Today, we celebrated Racial Harmony Day in school... I really think that Singapore should just declare this as a public holiday. You know, so we can go out with friends from different ethnic groups and all. Lol. But anyway, at least there weren’t any lessons today. If I didn’t remember wrongly, we used to still have lessons during the past few Racial Harmony Day, so hooray for the change.

To start off the day, we had a talk cum forum discussion with some minister called Dr Yaccob Ibrahim, who is also an ex-Tksian. Pretty engaging and interesting talk. And I must say, he can talk and think on his feet really well. Very eloquent. I don’t recall hearing him stutter even once.

Went off for recess before going for a ketupat-making session. It was pretty fun… We were taught how to make ketupats by weaving two coconut leaves together. Gosh I tell you. Don’t ever be deceive by how plain and simple a ketupat looks. It is super hard to make. I didn’t manage to make a complete one on my own, because despite the number of times I tried, something was always screwed up. T.T

Oh, and we also had free food! They let us try this Malay dish which has ketupat in it. It was quite nice I guess, except for the vegetables. Lol. Can’t remember the name of the dish though.

We stayed at the COE room to crap around and continue trying to make ketupats until we were told to go to the hall for the final event. The principal gave a talk to us, saying something like we were all rojak. LOL. Okay I know that isn’t quite how he said it, but anyway. We watched this short skit and then the day was over!

I was actually deliberating on whether to go do my hair (I’ve been wanting to do so for quite some time, but never really got down to it because I always made some excuse for myself, like “oh, if I’m fated and Supercuts still has a 50% discount, then I shall go treat myself to a haircut and treatment next week”) or go meet Lynette dear at Ikea.

I decided to go meet Lynette in the end, because I didn’t want to idle around with nothing to do whilst waiting for Yennying to finish her tuition to go Supercuts with me.

So I met Lynette and finally went to Ikea to eat meatballs. Gosh, it’s been like an eternity since I last went to eat at Ikea. And today was the first time I went to the new Ikea at Tampines/Pasir Ris. Jessie came to meet us too.

I managed to do like, a little less than one question of maths homework there. Ha. Then I had to go home for tuition. I thought leaving the place an hour before tuition would be more than enough time for me to get back in time, but noo, I was quite wrong. The journey home was so damn asdflskfjl that I could very well write an essay on it.

First of all, the shuttle bus only comes every 30 minutes or so. Do you know how long that is?! Like hello, isn’t it a well known fact that we live in a very fast paced world where almost everyone is rushing for time? 30 minutes is way too long an interval, if you ask me. Especially not when I’m rushing home for tuition!

And that place where that Ikea is located is pretty remote in a sense. There are hardly any taxis, and anyway it wasn’t really the main road. I was pacing back and forth between the taxi stand and the shuttle bus waiting area, and I took the bus in the end because even though I had to wait like 20 minutes plus for the bus, the taxi queue hardly moved so it would probably have been worse if I stood in the taxi queue.

At first I thought, since the bus goes to Bedok MRT and there aren’t any stops in between, it shouldn’t take that long right? WRONG! The bus was moving at a snail’s speed I tell you. I’m not exaggerating, and I swear it doesn’t just seem so because I’m so anxious to get home. I mean, if it were other tuition teachers, I probably wouldn’t have been so worried of being a few minutes late. But this is Mrs Sebastian we’re talking about. Plus my dad was being discharged from the hospital today, so he would be home and know what time I come back.

Sidetracking a little, did I tell you that the first or second time Mrs Sebastian came, I can’t remember which, she was about 10 minutes or so early, and I wasn’t home yet. My maid didn’t have my number, so she couldn’t call me. So Mrs Sebastian actually asked my maid to call my mother or else she would leave if I wasn’t going to come home soon! Like WTH. Needless to say, I got blasted by my mother, even though I was actually really only 3 minutes late. I mean, hey, it isn’t really my fault she came so early right?

Anyway, as I was saying, the bus ride home. The bus was CRAWLING along the road throughout the whole journey, it made me so pissed with the stupid shuttle bus when I witness car after car overtaking the bus. I only saw the bus overtake ONE car, which eventually overtook the bus again. How irritating.

10 minutes had past, and I thought the bus was finally going to hit the highway which was just in front of us. But NO, the bus just HAD to switch lanes and go by the other road, which was filled with a dozen over traffic lights. Singapore has such a concerned government which installs traffic lights every few hundred metres that just all the more adds to my already bad and anxious mood.

And as if all those weren’t enough, the bus just HAD to take a long route through all the lovely housing estates where traffic lights are everywhere. I knew I was going to be late. I kept hoping that Mrs Sebastian would suddenly call me up and say she couldn’t make it today, or my brother would call to say he wanted to switch his tuition timing with mine. But alas, no such thing happened. >.<

The bus finally arrived at Bedok MRT station and I rushed to the other bus stop. Fortunately I didn’t have to wait long to board the bus home. And luckily for me, the bus wasn’t crawling along the road like the Ikea shuttle bus. In fact, I might even say it feel like the bus was moving twice the shuttle bus’ speed.

Thank God that bus driver must like to speed or something, because he passed an orange-turning-red light and he actually ignored a lady who was running after the bus from behind! This is one of those times I’m actually happy that there are such bus drivers around.

I arrived just in the nick of time. Mrs Sebastian was just entering the house as I jumped across the wall of my estate. No questions asked why I was late by my parents. Phew.

Oh, and Mrs Sebastian gave me an A1 for my composition. Yayy. Lol.

Well, this is a really long post, so now that I’ve more or less finished my ranting, I’ll end here.

Happy Racial Harmony Day.