ö ♥

clara.

animator.
loves jesus coffee & tea.

www.claraaa.com
www.claraaa.tumblr.com

hear hear.

links.

pictographic labyrinth

Tuesday, August 30, 2005 2:01 PM

clara has nthin much to say.

i'm just contemplating, thinking about thinking.i'm wondering...shld i think about dreams? pictographic labyrinth ( xD my new love that i found in the super rich nyp library) did inspire me to think about dreams...alot.and about acceptance and love and my bit of sky and you and drawing and me. are you thinking of me :) ?

the book makes you think.
think about thinking and think about things. it moves me, and made me feel sad after reading it. its not a sad story, really. everyone will feel differently aft reading it. but it intrigues me and makes me feel sad :(
Below is an extract from Pictographic Labyrinth, copyright of Hsin-Chien Huang, and published by Storynest.

to whom it may concern.

It is said that long ago, man's vision was not inhibited by symbols or pictures.Their sight moved freely in any dimension. At that time, images they perceived vibrated with freedom and feeling. When extraterrestrials visited the Earth thousands of years ago, they were attracted by this kind of freedom. But their admiration quickly turned into envy and jealousy.

These extraterrestrials could not accept the fact that such a primitive race could have this kind of freedom. Therefore, they hit upon a vicious plan. Before leaving Earth, they taught Man how to communicate by means of repetitious syllables and visual symbols arranged on flat surface. They named it "language". This "language" forever limited the movement of the human eye to horizontal and vertical directions. Even when Man gazed into the distant sky, subconciously, his cerebral cortex still ordered his eyes to decode the hidden cryptogram he believed lay embedded within the imagery.

It is said that this evil curse can only be broken during the hours of deep sleep, when the brain finally gives up its futile control and the eyes are sheltered beneath the eyelids. Today the familiar pictures of freedom and feeling known to our ancestors, upon awakening become unrecallable memories brimful with inarticulate longing. Such a regret explains the tears that fill our eyes when we yawn.

unrecallable memories brimful with inarticulate longing.

art is so much more beautiful and surrealistic compared to science. clara loves her art :)

they've stopped :)

Saturday, August 27, 2005 2:24 PM

they've stopped quarreling! God is good :) haha.
thanks to all the sweeties (xiao hun, qy, clar, aman...) who were concerned :) zaaaannnk uuu, and work hard, you ppl! esp wanna send a note out to my dear er mei pai. haha. haven seen u darlings for MONTHS o_o. kinda miss those days :)

o yea. updates. :( iqbal is gone!!!!!!!!! we misssss uuuuuuu. take care when u're in NS ok o_o! and hmph XP to the tooties who said 0502 girls are rated 7 and below. =_=. you ppl are below 5, mind u. XP bleah. the only one who passed is gone now~ hahaha.
we're deprived i tell u. nyp designers don look good at all T_T...tot they'd be funky tall nice. i was dreaming.

oh yeaaaahhh! xD think i haven mentioned it yet. wellll, Jack Neo came over to my sch (!!!) on Wed to give a talk about film and his experieces and all tat. :) i like him.
haha! didnt like him much before he came to nyp...but aft his talk i realised that hey! he's actually such a humble nice funny guy. :) i tot he'd be smug and somewhat aloof aft all his success but he was actually the complete opposite. he shared all his filming secrets with us. no walls at all. and he had us laughing half the time :) he's so nice!!! haha. clara is now officially a Jack Neo fan. lol.
he really gave us a lot of tips, i must say. he tot us never to stop trying although other ppl mite ask u not to do it, or refuse to help you. for e.g., he needed to use a crane for one of his films, so he requested for a crane form HDB. they refused him. tat didnt stop him. he continued to write in letters until i think they were so fed up and irritated they loaned him the damn crane. haha. it really doesnt haf much effect when u're reading it off my blog, but its really humurous when you hear him speaking to you live :) the whole atmosphere is there.

