If there was a Guinness record for longest period of not updating a blog, i think i might bag it. Well, with NS coming next year, i wonder if I might break my own record.

Anyway, i can't really be bothered to blog about all the stuff post a level till present. The "honeymoon" period seemed to have past in a blur. For those going into NS in 2 weeks, all the best and look ahead. I would probably be unable to send all u guys off (since i have to work) and even if i did send you all off, i probably have to camp at Pasir Ris ferry terminal.

So, the past 3 days were spent on the island of Bintan with 20 other odacians. Somehow, this time Bintan wasn't as awe-inducing as the first time i went there for ccal camp last year. Perhaps i got used to seeing some pristine beaches or perhaps the trips to the beach were elusive (admist the camp activities) so they were more treasured. Somehow, we realised that our 100 bucks budget was not very realistic should we want to try all the fun stuff (like jet ski) because most things were expensive and food was so expensive that we skipped two meals. Yet, ironically, i spent less than 100 bucks altogether on this trip.

So, we gathered on Boxing day morning at Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal (which is probably the most ulu spot in Singapore) for our ferry ride to Bintan. It was quite funny how some people thought boxing day really had to do with the boxing sport. (btw its the day when you open your presents and its called boxing day for presents were traditionally in boxes). We got to Bintan in no time at all. Literally. Since our ferry ride took one hour and Bintan time is 1 hour behind Sg, so you go do the maths. I didn't know ferry terminals have Duty Free so i was so excited. Anyways, we decided to get a Baileys for good measure.

Upon arriving at Bintan, we swiftly checked in and me, gerard and yeesian were in the furthest room of them all. But no complains there. I think after so long i probably can bunk with any of the odac guys quite comfortably. We basically lazed around in the room for a while and headed for lunch. The food was super expensive and we ended up 2 people sharing a pizza. For my table, the bill for 7 people came to about $577000. rupiah. And then of course, we hit the beach. To play some mass volleyball. It was super funny cause there were so many of us and then there was kiampa who was super super afraid of the volleyball and shawntan who hates getting his hands dirty. After a while, we took a walk down the beach to look for Kelly and found her with RyanD listening to his guitar. So we camped there, it was quite cosy and cool to play guitar and sit under those trees along the beach. Soon, the rest came to declare all out war and launch sand balls at each other. And Gavan and I dunked willy into the sea haha.

After that we got back to bathe washup and sorry saraandjames i got your xmas present sandy lol. But it came in handy when willy wanted to dunk me to say "eh don't dirty this one is present." Since food was so dear on resort, we had to resort (haha) to eating instant noodles for dinner. And watching stupid shou zu on channel 8. I hate that show. Then we decided to hit the resort's pub for some serious partaaaaay. Yea so we went to karaoke. The bartendess was super niao about their policy of ordering 6 drinks in a hour in order to use the room. So i bargained until it was 4 drinks per room for 2 hours of use. Then as she counted that i was bringing in TWO more people than i had told her, she wanted 6 drinks per room. I adamantly said no thats not what you told me. At most 5 drinks in a room. I seriously hate bargaining for they use arguments as if they think you're an idiot. Well, anyhow we got quite an ok deal in the end and i figured she won't chase us out since that joint doesn't look like it enjoys brisk business anyway. So it was 2 hours of peng you, somewhere out there, eternal flame, and many many other old songs. Willy and I tried to serenade everyone with Starry Starry Night (aka Vincent) by Don McLean but we failed. So after screaming until we all lost our voices, we decided to check out the live band that played at 10pm.

And we were so not disappointed. The band (called Zoom) played song after song after song of popular pieces that got everyone dancing to the beat and screaming. This place is a pub but its super roomy and quite empty so the presence of 20 young people in the pub probably uplifted the band as well. Then they also played some of our dedications though sadly they didn't seem to know the existence of Savage Garden. My only gripe was the stupid smokers who smoked up the whole place. Anyhow, we danced and danced and danced to the beat until midnight when the band finally stop (not before finishing off with Y-M-C-A). I think that was the part of the trip that everyone had the greatest fun. It was clean, good musical fun.

After that weepin and I just crashed in my room because the room 1213 (aka the gathering room was noisy and crowded). And it turned out that gerard and yeesian got locked out of my room since the room door locks automatically and yida being the smart ass took our key to enter and didnt return the keys to gerard lol. And talking about keys, we here at ggleong.blogspot would like to thanks gerard for being the responsible keymaster and keeping the room keys in the safest possible location. Where the "keys" to his happiness are kept, down under.

