“人生沿路上的风景，有唯美的，又伤感的，但都应该被珍惜，因为当你还在埋怨时，可能已经到了达目的地。”
Since none of us could fly home to celebrate this important spring festival, we decided to have a "Smurf Family" reunion dinner on new year's eve. Unfortunately, we still had to get our lazy butt up to brave the chilly air and walk reluctantly to QMC for lectures early in the morning. However, the most unexpected thing happened right after class: the very first snow that we had been anticipating for months came into view as we exited the building. Initially, I could hardly believe my eyes, thinking that my imagination was playing tricks on me again. It took me a few seconds to burst out screaming like an orang-utan, not that I had ever witnessed one emitting any kind of loud groans. With our hopes of having a white Christmas shattered, I guessed we could all settle for a white lunar new year's eve instead.
The girls (and HongJian) spent the entire afternoon preparing dishes for the night. Every one even wore red for the night after being "instructed" to do so by Vivian. We even had some CNY decorations, Mandarin oranges and even Smurf candies!! Plus the hilarious revealing of secret jokers. =)
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| Part of the feast. =) |
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| The delicious meatballs made by Carmen. |
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| RED. =P |
Spending Chinese New Year with smurfies somehow made it a lot less lonely being so far away from home. The saddest thing for me this year was that I could only take a glance at all the mouth-watering reunion dinner dishes made by Grandma through Skype. I couldn't even smell it, let alone taste it. What's worse was that I knew for sure that the same thing was gonna repeat itself the very next year.
Well, love it or hate it, I'm now officially 23. Adding to the list of sad things was that I couldn't relate to the song "22" anymore. Okay, I was just kidding. I could relate to it as long as I wanted to.
Thinking that I was smart, I kinda figured out that smurfies were going to celebrate it the night before my birthday. So, when I heard the knocking sound on the door with every single person in my house refusing to answer it, I decided to look out of the windows to out-smart them but not a single shadow could be seen. "Okay, that was a bit weird," I wondered. Thus, I flew down the stairs to open the door and all I saw was Jessie. "Okay, maybe it was later or tomorrow then," I thought to myself. I totally forgot the reason Jessie gave me on appearing on our doorstep unexpectedly (something about bringing home-made food over) but I totally fell for it. Just when I closed the door, it was revealed that the rest of them were actually hiding behind the wall of my house! In that instance, I felt like slapping myself a zillion times for being fooled so easily again.
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| The Tepig that could make random funny sounds! =P |
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| The JD cash voucher. ;) |
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| This came in time! I really needed one to get my life organised! |
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| The special bookmark! =) |
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| The watch! the second gift received after the calendar~ |
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| This was actually my earliest gift!! Love the TS calendar~ |
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Thank you everyone,
especially those who made the most beautiful cupcakes (minus the "stupid" one) |
The next morning, I found another card on the floor when I opened my bedroom door. Just when I thought it was over, Phey and Carmen brought some Chinese red eggs and MeeSua over to my house and I continued to receive some gifts from the others. Also, I got a nice overseas surprise that came in a box. Terima kasih to each and every one of you, especially you who sang a touching birthday song through Whatsapp and "you guys" with the funny photos! =P
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| A DIY RED album. Arigato~ |
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| Camera equipments. =) |
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| Thank you. I knew how hard it was to dye them red. =P |
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| Thoughtful is the word~ |
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| My first blue-nose friend!! Arigato to you who didn't want to be named. |
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| Thanks much. =) |
I didn't know why but sometimes I had the sudden urge to throw everything behind and fly home to my family immediately. I had always thought that I had grown up and became totally independent, but I knew now I couldn't last long without them. I prayed with all my heart that it's gonna be another great and smooth year with more quality time with all my loved ones. =)
XO - Beyonce