and you now wad? he's actually slimmer than i tot! haha! i wan tat long sleeved shirt that he was wearing tooooo. he looks young for his age, really. :) kinda glad i sat in the front aft all. got to see him and his comical expressions properly :) o yeah man! the J team. lol.

o yea~ didnt go to sch on thurs too. wahaha. cos jk was on course so we didnt haf to go for drawing. :) lalala~
of cos, clara the hardworkin girl (bleah xP haha) went over to aman's hse to eat up all her food, and er, at the same time, do work. maggi mee work. ;) secrets, secrets. i'll reveal all aft monday.
o ya. clarence said something nice the other day. i told him i felt tat i wasnt using my brains much nowadays, then he told me tat i was using my heart more now. lol. never tot of it tat way :)

oh nooo. suddenly rmbed tat its gonna be a hectic day nx thurs T_T sob. this poor girl gonna haf to lug her heavy portfolio back to ctss, eat a hurried lunch, and be in yck by 3.
may i see all my darlings on tat day :)
i'm still wonderin wad to get my teachers too.....prob food for mr murali :p hehe.

its gonna be a good saturday :)

parents make things tense.

Wednesday, August 24, 2005 10:06 PM

grrr. my parents keep quarreling nowadays. its almost like an alternate day kinda thing. one day its fine. or at least, seems fine to me. the next day, TODAY, it starts again. its not like they're shouting or wad, but they are just arguing. it makes the atmosphere in the house so tense and arrrrrggggh. it just gets on my nerves. i cant even watch tv in peace. i'll tend to try to tune in to wad they're saying. i mean. tats normal rite. to want to know wads goin on. :(

sometimes i wish my mummy would be more willing to give way. both of them are such stubborn piglets!!!! argh. overheard my dad telling my mum tat whenever they try to talk about it, my mum will exude (not the actual words he used of cos) this nonchalant feel. overheard my mum saying my dad is very hard to please. if she says something, he will think that there is some hidden meaning to it, and if she keeps quiet, my dad will say that she is not trying to solve the prob and is ignoring him.

i mean, yea. i get both sides of the story. i agree tat both make v valid points. :( but come on. this is so. :(

i'm praying really hard everything will just be cool. its getting worse from wad i observe. i've always sympathized with those whose parents are a lil wee bit messed up, and i really don wan to end up pitying myself.

i actually had this goal to be like my parents when i grow up. cos i actually felt tat as they grew older, they seemed to be able to compromise and love each other more and more. but i guess i haven really felt tat way since sunday.

:( i really don wanna end up pitying myself. :(
i tell myself everything will be ok.

our ways.

Tuesday, August 23, 2005 8:10 PM

there's competition, i tell you. bad competition.(in case you were wondering, its not about sch work) its like...i duno. this unvoiced competition about...u know..who gets nearer, who gets nearer sooner....etc.
if u don get wad i mean, don ask.

pink poo is feelin irritated. (=_= yea. yet another name i got, all thanks to wilson...o_o the guy who has an uncanny resemblence to my bro...he's bony poo) i duno yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. i feel so drained. i just wanna sleep. i tink its just the effect of a super duper big meal.
oo!! but i gotta tell u. haha. retail therapy really works man!!! i went out with my mum on sunday to eat lunch cos the maid was on her leave, and as i mentioned earlier, my mum refused to go with my dad for a wedding....so aft dim sum lunch (xD wooooots! the 'ha-gao' was good! u noe...the shrimp wrapped in white skin...no wonder i'm getting fat =_=) we went to look round the office wear boutiques...and i bought, or rather, my mum bought, a pretty white long sleeved top for my formal presentation today and an even prettier black and white skirt!!! wahaha x)) its long and flowy and makes me feel like some demure lil girl =x
anyway, aft the retail therapy, clara was healed and she mangaed to do her cp work, 2 hrs a piece (hehe. aint i a good girl. nv cheat :) ), and clara felt hyper the whole of monday.