The next morning's breakfast was (thankfully) not instant noodles. The breakfast buffet had a pretty good spread and so i ate heartily. So heartily that we even da bao-ed quite a bit of it. At this point i know some of you are gonna think we're big cheapskates and manifesting the kiasu singaporean mentality, but hear me out first. It was actually our plan to kope the food since we wanted to save money for lunch. So we thought let's just take some of our breakfast and tada, make it into lunch. So have pity on us poor lil students. Anyway shawntan was damn unskilled as he made two whole plates of pastries disappear in under a minute. I think gerard was most skilled and his doggy bag disguised as a vomit bag was man useful.

We originally planned to kayak from 11am to 1pm but due to unforseen circumstances (ie choppy waters) we couldn't. So some of them went to cycle, some went to body board (more on that later) and some of us played beach volleyball. It was rather fun towards the end when i figured out how to play (though still extremely lousy). It was quite funny cause there were two middle aged caucasian men watching us and laughing laughing (not in the oh so noob kind of laugh but like happy to see young people playing ball kind of way). After that, me and yeesian went to tiao hai (jump sea). It was quite shiok to get knocked by all the strong waves and to bob up and down. Then we went swimming in the resort pool, which was weird cause the pool was super weirdly shaped. Willy and I con-ed weepin into the pool by saying there were two uber hot chicks inside lol.

So by 2 plus we went back to mana mana beach to kayak. The waters were still choppy but better and it was pretty much a challenge not to run aground on the beach or his the rocks to our left. Willy and mel turned their kayaking into windsurfing by spectacularly gliding into the beach. and then capsize. It was boring after a while since we couldn't go very far and i was glad we only rented for 1 hr. After that, it was dinner time. This time no more maggie dinner and we went down to The Kelong restaurant.

Being budget conscious, the dishes had to also be quite budget friendly. So we thought of skipping fish. But we thought, what the heck come kelong don't eat fish is quite stupid. So we got a steamed red snapper, which was THE BOMB fresh. It was a really good dinner, i personally felt, cause it wasn't often that odac eats together at one table and considering that NS is knocking on the doors, the few dinners we have will only get rarer. Sigh, depressing things.

The rest of the night was spent watching tv, playing saboteur and mahjong. No more pub cause we didn't want to get closer to greeting lung cancer. And my mahjong game was s-p-e-c-t-a-c-u-l-a-r. Got a ching yi se (green one colour) in one of the games. That was 5 tai and plus my one cat gave me 6 tai. If only we played money, then i would have won $6.40 (SGD hor) from EACH PERSON and yida will pay me 12.80. But no, we didn't gamble :(

The next morning i woke up quite early to find gerard missing. So after much frantic searching (due to my great concern for my friend), no actually cause he had our breakfast vouchers, I gave up. I started digging his bag for the abovementioned vouchers and found a book by Mitch Albom, so i took off to the hammock by the beach for some reading. It was there on some beach benches that gasp, i found gerard sleeping with siyu. And shawn tan and i forgotwhoelsealready.

Breakfast buffet was good, good food, good time, good waiters. There was this guy who was supposed to cook omelette and he was super funny. I went up to him and he greeted me with, "wassup man, wassup". Then i stunned and said oh hello. And then he went on to rattle on about a lot of other funny random stuff. I think i stuffed myself too full for the breakfast, but i only ate like what? 4 helpings?.

Then we set out to do body-boarding, which is basically this floating board given to you and you're supposed to use to to hop onto the waves and let the waves carry you onto the beach. It sounds simple but its hard cause you've got the catch the wave at the right time, ensuring you are carried on the front of the wave for maximum power. But if you do get it right, the feeling is super satisfactory. Actually its quite tiring overall as you keep having to battle the waves and hold your ground and hop onto the waves at the right time. And of course, it was during this activity we met The Man.

Enter man in green thong. So, i was walking back to the counter to keep my spectacles away and happen to be looking down when walking. Suddenly, i spotted guy with green G-string walking towards me. It was a really tiny bitsy g-string that covered some parts and not others. Sufficiently disgusted (especially since he was a guy in like 40s), i met siyu and ryan and siyu gave me a did-you-see-that look. After our activity, everyone noticed The Man and nearer our room, a few of us guys started cracking jokes that got us in endless, cramping laughters.

The rest of the day wasn't very eventful. After washing up, we checked out and went down to the pizza place near mana-mana and chilled out there, while mel (goh + ho) and bookiat went for massage. We then took a rocky walk to the tombola or whatever it is and then walked the path back to nirwana resort.

After much waiting, we finally got onto the shuttle bus and after even more waiting, onto the packed ferry back to Singapore. Our heart goes out to Weepin, who on this trip lost his spectacles, his soccer ball and his ferry ticket. But as the chinese proverb goes, sai4 weng1 si1 ma3, we now know Weepin has gained quite something in the few days that came after the trip ;)