Fast & Free

Summer is here!

The days are longer and hotter, and the summer dresses and tank tops are back. I'm eating more ice-cream than ever and meeting friends for brunches and buying flowers for the Beatrix Potter vase, even thought they wilt every two days because of the heat. I listen to the Beach Boys & The Young Veins all day, because even music is seasonal. Wayne & Libby Huirau from Parachute band has come and gone, and it was a fabulous weekend of fun and learning and music, and appreciating our brief brush with fame (well, sort of).

I watched the season finale of Grey's Anatomy and felt a little bit sick inside. It came out last Friday and I was in the office, sobbing like a whale in the studio during lunch hour over Lexie Grey's VERY untimely death (and Mark crying and saying We're going to get married... we are meant to be. TOO MANY EMOTIONS). Shonda Rhimes has made me emotionally damaged for life. She seems to be very very fond of killing off my favourite TV surgeons and leaving the crazed fan base in agony with her cliffhanger season finales. Recall: Hospital shoot-outs, roving buses and people getting hit by them, cancerous melanomas, unexplained absences from multiple episodes etc etc. I know, I know, it's just TV! I tell that to myself every time I watch an episode, but it's not that easy, is it? 


Speaking of TV, Parks and Recreation renewed for season 5! Kristen Wiig has left SNL. Ted's wife still unknown (it better not be that asshat, Victoria). 

Work has been good so far. Tomorrow is Breakfast Birthday Party Day & that means waking up an hour earlier to make savoury pancakes for seven people. Last week, while cataloguing our music database, I stumbled upon a fabulous Christian Band, Rend Collective Experiment, a combination of Fleet Foxes and Mumford & Sons and Edward Sharpe. They are creative and inspiring, and best of all, they are in love with Jesus :)

And yes, USA for Bethel School of Worship! I cannot wait! Hello, California! I am blessed beyond words.

This post is a little self-indulgent... I won't do it again for a long time, I promise. It's been an interesting couple of weeks, and if I don't write it down, I forget!

Quotes from the Lesser-Known: Part 7

'What does the word 'love' mean to you?' 

'Love is... I don't really know. I'm only 19. All I know is that love happens to us everyday of our lives.' 

'So you're saying it's possible to fall in love with just... anyone?' 

'Not anyone. Anything. Sometimes, I fall in love with a book. I fall in love with the scent of lavender. Or the colour orange. Sometimes I walk the streets, and for a while I believe that I'm falling in love with the stranger walking three feet in front of me.' 

'Isn't that strange, that we 'fall' in love?' 

'Yes, it is strange, this notion of falling. Then again, we are always falling. But unlike most things, when we fall in love, we don't fall into endless oblivion but into the comfort of a mug of tea, an illustrated novel, or a warm pair of arms.'

Conversations 
(with my mind)

Spaces

How I dream

of a house made of books

Where we could burrow into the pages

with words
curling around us like fire

How I dream

of a house made of clouds

where we could paint each other

 in shades
of cream & blue & roses

How I dream

of a house somewhere

where it would be just you and I

dancing around the kitchen

knocking over the sugar pot

and how

we would laugh and laugh

and keep on going

stars on our rustic kitchen floor

How I dream

of a house somewhere

of a home somewhere

Quotes from the Lesser-Known: Part 6

'What is photography to you?' 

'I think it's an extension of what I see. I try to focus on things that people find mundane, or things that people will not take a second look at. It's a way for me to say that there are things that are important and beautiful around us, and we need to slow down a little bit... slow down a little to appreciate the environment, and the people around us.' 

'That's incredible. How do you think photography can change the world?' 

'Wow. I've never thought of this before. (laughs) Well... photography is a powerful medium because it's so visual... When a good photograph goes viral around the world, it gets so many people talking. In the right shot, the right time and the right context, photography impacts people with its significance. It makes people rethink their values, and what they believe in.' 

August L.

Singer-songwriter, thespian & photographer. 

Quotes from the Lesser-Known: Part 5

'What is your reaction to people who say music isn't essential?' 