sad to say, its now tuesday. tuesdays are not the same as mondays.
well, finally got to present bout my beloved sushi today..was not a bad presentation, considering i didn't take v long to prepare for it. met clarence aft sch to pass him my calculater...his is spoilt i tink. felt so sleepy all the way home even though 3 quarts of the time i was talkin to him. YAWN. sometimes i wish coffee would have an effect on me. useless thing.

i have a lot of work to do. should i go do it?
yes i think i should.
i should but will i?
everyone else is so hardworkin. so i guess i will.
this must be postive peer pressure. :(

:( its quite sad how i never can keep it with me for long. you think i'll never understand, and i think the same of you too.

nostalgia

Sunday, August 21, 2005 8:00 PM

was lookin through old (& new) photos just now... :) nostalgia. i miss you, my dears ~ !!!!!!!!!!! (yeps. qy and kaili included!!!! haha. although they are MIA in this pic.)

i'm ok, you're ok, we're all ok. just ok. you'll never understand.
its only for special people :)

desperate

11:35 AM

i'm desperate trying to make myself feel better. argh. it started off as a quietly contented kind of day, with me waking up and feeling oh-so lighthearted aft having gone to church ytd and telling rachel bout FOP and the propaganda debate thingy~ sigh. it was a sigh of relief, really. i kept struggling with myself as to whether or not i should really bring them to the SS. finally, talked to rachel ytd and she said she'd help me sell of the SS tics, and agreed tat it wasnt the right time to bring them aft all the nonsense tats been happening.

so yupps, woke up happy happy, ate my ham sandwich AGAIN (u must tink i'm sick, aman, to be eating it everyday) but YES. no more ham for clara to eat. haha. i'm like so sick of it now T_T...

so my parents were supposed to go for my dad's engineer's wedding today in malaysia....when it happened. parents quarreled. shit it. it was no biggy..didnt like shout the house down or wad, but in the end my mum refused to go so my dad left alone. it was not a big quarrel, really. but u know, these things just make u feel a little irritated and somewhat confused as to what you shld be feeling.

so here i sit. babbling on and on and on and trying to waste time and pushing away the nagging thought of the ton of hmwk i have to do.

i'm desperate. where's hyperness?? i NEED it ... hmwk is a breeze when i'm hyper. never seem to be hyper enuff nowadays. :( i tink clara is severely deprived of retail therapy. she needs therapy therapy therapy :(

Tuesday, August 16, 2005 5:43 PM

oh yeah. clara was arty farty yesterday. haha. made this ((my pic & my poem ok! copyright. xP)) ytd when i didnt go to sch. LALALA~~ hehe. feels good not goin to sch. mm...the blogger pic thingy wasnt workin ytd so gotta settle for today. pls gif ur comments... sucky? hand looks horried? blah blah blah.. i need feedback. :)

o. had a ...rather horrid day today. i had to wear formal (( in the end i didnt even get to present la. =_= waste of my time )) so on top of lookin like some ah ma, the blisters on BOTH feet T_T were killin me. the plaster helped, but even so i could feelin it pressin in on my raw flesh. stupid shoes T_T sigh. i wanna eat suuuuuuuuuussssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhiiiiiii. sushi sushi sushi. they look so damn good in the pictures in my presentation. *drools*

had a rather long (?) talk with iqbal. found out he has never tried century egg porridge and campbell chunky. o_o i gotta buy him some on his bday. he duno wad he's missing man.

i'm hungry.
but i'm fat.
heck la.

heart and soul

Monday, August 15, 2005 10:28 AM

woots woots~! clara feels so arty farty. wahaha. watched a korean art flick ytd (did anyone catch it?...9pm arts central)...weell...i've only got one thing to say about it. :S love is a complicated thing. moi don understand!!! :S
the film ended with the guy takin all his sound-recording equiqment, and setting it up in this field of waist-high yellow grass. the wind made everything rustle so that it sounded like they were shushing him and asking him to keep still and listen (or so i tot). so he just stood there and listened. as he listened, a smile slowly grew on his face...
and yepps. tats the end. i'm not that arty farty yet. moi don understand wad tat really means! i can only guess. =x just like i did in casshern. so..i guess it means time heals everything? the title of the show is 'One fine spring day' aft all. he just stood there in the middle of the field. freedom? mmm...yellow grass = brighter future? good memories?
enlighten me someone?

