Of The Causes Of Euphoria In A Sleep-deprived State

pre-concert

the lead up to the concert was pretty hectic. had to squeeze in practices, memorise scores, come up with the program booklet...all while trying to immerse myself a little deeper into paediatrics. tutorials lasting till 7pm, ward assessments, lectures ran through the week, and it became a little difficult to tell one day from the next.

had a bit o' break on my birthday. ms lion, fish, missA together with jie-ke, p and grandpa (what a pleasant surprise!) had lunch with me at ma maison. got to eat some good food, which included escargots!

after that we rushed off to grand cathay to catch ratatouille. it's a cartoon, and i expected the plot to be appropriately simple, but i was mistaken. beyond that oft-rehashed plot of a someone (in this case a sewer rat called remy) trying to chase his dreams despite the impossible, there are the themes of coming to terms with one's own weaknesses, for example, so it really isn't a kid's movie. on the technical front, the team at pixar has brought animation to new heights once again. the animation was amazing; i especially love the parts where remy's fur gets singed in his mad dash around the kitchen and the massive turbulence of water that sweeps remy into the drains of paris.

the whole atmosphere of the movie reminded me of geroge orwell's down and out in paris and london, in which orwell describes the life of a plongeur, the dishwasher and kitchen assistant personified in the movie as remy's human friend, linguini. wikipedia has an excellent excerpt from the book:

"[A] plongeur is one of the slaves of the modern world. Not that there is any need to whine over him, for he is better off than many manual workers, but still, he is no freer than if he were bought and sold. His work is servile and without art; he is paid just enough to keep him alive; his only holiday is the sack... [they have] been trapped by a routine which makes thought impossible. If plongeurs thought at all, they would long ago have formed a union and gone on strike for better treatment. But they do not think, because they have no leisure for it; their life has made slaves of them."

straight after the movie was dinner with my parents at crystal jade vivocity, and the day rounded up with a delicious chocolate cake (my second one that day!) from breadtalk.

concert

when i met up with the group at 3pm on the day itself, i was greeted with good news - we managed to borrow a sound system from resonance! woo! wireless mikes! poor sushi though had to drive all the way to nus to load his car with the speakers and all, and when he came he had to find parking for it.

this was my first time working with such an elaborate sound system (by my standards!) so it really was an experience. so blessed to have friends from resonance who helped to EQ our mikes in order for us to sound our best that night. if we had relied on the mikes provided...well...the result would not have been the same. heh.

we managed to grab a bite of some sandwiches (the mashed eggs were suspiciously sour, thank goodness none of us had any tummy trouble after that) before we stepped out onto the stage. it was over in a flash - tea for two, blue moon, celebrate, a mile in my shoes, africa...all in an hour or so. was a little shocked when i realised we'd come to our last song, even though we had rehearsed it several times. i was touched by the support given - almost all our tickets were sold out! and of course, not to mention the flowers and cakes and hugs that came after that. it was awesome to have so many friends and family come down to watch me sing. heh. priceless.

post-concert

was on a post-concert high that lasted for about 2 days, and which carried me through night duty on monday (see previous post, in which i forgot to mention i saw an opthalmia neonatorum in a 15do babe whose parents were younger than me). we had a meet up on tuesday at nydc at holland village to exchange photos, calculate our earnings (enough for a good nydc dinner plus the cost of burning the performance video) and say goodbye to sushi and g. joss dug up some old pictures of us in j2 performing at junction 8, and i honestly can't remember much of that event! must be getting old. we're j6 now, and we've managed to meet up once a year despite being dispersed over 3 continents.

was to have rounded off the week with a cg dinner at st james' power station, but due to unforseen circumstances, we ended up at vivocity's carl's junior. not too bad a way to end our western hospital posting though.

i move on to the baby hospital tomorrow, and will be there till mid-october. i'm looking forward to having more down time - that i can have a whole morning to type this post is such a luxury i haven't had for the past month. i'm midway through my fourth year of medical school (if you exclude the elective period) and there's still so much that i don't know. and during thursday's bs, something came up, and now i've got to make a decision which i don't want to make. i also need to finish up the yearbook otherwise it won't make it to print on time.

can't wait for the two week break!