I'm in this strange open-ended phase where I'm not quite sure where my freelance work is taking me. Things are busy, I generally enjoy the work that comes my way, but sometimes, I get the feeling that my brain has so many mental folders in them that I'm not sure which ones I should put at the top of my pile. I was just talking to a friend about this - she used to do freelance editing (along with tennis coaching, what a combination!) but quit that arrangement because she felt "too lost". She … [Read more...]

  I love making checklists; I love ticking off checklists even more. But I've come to accept that there are some items in my Bucket Checklist that may probably never get checked. However, I still leave them there because sometimes, the process of working towards these things brings you to new places and new visions. Or sometimes, they just happen to you randomly, out-of-the-blue, without having to do much (I call this the Phantom Tick), and then you feel so grateful that miracles still … [Read more...]

In a nutshell, this is the work I've done this past year: Editorial - Travel +Leisure (SE Asia) - Yahoo Makanation - MOE Schoolbag - FRV Travel - Kitchen Culture in-house magazine Copyediting - CBLD website - WDA brochures ORO editions - Ongoing book project management/marketing and editing Exhibition media content - ATIC (Abu Dhabi) - Sun Yat Sen Nanyang Memorial Hall - Mapletree (ongoing) UniSIM - Taught broadcast writing and copywriting modules I am still … [Read more...]

A little tribute to the guy who helped to come up with computers that do not make me want to rip my hair out (at least 99.5% of the time). On the surface level, I don't think I need much help staying hungry and foolish. I love good food, and I make boo-boos all the time. But taking this quote a little more existentially, here's a desert landscape - it looks like the kind of place hungry and foolish people end up in. It may be a place of loneliness and emptiness, but that's where hungry … [Read more...]

Whaaaa...? It's September already? I've been busy...watching the Glee Project. I love musicals, I love reality shows so it's inevitable that I'd always get wrapped up with each episode; cheering for the winners, crying with the losers and rooting for most of the contestants. One thing I've noticed is that Ryan Murphy has the tendency to tell them, "to own this" whenever he is trying to push them beyond their comfort zones. There's something about the American type of optimism  which though … [Read more...]

Oh dear, I haven't been very regular with this work blog thing, have I? If anything, this has been a season of learning. Learning how to manage the workload of very different projects/jobs, learning how to communicate with people more effectively, and of course, learning ways to improve my writing. I realise there's never a graduation date with any of these things, and there are days that I need to suck in my inertia/ego to make sure I push things beyond the "usual way" I like to do … [Read more...]

Doesn't life seem so random, yet so unexpectedly calculated at the same time? I've had a fair share of weird doors opening the past year, and falling through them hasn't been the most comfortable of experiences. Nevertheless, there's always something to learn; to laugh at; to become more aware about. One door would be this new part-time gig at a university where I teach writing courses. It was something I was hesitant about initially, because the campus is far away from my home and I don't … [Read more...]

The other day, while trying to dig around for food in the fridge, I ended up knocking my head against the sharp edge of the fridge door. For a good two minutes, my head was spinning. And then, I had one of the most painful migraines that persisted till the next day. Alarmed, I went to the A&E where the doctor gave me a powerful painkiller injection and I went back to sleep. There have been more  knocks of the metaphorical nature that have been coming my way lately, and like my fridge … [Read more...]

Enough of idealistic philosophizing - now it's down to the nuts and bolts of being a more focused freelancer. Somehow, this quote spoke to me in a really hard-hitting, whaddayadoin' way because I've become quite the Internet addict and while surfing "for fun" in the midst of working is always a great pick-me-up, it also means I haven't been doing all the things I want/should/ought to do. This really bugs me. I think if anything, this month has been a lesson that time is finite...so I oughta … [Read more...]

“If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lightning to strike you in the brain, you are not going to make an awful lot of work. All the best ideas come out of the process; they come out of the work itself. Things occur to you. If you’re sitting around trying to dream up a great art idea, you can sit there a long time before anything happens. But if you just get to work, something will occur to you and something else will occur to you and something else that you reject will … [Read more...]

Right now, I am trying to work outside between appointments; the key word here being 'trying'. I've managed to find a nice, cosy bookstore cafe with tall bookshelves, leather armchairs and free Wi-Fi  - all the makings of a productive afternoon, but instead here's what's been happening: - The music is a tad too loud. As such retro-80's stuff gets me agitated, while Aretha Franklin (whom they are playing now) gets me sentimental. - I'm seated within full blast of the air-conditioning and … [Read more...]

The past few weeks have been busy; not just with work but life in general. - There were the elections in Singapore. For Singaporeans, you'd understand how intense this period was (for the rest of you, this provides a nice sum-up). I always thought I was politically apathetic, but thanks to the daily influx of hundreds of WhatsApp messages and the wonders of social media during the campaign period, I actually got pretty absorbed by the whole thing. It also made me think a lot about my plans … [Read more...]

I rejoined the freelance world three months ago with a lot less trepidation compared to my previous attempts. Perhaps it's because I'd just gone through one of the most difficult periods of my life - so somehow, going back to an uncertain work situation didn't seem like such a big deal anymore. And because I was a little more heck-care, I became a lot more proactive about asking around for jobs. Some didn't work out, but some led to really interesting opportunities. The biggest challenge for … [Read more...]

This week of settling back to work and starting on new projects made my study table an absolute mess. It's usually rather chaotic to begin with, but the piles were beginning to topple, and at some point my feet never made it to the ground with the spillover clutter below. Enough was enough, so I've spent the last two days decluttering and six trash bags later, I am finally able to see what the colour of my table is. I've mapped out this layout as I think it's probably the most intuitive … [Read more...]

