worth of life...

Though this breaks the chronological flow of events. In my opinion, its weight deserves some immediate thought over Venice. After returning from a pretty fun weekend of sledging and ice-skating, i was presented with some saddening news from my campus. A student had stabbed his professor and then killed himself. It is unclear at this point what his motivation was, but whatever his reason might have been wouldn't warrant him taking someone's life or even his own. In this world of expectation and fast progress we often devalue the worth of our own lives. Making money, getting a bigger place.. bigger car seems to precede spending time with family.. appreciating the natural beauty that surrounds. Granted that it is necessary to work for a better life, but we should know when to stop, sit back.. and be contented with what we already have. It shouldn't be that we spend all our time working to better a life which we will never actually get to live...

.. there is so much in the world to learn and to see, as it is a lifetime will never be enough to experience all that this planet has to offer... killing yourself over a setback, shortening that life, is unacceptable, for like it is impossible predict the weather, it is not possible for you to be certain that life is over at any point..

my condolences to the family of the student who must find it hard to morn their son's death knowing what he did before he took his own life..

Ice Blended

Fatigued, Frozen, eyes tearing in protest from unremoved contacts, the globe trotting superhero slouches in a surprisingly uncomfortable position in front of a building no. 3 on Piazzale F.M... and waits.

he was, waiting of course, for Hannah, who should have returned by then from her skiing trip.

Earlier he had received a call from her while on the way, but due to the chatty commuters, the creaking noises from the ageing Italian tram and the tension of the rapidly diminishing phone credits, he was unable to gather much information. All he heard were these few words.. 'late'.. 'ya it happens'.. 'BURRO'.. 'see u later'. The globe trotter quickly solved the word riddle, and knew she was gonna be late for some reason, and that he should make his way up to the flat by alerting her housemates. Armed with his GPS, a google map printout and confidence the trotter slid back into the plastic chair and waited for the penultimate stop to arrive...

...After getting off the tram, the superhero was greeted by the cruel Milan weather. Hurriedly he slipped on his snow cap and gloves to aid him in the battle against this adversary. With a map in his hand he schlepped thru the wet snow towards what he believed to be Hannah's residence. His breath fogged the metal panel which he was scanning thru to find the name ..'Burro'. The hero then cursed his goldfish memory and his overconfidence who seemed guilty for his inability to recall the apartment name. He knew that he could only make one last short call before his credit was exhausted. So he decided to wait it out for a while...

... it was getting dark, the illuminated display of the phone suggested the time to be 6pm. The superhero was faced with his kryptonite. wet shoes. He battled to prevent his toes from being frostbitten by jogging on the spot. Fearing that he might be perceived by the resident population of the neighborhood as a nutcase, he altered his strategy and walked about instead. His eyes of course still glued on building no. 3, hoping and waiting to spot an English girl holding a snowboard twice her body mass hastening to the gate. To his dismay, this was not to be...

...Two hours had passed and patience was being sucked out of the trotter. Weakened by the cold, he decided it was time to make that call. He pulled his hand out of the glove and typed in the number. no answer. engaged. unreachable. Did her battery die? Fearing that he might soon meet the same fate as Hannah's handphone battery.. the superhero pulled out a bar of swiss chocolate to boost his spirit, at the same time thinking of a plan B. As he was scrolling down the call list, he noticed that Hannah had actually called from another number. Quickly.. he called back. A chirpy male voice answered the phone. It was Hannah's friend... "Hannah has already left, she will be there soon..so sorry".. the trotter inquired once again about the apartment number.. "oh.. it is.. Ferris".. which is what he thought was being said..*click* the phone died. -YOUR CREDIT IS BELOW 2CHF- flashed on the display. He knew he couldn't make anymore calls. Again he scanned thru the list and found a FERRO.. "maybe this is it.." he thought putting burro and ferris together. "CIAO" a voice answered.. "Are you Hannah's house mate?"... "no no no.. house wrong.. no aNNa". The hero was certainly not going to call up all of the fifty apartments in the list. So he decided to wait for Hannah instead, afterall.. she was suppose to be home 'soon'...

... an hour later, sipping his redbull, certain that his evil adversary, the Milan weather, would prevail if the trotter was unable to find himself a safeheaven. SMS,! he thought.. "i can still type an SMS. " Carefully he constructed the sms, as this was his last throw of the dice. The reply was promising. BURRO indeed was the flat name. The hero realised all along he had been standing in front of the wrong DAMN building. Like an excited school boy he ran to the pharmacy building to see if there was another building no. 3 in close proximity. and YES. there was. and with a shiny burro engraved on one of the name plates outside. He pressed the button, and after convincing the people he wasn't a serial killer with a fetish for Italian birthday girls dressed in burlesque outfits, he was let in. FINALLY HE HAD MADE IT, after 3hours of waiting.