When the music fades
All is stripped away
And I simply come
Longing just to bring
Something that's of worth
That will bless
Your heart
I'll bring You more than a song
For a song in itself
It's not what You have required
You search much deeper within
Through the way things appear
You're looking into my heart
I'm coming back to the heart of worship
And it's all about You,
It's all about You, Jesus
I'm sorry, Lord, for the thing I've made it

i'll bring you more than a song

happy 40th birthday, Singapore! :)

Wednesday, August 10, 2005 8:51 PM

Dreaming
Of leaving
Muted places, familiar places
To a rain of kisses
Something that fizzes
My tea
Grasp
I keep close
As my mind plays host
To a steed
...we'll meet?

woots woots woots~!!!! Happy (belated) Birthday Singapore!!!
i went to watch fireworks ytd !!! xD haha. OMG. they were gorgeous. spectacular. magnificent.
and i saw my golden rain!!! aaaaaahhh! super duper absolutely beautiful. XD XD XD XD ~!!! haha. i don regret goin all the way to the Esplanade just to watch it (=x even though i had a very urgent assg due today...) cos right there where i stood, it was as if the fireworks were right above me. GORGEOUS. they were sooooo huge!!! like, bigger than the classroom's ceiling. xD fireewooooorrrrrkssss~!!!!! *_* how beautiful beautiful beautiful. i wan an encore ~ !!!!! (pouts...)
ENCOREEEEEEE ~!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i had a little talk with jerryboy on the way home today. haha. he has a funny name..but nice person :) he's realli into nursing! i wanna be so passionate about helpin ppl too. :p o well. i found one more person to treat me if i fall down! wahaha.

ms gail felt the anti-hamtaro aura the class was exuding...so she had a talk with some of us who lingered back in class when hamtaro finally left. the thing tat realli caught me off guard was how her eyes started to water when she talked about how each of us wld feel if our family members were ostrasized. really made me wonder. made me feel more for hamtaro too :( i'm ashamed of myself. stupid clara. u're so mean. gail's lil talk made me feel more for her too. poor girl seems so busy. hsework, her masters, teachin,...

YAWN. I DON'T LIKE DRAWING APPLES ANYMORE.

euphoria

Monday, August 08, 2005 9:03 PM

((High and Low, by M.C. Escher))...
click on image to enlarge. :) looks better when its bigger :)

euphoria! its rest day tml :) woots~!
haha. i'm such a lazy bum.
o well...
went runnin with sq today. T_T qy u must be so ashamed of me. i can onli run like, 1.2 km at one shot. i'm such a loser T_T. sigh. well...i will train train train!!!
gonna swim tues and fris alternately with sq from now on, and run at least 2.4 km once a week!! onli managed 5 rounds today and i was dying, so yupps. clara gotta buck up. T_T'''..
o yeah. just found out tat there's archery election committee meetin on wed at 3.30 T_T SOB. wed was the ONLY day i get to leave sch before 4!!!....sigh.
oooo yeah! n there's also archery trainin nex wed at 10. wahaha. we get excused from lessons~!!! lalala~~
national day feels good man...xD !

the magic of....food.

