well as promised... more on the trip...

so in addition to prague we also went to two other towns in Czech Republic: Kutna Hora and Cesky Krumlov.

Kutna Hora was in history the centre of economy, owing to the fact that it was the site of the largest and richest silver mines.

But before we get to that there's this building in Prague that's particularly interesting.




This used to be the headquarters of the socialist government in Czech Republic. Since the fall of communism it has become the headquarters of a radio station that specialises in broadcasting to nations that remain under fascist rule. Owing to this, military presence is always felt around the complex to protect it from any threat, especially relevant after terror attacks escalated worldwide.





Saint Barbara is the patron saint of miners. This is Saint Barbara's Cathedral in Kutna Hora. The architecture is in the New Gothic style, with high windows and spires. Apparently the trend during the New Gothic period was for higher windows to let in more light, but as a result of those high windows the walls were quite unstable. Thus we have those buttresses that you see rising from the outer spires to support the main body of the building.
We sang in here!




The Town Square in Kutna Hora. Decision making used to be centred around here, and now it's a silver museum and also a musuem on the history of the town.

A notice like this one has been outside the door to the parliamentary chamber since 1595.










And I bought this bracelet at
Kutna Hora!






Cesky Krumlov is a town that sits snugly around the meanders of the river Vltava. The name of the town, Krumlov, derives from a word that means crooked, and refers to the winding river, and as well as the architectural facade of the village that has over the years evolved to accomodate the river's turns.

These are the sights that I saw for two mornings when I woke up. The Hotel Dvorak is situated right on the banks of the river, and faces directly the castle of Cesky Krumlov.

It's a fantastic way to start any day.















A monument in the town square erected after the Black Plague in the 16th Century.










The summer gardens of the castle. It doesn't look like much because it's winter now and all the greenery looks rather drab and the sculptures are boxed up as to protect them against the elements.










Right in the middle of the gardens is this amphitheatre that was built during the communist era. It stands as a point of contention between the UN World Heritage and the government over whether or not it should be destroyed and the area restored to how it would look 200 years ago.




The castle grounds have always been home to bears. This was due to the fact that bears represent power and might, and as well as being family symbols of the Italian noble family of Orsini that the Rosenbergs, historical rulers of Krumlov, thought they were related to. I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad to have a bear named after you., even if you were once Queen of Austria ruling on the Hapsburg throne.

One of the bears. We all thought that bears hibernated through the winter but this one actually came out while we were around. It also went on to poop before retreating back to wherever it was hiding before.

ah it's good to be back...

but then and again i must say that i've been to so many extremely beautiful places..
i wanna go again!

haha...




Christmas market at the Old Town Square in Prague.




And that's me!
Just round the corner from the square.
















Wenceslas Square, one of the major shopping districts in Prague. Not really much of a square, really, more like a boulevard. Christmas markets open here too, along the long stretch in the centre separated at intervals by small, pretty gardens.








Strahov Library, in Strahov Monastery. It's been standing since 1143 and it is today still a library, and as well as the Musuem of National Literature.




Church of our Lady at Strahov Monastery. Mozart once played the church organ there. That's actually not saying much since in Prague and the surrounding territories Mozart played a fair lot of organs that are still around today.





Look all the way down past that huge chunk about who built it to see his name. It probably just says he played in
there in 1787.


The gates to Prague Castle. The castle is the largest castle complex in the world, and also one of the oldest, built in the 9th century. It has been and still is the seat of administrative power in the country.














Charles Bridge, named after King Charles IV, with 30 statues along the length of the bridge. At the pedestal of the statue of St. John of Nepomuk there are two well worn images, of the saint being thrown into the river and the other of a dog, that was said to have come to the bridge to follow its master to death.








If you touch the saint and make a wish it will come true, as long as you tell no one what you wished for. If you touch the dog, a symbol of loyalty, you will one day return to Prague.












The highlight of the entire trip - Gold in the International Festival of Advent and Christmas Music.










And together with it a special mention for the outstanding performance of one of our songs.






and more to come soon...

hello everybody..

i'll be away in Prague from 29th November to 9th December..

more when i get back!

the bus ride back home from choir rehearsal today was reflective and in some ways, very sad...
and this explains why.