I walked into the house and three curious women stood in the hallway. "you are?" ... "Hannah's friend"... "Hannah?".. "OH you mean ANNAH".. "YES!". They were such a sweet bunch. They offer me food which i gladly accepted and gave me a some wine! Including some pretty amazing pasta. Could be, that the ordeal that i had been thru earlier was clouding my culinary judgement. More people began to enter the house, and i engaged in small talk about the WEATHER and life in general. Hannah had yet to show up, so everyone decided to leave for the party without her. But as soon as we left, we made a U-turn back to the house to pick up Hannah. She was seen scurrying up the stairs with a huge ski bag. Once in the car.. she explained that the reason she was delayed, was cause her friend fell off the CLIFF. For a moment i was in shock, and i didn't know what my next question should be.. "is he alive?". She quickly added that luckily he was only mildly injured. After which she revealed our costume for the day.. GLITTER. So i peppered some of that stuff on my face and we were on our way to my first MILLAN party. It was a little club house run by a man and his wife in their seventies. There we had a few drinks and played a game of table soccer, which we got badly trashed at. The woman at the bar was perpetually annoyed, though she did manage a little smile when i clicked a picture of the couple.

Hannah and i both tired because for different reasons, agreed on the fact that we should head back home, to earn some rest. So we drove back with two of her housemates to the apartment, and after a short snowball battle at the carpark we readied ourselves to visit our nonsensical universe of dreams.

The next morning, we lay awake guessing the sounds of the vehicles passing by. A low humming sound making jalopy remains a mystery, as we found it too much effort to peek out of the window to satisfy our curiosity. My body must have felt it weighed a 100 Kilos. I thought for a second that maybe the earth had increased its rotation speed thus exerting a strong gravitational field on me, and so I should surrender to laws of natural physics and remain in bed. Upon realising that earth's rotation had nothing to do with gravity, I propelled out of bed, and joined Hannah in the kitchen to make some breakfast. We stared at the available ingredients as if they were the surviving pieces of jig-saw puzzle, and contemplated how best we could piece them together to form a meaningful picture. 'The Happy Egg' was the name given to this new culinary delight. "Is that your hair?" I questioned as I lifted a piece of mushroom which seemed to be bound to the other with a string-like form...

...The duo parted ways as they left the house. The trotter was off to explore the Milan terrain, while his trusty companion to the LAB to find a cure for Malaria. Out of phone credits, they fixed a meeting point at about lunch time. The trotter happy in his dry and comfy Winnie the poo socks boarded tram no. 12. Not used to having a cartoon character imprinted on his socks, he left his ankles slightly exposed, and was wondering why people passing by giggled as if he were a circus display. It took a kid, tugging on his mum saying "Mama,WINNIE" for the superhero to realise that his masculinity was being shredded to pieces. The trotter for the entire morning managed to only visit two places of interest, a castle and a church, and spend most of his time in the Metro train with his feet pinned against the heater.

The hour was drawing close, but he had still not received an sms from Hannah to confirm the meeting. He decided to head to the location anyway, to wait. Time seemed to move at a lethargic pace in Milan. To his delight he received an sms from his disease-fighting companion, confirming her company for a warm lunch. 30 mins later, at a distant he noticed Hannah racing thru the puddle in her not-so-waterproof boots. Both removed their iconic white headsets unknowingly highlighting apple's dominance in the portable music player market. They walked to a nearby cosy looking cafe, and were welcomed in by a man who surely worked in the Formula One pits before he began waiting tables. Tuned into his 'quick in quick out' strategy mode, he hovered impatiently around the table forcing the duo to pick their vittles. Satisfied by the quality of their order of food n wine. Hannah asked for a Salad! "do u want it Green?" questioned the lady in Italian. "Si". The duo burst into uncontainable laughter, when their 'Green Salad' was literally GREEN CABBAGE! Maybe he secretly knew about their morning breakfast, and their disregard for presentation. With a piece of bread still in the hero's mouth, the F1 Pit-stop attendant dragged away his plate, successfully eliminating any chance of getting a tip with his display of over-efficiency.

..As we walked out again into the cold weather, Hannah suggested we should scrap any plans for sight seeing and just head home for a Movie. That notion was gladly seconded by me. Once home we watched the 'Kite Runner' tucked into the warm and comfortable bed, holding warm cups of tea. The movie ended, and I logged in to check the train timings. And there weren't any. Could possibly be due to the horrible weather, or just the fact that there weren't any late night trains scheduled back to Switzerland. Either way the idea of not going out into the cold again was more than welcoming. Spent rest of the night trying out some football tricks.. before heading back to bed.

.. Next morning after a healthy breakfast of fruits and yogurt, the duo left home again.. with hannah once again on her way to juice cells in the Lab, and the trotter back to Switzerland, back to the office with coffee mugs painted with software design models. Despite the cogent attempt by the horrible weather over two days to ruin his Milan trip.. the superhero felt he had thoroughly enjoyed this weekend in Milan..

Sunny Belinzona..

