"You're wishin' too much, baby. You gotta stop wearing your wishbone where your backbone oughta be.”
-

if you ask me what was the thing which gave me the greatest satisfaction during my stay here? i would say it is finally being able to navigate through H&M in complete swedish (albeit some guessing), from the "How many pieces?" in the fitting room, to the interactions with the cashier. it's random but it makes me feel so proud of myself when they actually understand my swedish! :D

other things which i appreciate - getting Väl Godkänds (Pass with Distinction) for half of all my mods, and learning to dare myself to open up more, to try new things in the safe assurance of the friends i've made. on hindsight, i'm really fortunate to be able to grow these six months in their company - and never once was i afraid of them judging me. well, actually yeah there was once- at the welcome party, but that was before i knew them better. i'm the kind of person who likes to practise something by myself till i am reasonably good because i'd be too embarrassed if i made a fool of myself. but these months- i learnt the drums, and played for my friends ten minutes after learning it, just trying out different combinations and knowing that even if i screw up their song we'd all just laugh it all off;

i sang impromptu while j eremy played the guitar;

i experiment wildly with recipes and concoct my own really random foods;

i picked up photography (which i probably won't continue because for some reason, i don't find joy in taking pictures of anywhere else but lund... not london, not morocco... only lund makes me want to take more and more pictures )

i laugh, cry, and whine with my friends, and love them because they love me in spite of it; i really appreciate that j en, h azel, b enita, a ddy was there for me, even when i kind of 重色轻友 when i was with t olde. i always had someone to call, or just to run to their rooms for company.

really appreciate d esmond, who's probably seen the worst of me, and yet still doesn't mind "marrying me" (in shoot-shag-marry) i would probably shoot me if i were him haha.

and j enric. love cycling along the countryside in the fields of gold. sitting in those fields, nobody could find us while we lay on the grass chatting under the sun. she's like the total opposite of me and a risk-taker, she forces me to do what i otherwise would not dare to (like jaywalking across a 6-lane EXPRESSWAY -.-) ahh i'm really glad i met her on this exchange even though i didn't like her at the first impression. now i feel as if she's a childhood friend i've grown up with, and when i go back to singapore i want to hang out at her condo regularly and swim or paint our nails or something. a passage from a book i read describes our friendship perfectly:

"she and I would play games together, laugh when we saw each other by accident in the street, chatter nineteen to the dozen about nothing in particular, go on adventures. we would make each other feel complete without losing any part of ourselves in the process" - Tim Lott, White City Blue

h azel. i've had some problems tolerating her, maybe because she's my roomie and i spend the most time with her. lost my cool with her once, i can't remember if she ever lost her cool with me. but nonetheless, she gives me my space and i was quite comfortable living with her because she let me stone/stare blankly out of the window/sit on the window-sill and look at people downstairs/daydream in peace. on my own i'm pretty anti-social and she is a total social butterfly, so ya, it's miraculous how well we lived together.

appreciate the quiet times i could enjoy in lund. see, i have so much time to actually blog. and think. and lie in the park and just really, listen to the birds, and read. the first 3 years in smu i have been just going through the drill. okay, year 1 done, year 2, done, ocip done, internship done, year 3 done... if not for this time, i would probably be just speeding through my life without being aware of where i was going. was telling m anda that she and d orene probably have their lives figured out already, whereas i suddenly feel like i should be changing directions. but it's not a bad thing... it just feels like i've had my head underwater all this while, and now i've found the surface. i'm not sure where to go yet, but the fresh air sure feels good.