me and set me straight. i had to do it all myself and i could never be more grateful for this chance to prove to myself my worth. 

instagram has been my source of encouragement in leading a more plant-based lifestyle. i had actually created another account to follow vegan profiles but one day i realized that i should be proud and support my own choices and not care what others think. if you really need change in your life, you have to be the change. 

in retrospect, a crazy amount of willpower is needed for this but i think everyone has this and it is possible. sydney vegans on facebook have shared this article on why a woman stopped veganism but it was because of getting bored with food choices. imo i dont think anyone should do something that they dont enjoy aka everyone has a right to be happy w their choices no??