We just had our site presentation, an interim one... which marks the end of 4 weeks since the design project started. Look at the Singaporean students doing their stuff: Craig, Elita and Ju were in one group (yea we work in groups of 3... I was with Maarten and Ramiro). Presentation went well for them! One of the tutors actually commended that Craig was a "smooth talker"! The site analysis was a bit more than what we do in Singapore... cuz we are required to propose massing models based on site forces / elements that strike us most on the sites. Pretty wild!

The architecture faculty pub (run by students) opens on Tuesdays and Thursdays 1600-2000 hrs. No place better to chill out and unwind after a sleepless night working on models and A0 panel! When it is sunny, the pub moves out to the faculty lobby outdoors (as seen in my previous post). Since it was kinda gloomy today, it didn't. Had a cup with my studio mates, as seen below...





All packed and ready to go to Berlin tomorrow! Waking up at 4am to catch the early morning train. Travelling mostly by Eurail. We'll spend Friday, Saturday and Sunday in Berlin before training overnight to Munich for Oktoberfest!!! Then on Monday itself, we will train overnight again back to Delft. Won't be updating blog in these few days... Cheers~!

Oops, the cat is let out of the bag. Yep, I received the Hunter Douglas award... But urmz, merit only lah... so actually no big deal (no Dubai trip... sigh...). Haha... still... thanks for all your congratulations and well-wishes...! I also received the Ramalingam Medal for AR3323. Must thank Prof Tse for her guidance (as if she is reading this haha...) but really appreciate it. What a 'tyco' sem...!

Time flies, it's been more than a month since I moved to Delft. Haven't posted in some time so here're some updates ;)

First of, my MP3 player broke. Well, it still ons and stuff, but the connection where the headphones plug is inserted is not responsive. Meaning when I insert the headphones, I hear no sound. Sigh... Can't blame anyone but myself. I've been listening to Jay Chou's newest album (sigh, disappointing album... at least for me) as I cycle and I put the MP3 player in my jeans front pocket. I think the peddling of the bike caused constant compressions on the connection and it finally gave way. Now when I ride I can only hear the wind against my ears...

Talk about riding, my bicycle stand broke yesterday. I was parking my bike when I thought that the angle of the bicycle stand was too big and the bike was leaning on it too much, so I thought maybe i will use my foot to press it down and straigten it some... Who knows, the metal rod gave way and snapped! Got it replaced at 8 Euros. Okay lah, the old uncle was friendly... It was the 2nd shop I went to, cuz the 1st bicycle shop just told me "collect on Tuesday", as it was Saturday and the shop has 1 or 2 customers more than usual. Yea as if it will take so long to fix a stand. The uncle that helped me only took 5 minutes!

That's a common problem I guess... Here everything is laid back "relack"... order food, wait 20-30 minutes too. And don't get me started on DUWO or TU Delft's administration efficiency.


Since someone was on the topic of what we want for Christmas, here's what I want...! A Yamato Macross 1/60 scale YF-19!!! Super articulation and details! Nice!!! I WANT!!! Of course, I also want everyone around me to be happy and healthy.

Booked tickets for Chet to come over on 18th December, and changed our flight back to the 10th January (instead of 15th Jan). Let Ma and Pa know k...? Trying to plan an itinerary... My target: Prague, Venice, Rome, Madrid, Barcelona, Paris, London, Amsterdam (in sequential order). But alas, I know it is impossible to cover them in 20 days. Seasoned travellers (like MH) please advice on what I should drop, how long I should stay at each place, etc. And also, how much $$$ I need for a budget trip :) Thanks.


Been working on some Sketchup for Technical Studies... Sigh, construction and detailing modules are actually more appealing to me than design. Shd I switch to DTM track? Anyway, this is Mirano's Hospital, a MAT building typology which is a winning entry in a competition but didn't get built (what's new right...?). Since it wasn't built, it was up to us to preserve its original concept of being a flexible building, but design its structure and construction and tectonics... Kewl shit!

