moulting.

Why, hello there! It’s been a long while.

So I was stopped in my tracks by this amusing sight one sunny Sunday afternoon, outside Marina Square.

Just this lone pigeon, peacefully pottering down an empty corridor. An odd pigeon strolling through life.

I have been gone for a year now, chiefly dealing with life and work and its many roller-coasters. Much has happened. My absence coincided with a need to disappear into the seams of my life, to privately deal with the stuff that was impossible to articulate or share publicly.

You see, M and I decided peaceably to go our separate ways. We are still friends, but we are no longer together. We are both fine, in the bigger scheme of things, and healing in our own time.

On top of that, 2015 has been pretty rewarding work-wise, with many new challenges and opportunities to be thankful for. Projects like Checkpoint Theatre’s “Normal”, or The Studios : fifty’s “Selected Works of Tan Tarn How”, or doing a voice-over for a children’s animated series, or being drenched for 7 hours straight for a TVC shoot. You get put in front of this crazy challenge, and each time you go “Oh fuck I have never done this before, will I be able to do this?”, and then somehow you do. With varying degrees of success, but you do your very best, and you learn your inner critic is the one you need to please; not anybody else.

Despite these projects, there have been typical freelancer-style nail biting moments of “will I get work this month?”, but I have more often than not heaved a sigh of relief because some small (but no less treasured) job comes along and stacks upon the others and tides me through the month.

… And I turned 30 this August. 30 used to scare me but now I’m glad I can claim that age. To validly own its weight and its heft. Was it Anna Kendrick who said something like, “I love turning 30 because I feel in your 20s you stay out late and you kinda feel you have to. But now I can say, I’m 30 dammit and I’m heading home at 11 to kick off my heels, snuggle under a blanket and watch a TV show.” Yah.

So yeah. Here I am. Doing this thing. This theatre thing; this life thing; this new beginnings thing. And it’s scary, joyful, heartbreaking, uncertain. And I’m feeling everything keenly. Soaking it up.

And hey, thank you for sticking around ;) I treasure the company.

p.s. I am planning to continue writing here instead; I’d love it if you would join me there.

a wise man* once said, “If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking.”

I like how serenely this girl watches us, with that little half-smile and a bird perched on her shoulder.

(Plus, I’m dying to have her dress.)

Hello! How’ve you been? It’s been so long since I checked in, I’m sorry about that.

After I came back from New York, I harboured this crazy desire to return sooner than later. I just wanted so badly to be back in New York, for a variety of reasons. And somehow in the weeks after I returned, things lined up such that it actually became possible financially and logistically to do so, in October! :)

The main reason I’m headed back there is to pursue intensive singing lessons with a wonderful teacher by the name of Jeff Stanfill, whom I adore. I met him during my trip in June, introduced by a couple of teachers I have here in Singapore. Two lessons with him, and I knew we’d found something here, together… something that could be so helpful to my growth. (I’ve been feeling like I’m struggling to get across the “hump” with my singing for some time now!)

The other (also main) reason is to get away from it all, and recharge my acting / singing mojo. This year’s been tough – I really appreciate being given the chance to audition, but rejection does wear you down over time, try as you may to stay strong :) I made the decision to go to NY at a rather low point, and it’s given me something to look forward to as I recalibrate, even in the months leading up to it, my attitude on this life-long journey :)

I’m still working on the “let it go, let it be” thing. In the meantime, it’s lots of freelance branding work to finance the NY trip, rehearsals for my next show in September, and auditions here and there.

Oh, and I turned 29 yesterday! It feels funny to be 29. I just feel like I have to be even more grown-up than I am now, or something. But boy am I happy to have my twin with me in Singapore to celebrate with :) Finally! After many years, we are united again at birthday-time. Ah. All is as it should be.

M and Yibs decided to surprise me with go-karting – which was another post for another day. SO FUN. (Also, I thought I was going to die.)

Have a lovely week ahead x

(Etsy print, from IrenaSophia)

*Steve Jobs was said wise man.

Our New York adventure, in thumbnails. Part 1.

Our New York adventure, in thumbnails. Part 2.

“what if I fall?”, said one. said the other : “oh, my darling, what if you fly?”

Over the weekend I caught up with two close girlfriends. We talked about our perfectionist streaks, but not in that glowy pseudo-self-consciousy passively-proud-of-it way people do these days … We talked about how it resulted in us getting in our own way. We couldn’t really be happy and find peace if we kept clinging on to these unrealistic expectations of ourselves and others.

Worry and anxiety are freelancers’ (and business owners’) uneasy bedfellows, because you worry about continuity, about not finding work, about auditions and fucking up at them, about the work you currently have, that you’re balancing with 3 other things at the moment.

Especially when your work is your dream goal, the stakes are that much higher, and it becomes that much harder to let go of your own stranglehold on how much you want it to come true.

But sitting with it – making peace with it – and just doing your best and recognising the rest is out of your control, is such obvious advice but it works, for me. Some days are obviously easier than others, but I’m determined to start letting peace in more.

So this little quote struck home because it reminds me that having set out and done “it” (in this case, just completing an audition that I had a day to prepare for!), is more significant and more worthy than achieving perfection.

In other news, 10 days to New York! Crazy daisies.

Have a brilliant week of getting things done – and not (necessarily) perfect – ladies and gentlemen! Love x

Naiise.

I’m so glad that naiise exists, finally a lovely well-curated e-store showcasing the best local design has to offer!

SCENE SHANG 新赏 is a beautifully crafted brand created by two friends, Pam and Jess. I am in love with their cushion covers, and am definitely getting at least the Aliwal Arts Centre one (They have four editions currently – Aliwal Arts Centre, Tanjong Pagar Railway Station, The Cathay cineplex, and Tiong Poh Road). This building has personal meaning to me as my actor training classes are being held here :)

These wheniwasfour Ang Ku Kueh pins are so adorable! I love ang ku kueh’s, mostly because they’re my dad’s favourite and remind me of him. (If you’re more of a savoury person, they also have the peng kueh version here.)

 

 

Sumaya’s Instant Gratification Noodles print quips, “Just add boiling impatience”.

One of the things I love most about the Chinese language is how poetic it is – succinct yet richly layered in meaning. Typesetting letterpress postcard “Pride invites sully; Humility invites goodness” exemplifies that.

And how lovely to see local artisanal food producers featured here! I may try out this delicious-sounding coconut gula melaka granola, having tried a similar granola at Common Man Coffee Roasters over the weekend. Mmmm.

Photocredit : Naiise.com

 

Resilience.

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build’em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son! 
—Rudyard Kipling

Today is

for awesome.

Popiah and teh peng for breakfast

then cake and a stroll around NTUC with one of my dearest girlfriends,

holed up at home and practised singing in air-conditioned relief,

took the plunge and bought Bombay Bicycle Club’s latest album (yay happy music),

and looking forward to meeting the Glass Anatomy ensemble folk for a theatre show & supper after.

WOO.

“There’s a lot of words to call out
Just waiting for the perfect hideout”

Hiraeth.

Back from Shanghai, and post-production blues have hit like a wall.

It was an incredible experience, tough and frustrating and exhilarating and so much fun all at once. I miss it already.

Productions are funny things – they are such intense connections – with other people, and the places, stories and characters within. When the run is over, the costumes and props are packed up, the set and light rigs dismantled, the theatre cleared, the people separated… and it’s almost as if it never happened. It evaporates into thin air. This is part of the magic of theatre, of course. But it’s also such a good reminder to treasure the experience while it is happening. To be present through it all :-)