Omg, I spelt 'spelt' as 'spelled'. Even more epic fail.

Today was spelled as: EPIC FAIL. ):

If its one thing I hate about myself, its that I'm such a huge procrastinator. Kept telling myself to update my already extremely neglected blog, but no, I was too lazy to do so. And so right now when I'm supposed to be studying, I've decided to try and revive my rotting blog. How predictable, Rachel.

Anyway from where I left off (which was a verrrrrrry long time ago), having my parents over with Brian was totally awesome! Really missed all of them so much, and we managed to spend a lot of time together even though they were staying in Brian's College Square (CS) apartment in the city. I went down and stayed a couple of nights, only returning to La Trobe whenever I had to. So yeah, I brought them around the city, and helped Brian orientate himself and settle in. We didn't manage to go to many places this time round though, largely due to the fact that Brian and I had our respective orientations in school to attend (I skipped most of mine, though). But the few highlights would be the discovery of the free bouldering walls at Burnley Wharf and the trip to Sunnyridge Strawberry Farm. Sounds like nothing much, but throw in lots of good food in between and that basically made up our little adventure of two weeks as a family. (:


First family picture! And first homemade dinner at CS (:


First Skype with BB! <3


Brian at his faculty building!


Burnley Wharf!


Wall 1 of 3 at Burnley


Being the retards we are.


Sign says it all


Mum and Brian picking stawberries!


The work of our labour :D


Chef Brian learning the tricks of the trade




Lindt's heavenly macarons! Ordered two but I gobbled up the first one :P


Lastly, I think this picture is too cute :DD

Yeap, that pretty much was a reeeally short summary (both in words and pictures) of the two weeks when my parents came with Brian! Fantastic time, especially when I could do/eat things that I wouldn't have had the finances to do so without my parents! Haha but that aside it was really good to spend time with my family again. After being away for so long, a little family bonding really lifts the spirits. And it really changes your perspective on life when you have the assurance that your parents are there (in the same country). But now that they've gone back to little ol' Singapore, I've adjusted back to my independent survival mode. Ah well, good things have to come to an end anyway. I'm just glad they came! (:

And in case you're wondering, my brother has settled down in Melbourne pretty well too. Many thanks to ME, I think. Haha okay kidding. But having Wendy as his flatmate also helped heaps! And they're both getting along extremely well as flatmates, to my surprise. I'm just pretty happy that God's been so good to Brian in helping him adapt to life here too! And very proud of him that he's adjusted so quick and smoothly. (:

School, unfortunately, has started for me. After been through approximately three weeks, all I can say about university life here is that its seriously stressful, busy, tiring, and ANNOYING. Okay maybe not tiring because I only have 15 contact hours of class per week, but the amount of work/info that we're expected to complete/learn is insane! There's so much reading to do, so much research to conduct! And there's absolutely no spoonfeeding here at all. ): Which sucks in a way because I'm so used to being told that to do and all. But I guess it helps me to be more independent in learning! Though I have a looooong way to go. ): But I think its crazy here because the facilitators and lectures don't even tell us what to do, and if they do, they speak to us as if we're already familiar with it. Which is stupid because nobody has a clue whats going on! But I can't complain la, I feel I just need to buck up in terms of being on the ball and INDEPENDENT. See, there's that bloody I word again. I'm starting to hate it! Hahaha my laziness showing again.

Other than the stress and annoyance of uni work, I'm slowly getting used to life as a university student. Thank God for giving me nice teammates for all of my workshops too. Even in HBA where I'm the only Asian in my team, my other teammates are quite friendly and include me in their discussions. Though its hard to talk to them, because I speak so fast and slowing down my speech totally makes me a boring person. Haha. Initially I was quite intimidated being surrounded by so many angmohs (too used to the internationality of my Foundation class lol), it was pretty scary. But now I've more or less gotten used to it.. Still intimidated sometimes but I'm working on it! Hopefully I'll get more confident as time goes by.