'... I washed my hands at the ornamental spring, but even rubbing at the marks with soap wouldn't get them off. They were stuck fast on the skin. It was most odd. I showed them to Uncle Shigematsu, who said, "It could be oil from an oil bomb, after all. I wonder if it was an oil bomb they dropped, then?" Then he looked at my face and said, "Or it might be poison gas -- some sort of substance like mud, but more clinging. Perhaps they dropped a poison gas bomb." He looked again, and said, "Or it may not be poison gas, but something that sprayed out of a Japanese ammunition dump that blew up. Perhaps a spy or someone set fire to an ammunition dump. There may have been an arsenal for storing the army's secret weapons. I was at Yokogawa Station when it happened, then I walked back along the tracks, but I didn't see any black rain. I expect you've been splashed with oil."

If it's really poison gas, I thought, then this is the end. I felt horrified, then awfully sad. However many times I went to the ornamental spring to wash myself, the stains from the black rain wouldn't come off. As a dye, I thought, it would be an unqualified success.'



'... The boy's face was swollen up like a football, and was much the same color; his hair and eyebrows had disappeared. He might have been anybody.

"Ichiro, it's me. Me, your brother!"

He looked up into the young man's face, but the young man made a wry expression as though unwilling to recognize him.

"Come on, tell me your name then," he said roughly. "Tell me the name of your school."

"Kyuzo Sukune, first grade, second class, Hiroshima Prefecture First Middle School."

The young man drew back, suddenly on his guard.

"I see, but Kyuzo -- yes, Kyuzo's wearing puttees. And he's got a shirt made from a cotton kimono, with dark blue spots all over."

"But the puttees got blown off. And the spots have all gone into holes. It all happened when the bomb flashed. Ichiro, you must know who I am!"

The shirt was indeed covered with holes, but the young man still seemed wary.

"But... yes, of course -- I could tell Kyuzo by his belt!"

"You mean this one, Ichiro?"

Swiftly, with raw, burned hands, he pulled out his belt and showed it to the young man. It must have been made for him from the leather strap used for fastening a wicker hamper, and it had a crude ring of the same color encircling it by the brown metal buckle.

"It is!" The young man's voice choked. "Oh, Kyuzo..." '

- Black Rain, by Masuji Ibuse,
translated by John Bester

well, so here i am.

this new week marks the beginning of the end of this period of life that has went on for two years. strangely enough, with all the performances and rehearsals and preparation going on in my life right now, the end of such a momentuous era in my life seemed to be sorely lacking something, specifically, recognition.

ergo.

not too many days ago, in anticipation of this time coming, i had flipped back to the dusty pages of my archives and read and re-read all my previous posts; on graduation, on army, and on life in general over the last two years. and quite unabashedly, i'd like to say that it has been, well, good. good, because over the past two years, whether borne of good or bad, i've learnt so many things and grown in so many ways that when i cast the mirror back and look at that floppy-haired guy from the past i can hardly recognise the reflection.

it seems that everything has gone on a long, winding, but ultimately eye-opening journey. now, stopping to look back to see how far i've gone it doesn't seem far, because i'm back where i began, pursuing passion and laughing like a child and letting love and life take their own inscrutable ways. that was exactly how things were when i left civilian life, but in the days in between the then and the now, i've let passion slip away, trying to convince myself that i could live a lesser life, and shed tears, and veiled laughter. but after it all, i'm still back here where i began.

and thus, having suddenly set all these previously unnamed, undefined and therefore non-existent thoughts to life in black and white i seem like that boy again, facing an impossibly huge world and future. but then, at least now i have the knowledge that i can, after losing sight of everything, find it again.

because i've done it before.

i so want to write mounds and mounds of words like i used to but nothing comes to mind...

so i shall just mindlessly ramble on until i come to something...

swimming somewhere around my consciousness right now are three unfinished pieces of prose... as much as it puts me to shame to say that one of them i'll probably never get round to finishing, i will have to tell the truth and say...
well, i suppose no one's ever going to find out what happened to Lord Graine the night he was murdered...

how sad.

now let's hope that i can finish the other pieces so that i don't seem to have no backbone whatsoever and that i have no perserverance to finish what i start.

so the past few days have been spent at home, practicing and watching the telly and going out to run errands and all that stuff that seems to be so inconsequential but when you look at the time half the day's gone.. in an hour of boredom today i started folding paper airplanes from a stack of paper that i had meant to throw out and before i knew it i was five again, and indulging in the endless, childish, yet so innocently pleasurable cycle of throwing, watching in amazement, rushing to retrieve the paper, and throwing again.

and it really helped that when looking out of the window i could actually see the sky... all grey and translucent and cloudy, promising even more rain...

that was fun...

