Aidilfitri! The happiest time of the year! Well my family and I did lots of stuff to prepare for this occasion. Recently, I got a job so I had some independence on the use of my money. Might as well use it to decorate my bare room. Got a bunch of wine boxes from a nearby wine store, gathered all of my souvenirs from my travels, and mounted a little display on the wall. I also had painted some black acrylic paint at the side of my workstation and did some chalk art.
Mounted some new stuffz!My new chalk art!
Afterwards, I went to the store room to help my grandmother to sort out some stuff. I found this old keyboard that can’t be used no more so I kinda made good use of it.
Turned my room into a mini music studio haha!
On Aidilfitri, mostly, I look forward to tasting the food. On the eve of that day, my grandmother started cooking loads of dishes from Rendang to Ketupat. As for the Ketupat, before we can actually steam it, we have to weave the “shell” of it first using some sort of leaves-which-I-don’t-really-know-what-it’s-called.
A box full of weaved KetupatSome vegetables for the dishesLeaves used to weave the KetupatRendang!Rice grains used to fill the KetupatMore Ketupat!
It was like 11pm at night but our house wasn’t ready yet. We still had to paint the living room white and do some gardening. Traditionally, we would hang colorful lights in our backyard.
“Lampu kelap-kelip”My younger sister painting the living room 🙂
Haha I slept at 3am the following day. Arranging books, dusting the living room, et cetera.
At a nearby mosque, we started Aidilfitri prayers at about 8:15am. The mosque was kinda packed with people so we actually had to pray in the middle of the road.
Aildilfitri PrayersHaha right in the middle of the road
Actually the best part of Aidilfitri is that we get to spend time, and ask for forgiveness from other family members. Honestly, I hadn’t cried for a long time.
Well after a 6-month long holiday, orientation for my new school started. And so I got my stuff ready.
Preparing for Week 0!
I was kinda excited since I didn’t keep in touch with friends in a very long time. And also, it was going to be my first time cycling to school. Thankfully, on the first day, the skies were clear, and there weren’t any signs of the weather raining anytime soon. My grandfather told me the easiest way to cycle to school was this park connector which runs through a canal, and that I have to cross three junctions.
Greeted with this sunrise!
Of course, I took a couple of photos on my journey to school.
On the first few weeks of school, I would usually park my bicycle in the void deck opposite school, then eat my favourite Egg Prata with a glass of Milo in the coffee shop nearby.
Breakfast!
After Breakfast, if I have the time, I would sit in the benches in front of the block of flats and stare blankly at the traffic.
Actually after a few weeks, I found a much faster route to my school, which was through another canal which runs behind this forested area. Sometimes you can find monitor lizards and snakes and stuff. In the canal, you can find otters too!
By the time school ends, it would be like around 6 in the evening. So, I kinda have to cycle in the dark sometimes.
Oh look! It’s the highway!
If I choose not to cycle home immediately after school ends, I would stay in school until 9 at night and probably do fun stuff with my friends.
I remember that Friday on Week 0, when I made really good friends with a guy named Jian Shun. We sat together during a School Olympiad and we did all the sneaky photo-taking and cheering together.
One engine!
Our recess times are like, on average, 3 hours long. In the three hours, normally we would go to the library to study.
Haha there were times we would also goof around in the library like the time he broke my watch.
Watch looks cooler now though…
I remember there was this Co-Curricular Activity fair and the both of us signed up together for like 7CCAs. One of them was Music Vox. I signed up as a vocalist. Actually, I didn’t know what I was thinking. I have never performed in front of people before, neither do I have any vocal experience. So during the auditions, I screwed up here and there, and as a result, I didn’t go through the first round.
Mungkin by Anuar Zain HAHA
Every Friday, at 1 in the afternoon I would have to go to a nearby Mosque to do my prayers.
Praying in the rain
Thankfully in the school campus there are spaces where we can do our obligatory prayers too.
HAHA, spooky, right?
So far after my 5 weeks here, this school’s amazing. You have awesome classmates (who are like soccer fanatics), and little kittens that run around the corridor.
This school’s huge too. There are a lot of hidden rooms and passages to explore. My seniors would also share spooky ghost stories. Like that time tables and chairs turned over and stuff. Actually, the more I explored the school, the more fascinated I am with the school’s architecture.
I’m actually afraid of heights
Like the seniors, many of the staff here too have lots of stories to tell on their experiences here in this school.
Janitors need rest too (:
Haha so those were my 5 weeks of school so far here in Temasek Polytechnic. Sadly I’m going to be transferring into a University in a few weeks so I’m definitely going to miss all of this. 😦
Well, just recently I set up a Twenty20 account to see if it can help me with my university fund hahaha :p. https://www.twenty20.com/mddanial100