Okay, my 19th birthday wasn't as bad as I expected it to be. Although it was an average day, my dorm friends were nice enough to celebrate with me in Chisholm's Art Centre. Surprisingly the other Year 1s in my batch had organised a little something for me too! I didn't expect that, because I'm not that close to them.. But they got two muffins and made a card for me (which I think is awesomely cute). So the Year 1s celebrated with me, before my old dorm friends had their turn. I was quite touched la, everybody was present (even the Glennies!!) and I got a few presents from them too! A nice green quilt cover set for my bed ('cause I though it was a waste of money to buy my own), an adorable stuffed dog (I named him Mango :D) and a garment hanger for my perpetually over-crammed wardrobe.

I'm too lazy to put up the pictures that were taken at the little 'party', but here are some:

With my fellow batch mates (:


My Glennies!! Aw man, I miss you guys so much ):


My bed with the new quilt cover, Mango and Saru (:

Just wanna thank all you guys for always being to nice to me!! And going through all the trouble to organise the little gathering. I love you all!! (: (: And also to the following people for wishing me through the various mediums..

Through Facebook: Phoebe, Celestine Ong, Kai Yin, Kerry, Rai, Shirley, Ona, Jeremy, Ben (sister), Peiqi, Esther, Qimin, Suba, Rach Ong, Sharon, Amie, Alvana, Jason Long, Boon Kiak, Ana, Jillian, Luong, Terry, Marissa, Stephen, Stephanie, Linette, Jolyn, Tiff, Suemay, Miang Lin, Taihong, Jonathan, Lionel, Timothy, Metas, Eunice, Amanda, Raveen, Melissa Tay, Mark, Winnie, Seon, Alyaa, Ali, Singyee, Xuetying, Lynette, Gloria, Su-ann, Ethel, Chloe, Sheng, Gift, Michelle Leow, Priya, Leo, Faith, Ashley, Paulina, Phoebe, Junhong, Wei Ren, Julyn, Wingsze, Yongern, Bryan Kuek, Miss Liu, Minyi, Adi, Jek-kai, Joee, Naves, Jocelyn, Justyn, Ann-marie, Mingwei, Kenny, Heydi, Manprit, Meryl, Hengtiong, Nita, BB, Pok Hua, Yangyang, Sarah, Peiling, Christabel, Pat, Alvin, Ivan, Ben Choy, Seba, Justin Chew, Jasmine, Mohammad, Nicola, Jerome, Emily, Engkiat and Tinee!

Through phone: Brian,SPASS, Jialin, Michelle Hui, Daph, Jerilyn, Mum and Dad and Kiera (from Singapore!), Shuxia, Koko, Spassss, Danielle, Max and Shawn.

And via Skype: PUAYHOON and SABS!

Love you guys, all of you! (:

Ohyeah, I also survived a major hailstorm a few weeks ago in Melbourne too! It was truly scary, the hailstorms were the size of ice cubes! Never in my life over here have I seen such huge hail stones. And Brian, Bryan (his friend) and I got caught in the middle of it, tried taking shelter under the tram stop outside CS but still got hit by the hail, and resorted to boarding a tram to seek shelter. We were drenched, cold and pathetic. ): After the rain (and hail) subsided we had to cross the flooded road to board another tram, and Brian's slipper floated away and he had to chase after it! And all this while I was wondering why he was running in another direction LOL. But anyway though at that time it was suuuper scary, I think it was quite a fun and cool experience! Haha especially when the storm made international news. Ah, the perks of living overseas. (:

Okay, I should seriously stop now. Need to start sleeping early! Can't wait for Saturday's trip to Philip Island with the ISA! Yay. Haha okay MATTA NE! (:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO old old ME

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I really really really miss you all. Spending my birthday overseas for the first time sucks TTM (so far) because my birthday is a day that I appreciate the presence of my friends and family even more and I'm sort of lacking in that right now. I have my Melbourne friends, but its not, and never will be, the same.

Ohwell, I'm just trying to keep my spirits up and optimistic. Maybe when I wake up later in the day I'll feel better. Hopefully. One thing that is making me happy now is that the picture in my Locoroco calendar in the side bar for my birthday month is a cute fat Locoroco! Its so cute and happy. (: And yeah, my brother and Puay wished me, and I skyped with Sab.. Better than nothing I suppose.

Its gonna be an average day.