i received a call a few days back and the caller asked why i sounded so weary.
hmm. i said i sounded tired because i was.
(that day being the day that i had to go down to get my phone serviced. and i'm one of those people they talk about in the papers who when the phone breaks down they just get depressed because they've developed some reliance on the phone. which is pretty weird cos i don't use the phone much anyway. but then and again maybe i'm secretly, unconsciously afraid of being alone and the phone allows me to, without actually being in contact with anyone, be in touch with the outside world.)
but thinking back upon the last few days it seems that my mood nowadays swings from a victorious and triumphant conviction that i'll succeed in doing what i want and this depressing, nagging feeling that i am going to, after all the trouble, have to go walking, head held tensely up, brow hardened, into NUS, to matriculate like everyone else.

i so do not want to be anyone else.

and surfing around i chanced upon this:
Pronoia: "The delusion that others think well of one, the unreasoning belief that his superiors think him to be indispensable, that his colleagues adore him, and that he is doing brilliantly in his work."
a word coined by Fred Goldner, in an article in Social Problems (1982)

and this so succinctly sums it up.

i swing between pronoia and self-doubt.

and so it seems that rambling along i have come to a reasonable length..
nighty then..

yes very abrupt i know.. but then suddenly the urge to write just dissipates into thin air.

which is a good thing, actually, since these urges to write come mostly when i feel less than perfect...

so life has been terribly busy these days, because amidst preparations for myriad events and performances i also have to make even more important preparations for the future...

but first the performances (which i would be ecstatic should i see some familiar faces):

Saturday, 25th November, 8pm
Raffles Hotel Jubilee Hall
Kim Seng Wind Symphony in Concert
tickets available at $10 each

18th November
Earshot Cafe at the Arts House
(which i shall be an accompanying pianist for the evening's singers)

and i will be flying to prague for over a week following these performances... this next event stresses me out to no end but is at the same time so exciting..

so that's what's up with my life.

and in the middle of all that i have somehow come to decide that i should at least take one long shot at trying to do what i really love doing... there have been countless cycles of vacillating between hormone-induced, adolescent despair and acceptance that life is bleak...
but the status quo now stands at acceptance that the lesser alternatives (which i have already secured) are not at all unbearable, but they are lesser nonetheless, and the chance to heed passion and pursue what i really want makes these lesser alternatives seem a lesser life, pale and muted...

at long last it seems that now that i'm trying my best for myself the angst and despair have melted away, and all i have is a quiet determination, and quite weirdly, peace.

or maybe the paranoia just hasn't set in.

hmm...

shamelessly ripped from leonard, who ripped it from zat...
you can rip it too!
at http://colorquiz.com/


Your Existing Situation

Acts calmly, with the minimum of upset, in order to handle existing relationships. Likes to feel relaxed and at ease with his associates and those close to him.


Your Stress Sources

Feels that life has far more to offer and that there are still important things to be achieved - that life must be experienced to the fullest. As a result, he pursues his objectives with a fierce intensity that will not let go of things. Becomes deeply involved and runs the risk of being unable to view things with sufficient objectivity, or calmly enough; is therefore in danger of becoming agitated and of exhausting his nervous energy. Cannot leave things alone and feels he can only be at peace when he has finally reached his goal.


Your Restrained Characteristics

Feels that he is receiving less than his share and that there is no one on who he can rely for sympathy and understanding. Pent-up emotions make him quick to take offense, but he realizes that he has to make the best of things as they are.

Trying to calm down and unwind after a period of over-agitation which has left him listless and devoid of energy. In need of peace and quiet; becomes irritable if this is denied him.

Feels that things stand in his way, that circumstances are forcing him to compromise and forgo some pleasures for the time being.


Your Desired Objective

In despair and needs relief of some sort. Wants physical ease, a problem free security, and the chance to recover.


Your Actual Problem

The fear that he may be prevented from achieving the things he wants leads him into a relentless search for satisfaction in the pursuit of illusory or meaningless activities.


thank you very much. i sound like a bad case of neurotic anxiety.

My horoscope according to flooble.com

"Pisces cannot live without lies and treachery. They often get so wrapped up in their own tall tales that they can easily forget which of their stories are true and which are not.

A Pisces constantly contradicts himself, and is always trying to wriggle out of a lie somebody has called him on. He will generally not profit from such fruitless tasks, but that's fine by him - he's doing it for the art.

Additionally a Pisces loves nothing more than to stick his nose into someone else's dirty laundry. Pretending to be a self-taught psychoanalyst he will pry into people's secrets, which he will later manipulate and trade through his own self-styled network of spies.

Incapable of working, or for that matter doing anything remotely useful, a Pisces has no interest for aquiring such abilities. Forcing him to do so is nearly impossible - he will simply wriggle out and disappear."