Saturday, August 06, 2005 9:16 PM

:) the wonders of food! haha.

i'm feeling so much better now. food food food is good for you and it concerns ur happiness, dude! xD ! eat eat and eat!
papa brought us to clementi to eat yummilicious deer meat, sambal kangkong, salted vege soup (haha. yeah. u'd think i'll be afraid of salted veges for a while aft my steamboat experience...but nope! clara forgets easily!), and roasted spring chicken covered in brown sauce. the food was GOOD i tell u.

so aft having slept well (woke up at 11+ and still took a 3 hr nap aft tat o_o) and fed well, clara is all happy again. :) :) :) wooots~!!!

and oh yeah.i'm gonna do well i'm gonna do well i'm gonna do well !!! gambatte, clara! (...=_= i actually haf to cheer myself on. how pathetic am i?...)

i gained 1 kg. o_o i'm HORRIFIED. o_o GASP. yeah. ok. i'm all ready to go running with mr knight already. run run run, burn burn burn! fats be gone!

And Life is a road and I want to keep going
Love is a river I want to keep flowing
Life is a road now and forever
A Wonderful journey
I'll be there when the world stops turning
I'll be there when the storm is through

In the end I wanna be standing at the beginning with you

2:33 PM

is it really that hard? cos i'm startin to think so. :( it just comes and goes. i'll never understand it. :( ...

it wasn't a very good day yesterday.
it started off good, though. woke up feeling all high about the Festival of Praise (oh yeah, man! Hillsong and Delirious TOTALLY rocks.). had a very fruity salad that my mum prepared then headed off for colour theory. it was good...the teacher - (can u blive it??? he drew hao gong ming pics!!! i tink he lied to me when he said he doesnt make a lot of money. imagine the loyalties he's recieving! haha. kinda interesting, come to tink of it, to haf hao gong ming illustrator as my teacher) - asked me to show him my work then he commented on it...telling me how to improve. he's so nice! when i was in the midst of editing it the way he wants, i had to return the tablet pen....and suddenly he tells me i can hand the assg in nx week instead!!! :) hehe. he's so nice~

aft colour theory, i grabbed my darling ham mayo sandwich, then headed off to kallang. then the bad things start to happen. we all got out of the station barriers....then realised samuel was still lookin for his wallet. aft a few frantic mins....still no wallet found. there was 'OH SHIT!!!' written all over sam's face and i felt horrid too. my heart was screaming 'oh dear God!!! why let this happen when we were just headed off to have a happy time with u?'...sigh. sam had his joker face back on aft crapping around with us while waiting for the shuttle bus to SIS, and only then did i start to feel better.

Hillsong opened the concert and oh yeah. they were GOOOOOD. XD ! never heard of Delirious before, but they were fab too. xD ! the lead singer's so cute! haha. fiona was a lil' crazy bout him too. cute smile, nice eyes, amazing voice (deep n sexyyyy~ woooots~!! haha)...and praise was goooood. i know god must have been there...but maybe bcos i was worrying about sam n zach so i didnt enjoy myself as much as i cld haf. i toked to zach on the way home..he seemed fine with it. he's catholic aft all. but sam must haf felt awkward. maybe fiona n i shldn't haf called him along aft all...:( sigh.

then there was the trip home too. the damn train left so early there was no train to bring us home. so we had to take a cab. as if i wasnt broke enuff. shit it all.

shared a cab with zach and amos. toked about stuff and it felt good :). no awkward silence. nice.

i was the last to alight. T_T ...i cant complain they're not gentlemanly or sumthin...i mean, i do live at the other end of spore...but sob. i wld haf prefered to go home earlier. turns out tat things COULD get much worse. when the taxi finally stopped, the cabby pressed a button and the damn fare jumped 10 more dollars. shit it. midnite charges. shit it shit it shit it.

didnt haf enuff cash on me so had to run up to get it. and hey hey hey. surprise surprise~ things got worse.

the damned gate was padlocked. HELLOOOOOOoo. u ppl didnt gimme the padlock key so why in the world did u all padlock it???? tried to ring the doorbell as gently as i cld, hoping my maid wld wake up.

not a soul heard the shitty bell.

so i rang it more persistently. still no one. shit it all. so i called my hse...dad woke up to ans it (worse situation EVER). got $10 from him, accompanied by a look a nasty cat would give when aroused from his sleep, then ran down to pay the cabby.