Once again i have decided to grace the pristine halls of the World Wide Web, drawing some inspiration from a near death experience to conjure up a coherent piece of writing that a couple of people would enjoy reading (myself being one, in typical egoistical splendour). The name of the blog has its roots firmly entrenched in the distasteful chocolate Fondue Hannah, Aparna and I consumed towards the end of the Lugano escapade, in a picturesque coffee house, beside a rather extravagant bathroom door. So lets rewind to the beginning of this trip, to station Arth-goldau, where two ex Singaporean college room-mates were discussing about the warm days in Switzerland unaware of the irony the "it was so nice and warm, at 3 degrees" remarks produced. Just two weeks in Switzerland, and it has already altered my perspective on temperature.

The speedy connecting train to Lugano was overcrowded with green men(think army.. not ET), so we selfishly opted for the slow but spacious option, extending the waiting time of our Italian travel companion by 45 mins. In the train,over small talk ,we consumed a bar of swiss chocolate to tame our mushrooming hunger. Upon arrival we instantly noticed that the people on this side of the country were a lot more "expressive", demonstrated by their bizarre hairdo and inordinate dressing. The women also seemed to possess strong vocals leaving only the soft feminine features to tell the difference between the two human forms. After meeting Aparna, who didn't seem too upset about our delay, thanks to Milan's forceful induction of tolerance, we proceeded to downtown Lugano for a night of partying. As we approached the beefy bouncer to enquire about the club's cover charge, we were surprised to learn that the clubs only opened past midnight. The bars and clubs in Lugano seemed to exhibit a symbiotic relationship (a new word for my vocabulary thanks to the two bio geeks), with the bars closing at around midnight coaxing its patrons into continuing their night out in a club. The night scene in Lugano was pretty enjoyable especially since it wasn't packed like the MOS stock exchange in Singapore. The next morning, Aparna kicked us out of bed with a combination of physical and verbal attacks. The weather was beautiful with the sun smiling at us, as we completed our 40 min trek to the top of a mountain. After spending some take some photos, jumping in the air etc, we made our way back down to the hostel to make plans for the evening. While we were sitting and formulating our plans.. we heard a knock...

.. it was Hannah, she had made it to Lugano despite the hangover and misplacing her phone from the previous night. Also to note, she miraculously acquired the directions to our room, despite giving the reception a highly inaccurate description.. "hi, I am looking for three Indian GIRLS! who checked in yesterday". With the addition of a fourth member, we whipped out the two bottles of wine we had secured earlier. The night was mostly spent talking about nothing in particular, and included a short walk to a nearby bar and back...

.. Next morning recharged and rejuvenated the four travelers wake up, looking forward to the exciting trek up another mountain. The glum weather called for an instant change of plans to visit the medieval town of Belinzona instead. This delighted the anti-mountain climbing member of the group, who would later learn that the trek was probably a better option. The train journey was pretty amusing with our resident photographer clicking away in paparazzi like fashion. We were also trying to imitate utk's classic expression but failing miserably. After ten attempts we managed a bleak similarity. As the train pulled over in Belinzone.. our "the sun never sets in belinzone" and "City of Castles" image was shattered beyond reconstruction. After much search we finally located the first of the three UNESCO castles... and raced up the stairs like hyperactive 14 year olds. The castle was filled with morbid sculptures. We walked about the castle for a bit.. and then set our goal to walk up to the THIRD castle which seemed a universe above this one. Utk in spite of dreading the thought of such a climb, sportingly participated in this adventure up.. to the second castle.. then to the final third. The view from the second and third Castle was breathtaking.. i shall omit the description and let the facebook pictures (which aparna will soon upload) do the talking. After taking in the view at the top, we made our journey down to the station, where utk left early since he wanted to be home before the snow piled up at his door. I on the other hand accompanied Aparna and Hannah back to Lugano, waiting for my Cinderella hour of 7 O'clock, as to avoid the swiss transport system from bankrupting me. We made our way to the coffee shop where we were to spend(or drop.. as some american influenced people would say) 18 francs on the highly disappointing Fondue...

... We made our way back on foot rather than on the "corn flake", which we should have taken atleast once. At the train station we were faced with a long ticking queue. To make matters worse.. the train left earlier than expected. So we left Aparna to buy the tickets, and raced back to the hostel to pick up the luggage.. this felt so much like the amazing race without the cash bounty. .. This is where we got almost knocked down by a speeding train. As it is, my heart rate was up from all the running.... this promised to make it stop. With no time to ponder on the near miss we continued running towards the platform and MADE IT! .. after seeing off Aparna n Hannah i went for a cold coke, and waited for my train home. I spent most of my journey dozed off to the side of the window..the station was approaching.. and I readied myself to drag myself out of the train, half spluttering drool from exhaustion and drowsiness. Finally i was home and Was glad to see my bed again.. even though littered with clothes and cables. I rummaged thru my bag for my toothbrush.. and found Hannah's bright blue trainers stuffed in my backpack instead.. poor girl.. she will now have to conduct her jogging sessions in flip flops :P