'I would agree with them.' 

'What! No way.' 

'Absolutely. Music isn't essential in the way that things like, basic mathematical or language skills are to everyday life. But for all the years I've been a musician, the happiest people I have come to know are the ones whose lives are steeped in the The Arts. It's a richer kind of existence. Yes, we could live without music, but aren't you afraid to see what that world would be like? I am. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that, yes, music is only the icing on the cake, but isn't the icing the best part of it all?'

J.J. Davis, 26

Music producer, multi-instrumentalist & skeptic 

Violet

Today is just one of those days where everything seems a bit off. The tea is cold, the favourite movies are less entertaining & the comfort novels that I run to every time don't seem quite right. I am tired when I have done nothing all day. I feel like crying one second, and then I find myself laughing at absolutely nothing in another. I play guitar and listen to music and try to write, but the notebook paper remains blank, like the insides of my mind.

I know I sound a little bit depressed, but honest to God, I'm not. Maybe it's just too much Plath or Foer I've been reading lately, or work coming up next week (still not entirely sure how I feel about that), and having so many things on my mind. It's just one of those days, and tomorrow is a new one, so there.

Quotes from the Lesser-Known: Part 4

'What do you enjoy most about reading?' 

'What I enjoy most about books is how it opens up your world, how it allows you to use your imagination to recreate the places that the author puts forth in his stories. The thought of it is just so attractive: you are allowed to shape that place & those characters according to what you see in your mind. That's why I don't really like movies, because they force you into a way of looking at these characters, which doesn't give you that same liberty to craft them.'

Jennifer Lee, 22.

Literature student, doodler & avid Beatles fan

Quotes from the Lesser-Known: Part 3

'What is the rush you get from running like?' 

'Sometimes, running feels like you're chasing pavements. It’s a mimic of the journey of life. The rush never comes in the middle; it always comes at the start of the end. When your legs feel like slabs of concrete, and your lungs squeeze in agony, and your body screams to stop but you know you can't, because somehow you have to finish what you have started...' 

Samuel C. 22

Student & sports enthusiast

I choose light

 

The words we say today, we'll say

And we'll see them again, we'll see them again

So I choose my words so carefully

Like the sun, make it glow, or they glare at me

Well, I choose light

Light that won't

Keep me up at night

_________________________________________________

I am in love! I want so bad to be at Coachella now. There's a certain quality in their music that speaks of honesty and light and summer; it shines so evidently, even in the depths of a dark Brooklyn apartment. 

It frustrates me sometimes that I live here. I know I should be grateful to; there are so many reasons to be thankful for Singapore. But just by being here, I will never experience the secret pleasure of being at a clandestine underground gig, or feel the surge of thousands of people at a music festival become one, in the space of a song. 

The complete set-list 

hosted by La Blogotheque / The Switch

Saw You First

Atlantic 

Meantime

Up Up Up

Wandering 

Quotes from the Lesser-Known: Part 2

'What inspired you to get into theatre?' 

'My friend pressured me into auditioning for the school play. I was sick and unwilling to fight so I did and I managed to score one of the lead roles. Prior to that I was simply happy being an audience member captivated by what took place onstage.  But when I realized I could be a part of that experience as well and present truthfully to people that which isn't true, I fell in love with it. I know I sound like a sociopathic liar but I'm not, honest. Life is about telling stories, and telling them well.' 

'Was there a particular pivotal moment, or experience?' 

'One life-changing experience was when I went to watch a tiny production of Oliver Twist. Cast of 5 and only 2 major props which doubled as a boat, door, coffin, gallows, Fagin's underground shithole for runaways and other assorted naughty children, etc. Every single one of the songs were sung in 5-part harmony and it was fantastic. I think I was 14 when I watched it. I stayed back to congratulate Fagin and when I saw him up close, my mind was blown to see how a skinny, 6-foot-tall man could have been so many things on that stage. I think I still have that ticket with me.'

Elizabeth Mak, 19

High school thespian