it was such a bad day. felt so discouraged :( ...
is this my test, Lord? i tink i'm on the verge of failing. give me strength, pls. i so desperately need it.

me and my messed up world. sigh.
supposed to go with clarence to help him choose his mum's bday present today...but cldnt make it. supposed to go running with sq on sunday..so don feel like it. and i'm not getting my As !!!! got a B- for drawing (perspective) and a C+ for comm skills. not tat i give a damn bout comm skills, but i'd still rather my report be filled with straight As. i wan my As, dammit. got some last term....but i'm not so sure about this term...my col. theory assg 2 sucks like shit compared to other ppl's, i don't see how apples can be exciting when they're all round (design.fund), i'm not much good at drawing hands, i cant find info on european clothes (u.media), and i've never made a formal presentation before (comm skills).

there goes clara. kick her butt and send her flyin down the drain into a pile of shit.
hopefully there are As in the shit.

the magic of M.C. Escher

Thursday, August 04, 2005 1:00 PM

((Relativity, by M.C. Escher))

Maurits Cornelis Escher.

the man i hail as a genius.

his works are astounding. i got to know of him when i finally went to the nyp library on monday with the intention of looking at some good art books (for the first time =x...). then i found it. The Magic of M.C. Escher.

but but but !!! before anyone sues me...this book and any works and text that i should put and quote in my blog are all copyright of M.C. Escher Foundation, Baarn, The Netherlands, and the book (The Magic of M.C. Escher) is published by Thames & Hudson Ltd. None of it is mine. i'm just a poor art student. :(

now now...back to the genius...the above picture is a work by him. isnt it breath-taking?? i was like GASP O_o when i first saw it. the things this man can do with lines !! Mr Escher was always intrigued by picture-puzzles. As Dr. J.L. Locher writes,

"How can a level field evoke depth or height, as well as surface? How can something be both inside and outside or both convex and concave?...In Escher a feeling for the conventional foundations of visual reality went hand in hand with a profound awareness fo the subjective dimension of every perception, and absurdist sense of humor, and an eager gazing at nature and architecture...His best images...confronts us with the limitations of our senses and particularly with the limitations of our eyes."

indeed Escher's works confuse us yet gives us a very captivating form of dialogue - one between our senses and his works. One of his quotes particularly touches me as a young art student.

"If someone has expressed himself in graphics from his youth; if he has created visual images for many years, always using such graphic means as...press, ink and all sorts of paper for printing on, this technique finally becomes second nature to him. Obviously, the technique itself must have been the most important thing for him, at least at the beginning of his career as a graphic artist, or he would not have taken that direction...and he will undoubtedly strive all his life for a technical expertise that he will never completely acquire...

...Meanwhile, all this technique is merely a means, not an end in itself. The end he strives for is something other than a perfectly executed print. His aim is to depict dreams, ideas or problems in such a way that other people can observe and consider them. The illusion that an artist wishes to create is much more subjective and far more important than the objective, physical means with which he tries to create it."

(Lecture, Stedelijk Museum, 16 November 1953)

i love this guy. Amazing.

macs.

Monday, August 01, 2005 7:01 PM

heehee~!!! this image nv fails to tickle me although it happened a few weeks ago. see the paper in the fountain? hahaha. tat's samuel's sketch...and samuel's the guy kneeling down and screaming 'NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooo~~!!!!!' haha. xD i'm so evil to be luffing at him...but...HAHA. xD

...how do you eat ur macdonalds?

:) haha. just had this silly ques stuck in my mind aft my mac lunch.

hmmm. i'll first take a sip of my drink (more often than not, its icelemon tea), pop a few fries into my mouth, then start on my burger (which is almost always double cheese)...inbetween bites of my burger i'll pop a few more fries...then when i'm done with my burger i'll finish off my fries..one by one. muahahaha.

how do you eat ur mac? :)