While it does seem a little strange to display a bunch of adolescent boys on my homepage - after all, I've long past my NKOTB phase - there's just something about this quote and this film which reminds me of a life full of possibilities and authentic expression. There's actually nothing inherently inspirational about this particular line. So I declare all my "barbarities" publicly; then what? There will be people who mock or even condemn. There will be people who will twist them into … [Read more...]

Stay Home Days are good for: 1. Clearing work. 2. Realising that there's other work to clear. 3. Making "tsk" clucks to the noisy construction work nearby. 4. Clearing my work table that has a tendency for piles. 5. Finding out that there are two brown sparrows that like to visit my kitchen and poop. 6. Afternoon naps. 7. Discussing the latest Glee episode online with accompanying youtube clips (oh Blaine, how I wish you were straight). 8. Laundry, which I think will still exist even … [Read more...]

It's been a while. But after going through some pretty crazy times, I'm back to freelance writing again. This time, I'm intent on starting (re-starting?) out right. Got some help from the lovely ladies at The Ahava Agency and one nice guy at Macnetis for a spiffy-looking work website. Going to make the best out of everything - the opportunities, the projects, the ideas and the space I have to make this work. In a way, it had to take a tornado to land me back on this yellow brick road. So … [Read more...]

I've decided to take a break from freelance writing (as in writing for money) for a while. Why did I make such a decision after less than a year of trying to become a more serious freelance writer? 1. Restlessness - It's amazing what a few months of clearing the head can do. Once I felt less burnt out, I started craving to learn new stuff again. I feel that beyond writing, there are still so many more things to discover, to dive into, to make mistakes in. I remember someone once telling me, … [Read more...]

...have a love-hate thing going on. Whatever the case, I have her to thank for my writing abilities. As an English teacher, she was the Nazi grammar-griller and the obsessive library book borrower. I find it interesting that she'd force feed me classics that she'd never read herself. And when I used to paste up typewritten quotes from George Orwell's 1984 in my rebellious youth, she'd rip them down saying they were "nonsense" and I'd yell back, "But it's from one of the greatest classics of … [Read more...]

There have been some unexpected twists and turns of late so I'm writing this post as a reminder to  myself to update when the changes do take place. … [Read more...]

Today, I dropped by the British Council while showing a visiting friend the area near her hotel. She asked me, "How come you seem so familiar with the place? Have you taken courses here before?" And then I remembered that yes, I'd actually been sent for some English Proficiency course when I was 15. I'd been flunking my English compositions because the teachers said my fantasy-based romantic and/or horror-time travel storylines were clearly out of point. Before the course started, the good … [Read more...]

There seems to be this idea that once a women hits 30, she starts caring less about what people think and will be be happier and have more self-confidence. I'm not sure if it's an age thing as opposed to merely just being a deliberate state of the mind. I've seen so many insecure ladies above 30 and I've seen so many self-assured ladies below 30 and the only factor that I see coming into play with regards to their confidence levels is how they responded when the crunch came. The ones who made … [Read more...]

I love being with trees that have character. It's hard to pinpoint "character", but I do know that trees with character make one feel slightly awed, and yet very safe with them. The large camphor trees at Sha Lo Won, apparently over a thousand years old, exude such vibes.There's a fascinating story about them too which goes something like this: When Hong Kong was under the occupation of the Japanese Army, due to a shortage of fuel, there was a great demand for wood. As a result, the Japanese … [Read more...]

I feel like I'm a combination of these five dwarfs in the picture: Grumpy - mutter mutter Doc - CHARGE!!!! Sleepy - Zzzzz Bashful - *Wide-eyed wonder* Sneezy - Sinusy snort And like all of them, I've got to get crackin'! … [Read more...]

While I'm all for character building during times of trials, I also wonder whether there's such a thing as holding on for too long. There's such a thin line between being stretched/strengthened and being on the verge of snapping. The School of Hard Knocks tells you to stop being a wuss, but often, this is more of an unquestioning statement - you do not have the right to be unhappy and are much less of a person to give up on something. While I think this strategy is a good way to snap someone … [Read more...]

I've started to keep owlish hours since it's not necessary to wake up early on most days. However, the problem is that I still arise during morning lark hours, which means that a sleep debt is slowly but surely accumulating. The most challenging thing about freelance writing so far is not about getting jobs, but really about working out your time in the best way possible. Since it's the last month of 2009, it's timely to work out some kind of work routine that is sustainable for me in the … [Read more...]

I was suddenly inundated with lots of paper this week so now there's no space left on my study table. I've had to resort to Starbucksing and working in the living room, which ain't such bad things really. The blueish glow from the television comes courtesy of Everybody Loves Raymond. Realise that I need clear space for a clear mind. Everytime I pass by my study table with its mountainous paper terrain, I can't help but feel annoyed. Spring cleaning cum home office expansion time! … [Read more...]

I doodled this with glee several weeks back in relation to the then impending release from corporate shackles. Yesterday, it came back to bite me in the *ss. A local publisher offered me a possibly once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity to do something that would definitely benefit on the writing-my-own-creative-stuff front. But I wasn't able to say yes because I've already committed to other things. According to my husband, this happens to him all the time and he says that this what-iffing will … [Read more...]

11am: Woke up and went "Gah!" 11.40am: Started checking my e-mails at 11.40am. 12.15pm: Called aircon repair guy to arrange day to fix leaky air-conditioner. 12.30pm: Called cable customer service to query on faulty Discovery Travel + Living channel. Had to crawl rather ungraciously under the console pullling and plugging assorted wires whilst receiving instructions. 1pm: Started editing book. 2pm: Interrupted by former colleague's IM: she is doing PR now and might be able to hook me up with an … [Read more...]

I am pleased to be able to stretch my neck out finally. There is hard work ahead, but I'm glad to have the space to get a bird's eye view. It's nice cloud-watching too. … [Read more...]