from green to black

mind games

so the story starts on friday since i didnt have time
to update so far. i decided to run 15km for fun. its
a pretty short distance i guess since it was only buona
vista and pgp route combined, take that and 2 additional
rounds in the car park (because i wanted to drink water
but still keep running to get used to the feeling) and
it was done in 1 hour and 20 mins. oh and i did 15 minutes
of rowing machine before that and some light gymwork
after. i must say it wasnt much of an accomplishment
since i've run longer distances before. but the good
thing was i could still keep going, it felt easy in fact.
so hopefully i'm in good shape for my ironman.

ok so for you guys who dont know, i guess i'll be with
the business school guys elijah and nick to represent
school in a full ironman since school will be sponsoring
us. for what it means, well its a 4km swim, 180km bike
ride and a 42km run. i hope to finish it in 11 hours.
so i guess the most important thing for me is to learn
how to love the pain again, to tell myself that i can
finished the race and that my body will not give up until
my mind gives up. looks like i'll start to run 15 clicks
for fun now since its such a short distance to train. yawn.

i went for the ministerial forum that night as well and
came out a little more enlightened about why things wont
change here. ( yes i know they wont change but that day
gave me a look at the mechanism why things wont change).
so i thought the minister was a smooth talker, dr viv B.
i mean, smoke the rest, the polsci students aint gonna
swallow everything hook line and sinker. although i
found his candidness refreshing, enough to keep me from
falling asleep that is.

some of the things he said scared me a little. especially
about how hardworking he thinks we are. "the most hardworking
people in the world" bullshit no doubt, never heard of
anyone who died because of overwork in singapore, but
there were people in japan who die of overwork. but that
is beside the point. i became even more worried when he
quoted the mm talking about a disciplined and hardworking
people, competition. because as much as i admire the trait
i am not one for having it foisted on me. i know that i
am probably not kiasu hence "singaporean" enough to
work as hard as the foreign talent are willing to work.

let them have the crazy lifestlye i say, i'm pretty sure
nobody wants to work ceaselessly even if competition is
that intense. i worry that working ceaselessly would be
the new benchmark that will be expected. * well of course
not ceaselessly, but you can imagine if we have to be
so hardworking as to work 20hour days every day right.
just to be, i repeat, just to be competitive.

i cant quite remember the rest of the what he said
although, i did remember being amused here an there.
what struck me as something i would take away though
would be his conduct, unlike the pm, (the ministerial
forum from 1 yr ago) dr viv b, definitely had more class.
even though there was this "irritating" (no he wasnt
really) bugger who never stopped repeating his question,
viv b actually stopped the moderator to attend to his
concerns. well that took class. he didnt care if the
rest of us would be late, he wanted to make sure that
the student was treated with dignity! now that is what
i called grace under pressure, he ended the session
well with a summary too.

note that i still mention that i think he was smoking
through some of it, in case people are wondering if
i'm going la la over nothing.

today was tiring because theres so much to do for my
essays, not to mention i had a group project, followed
by work. but i guess its nice to print stuff in the
library on a saturday night. all the books will be in
rbr. lol. cant wait for 24hr library to start then i
can sleep in air con again. rofl.

sigh how am i supposed to finish my stuff. tsk.

posted by green unseen @ 8:54 AM