Elita's father stopped over amidst his business trip to visit his dear daughter on Friday. All 5 of us went to Den Haag together for a day trip on Saturday. Later in the day, we realized that OMA was having an exhibition in the Hague and we decided to go! But we were too late and it was already closed. Since the train tickets were so cheap (2 Euros pax) and we had nothing to do on Sunday, we decided to make the trip again just to see what Rem Koolhas has up his sleeves!

Looking for which way to go... As usual our sense of direction is superb!




A tribute to Ju, who's been watching the anime GITS: SAC by himself to kill time. Bo jio! And those are Craig's shadow scissors trying to cut up my urmz... shirt. Did you notice the crazy ballerina that was dancing on the streets in the earlier photo?



The above series of photos are of Richard Meier's Stadhuis in Den Haag. Very typical construction language employed, with his signature whiteness. Check out its reflection in another interesting building cladded with reflective glass standing on the opposite side! Below is a pretty nicely done conservation project, topped by a glass canopy. When such a marvelous piece of construction reminds you of Bugis Junction, you know for sure you are starting to miss home...




Office for Metropolitan Architecture's exhibition in Den Haag lasted for a couple of days until 17th September. Glad to make it on the last day. The buildings were formalistically pretty interesting. The 1st pic was taken on Saturday when we arrived at the exhibition venue only to find out that we were too late and that the doors have been locked... The 2nd picture shows one of their later works, the Deltametropool, Koningin Juliana Plein. Reminds me of the Pinnacle... Sharks, I am missing home!


A tribute to Elita's dad who was not only generous in footing the bills for all our meals (very paiseh... sigh), but also very eager to update us about design related news in Singapore. Thank you for making our trip to Den Haag so special and interesting!

Dear friends, it has only just come to my attention that comments couldn't be posted since I changed to this new blogger template. The problem has been rectified, and I have changed it such that you won't need my approval anymore... Ha... Thanks and please keep posting!!!

I haven't really encountered anything really interesting in the few days that have passed. Well, school's began and I'm busy so... maybe it is a good thing; it's about time I got my mind thinking about architecture again...

I might not have encountered anything interesting, but I certainly encountered some weird stuff! To begin, when I was parking my bike at night in front of my block, I saw a large shadow crawling on the floor. My initial thought was: OMG! It's a rodent! Then I observed it and thought it was a big too big to be a rat... On closer inspection, I realized it was a hedgehog! Kewl! Too bad I didn't take out my camera in time before the 30cm ball of spikes scurried into the bushes!

Then I tried to do my laundry. Yes, after much procrastination, I have finally ran out of clothes. The washing machine and dryer are supposed to be pay-per-use, but apparently the paying machine hasn't been installed yet, so as of now it is free. Check out the laundry room photo below:

While I did not encounter any weirdness in the laundry room, I was the object of weirdness to one of my neighbours who I do not know by name (probably lives on other floors). The dryer buttons are labelled in dutch (well, I expected that, which was why I brought my digital camera in the first place; so I can refer to the digital photo and translate it online)... So while I was taking the second shot above... a guy came in! I turned and from his expression I read: what's this Ching boi doing here with a camera at 12 midnight, taking a photo of other people's laundry? Sigh... I couldn't bother to explain myself... I said hi and left... Sorry to all Chinees (Dutch peeps spell 'Chinese' this way) people, I've lost face for u all...

Another weird encounter is actually something that I have to face everyday. My toiletbowl. To cut the long story short, I drew a sectional sketch of the water chamber (I am weird!)... Pls see below:

The funny thing about this toilet bowl is that it has a shallow reservoir that collects what ever you "discharge"... This might not appear to be so much of a problem... But as you are going to discover as I elaborate further, complications might occur. So, when you pee...

...this is what you will see. It is as if the toilet bowl is designed so that you can either inspect / collect what is discharged...! For clinical tests...? Maybe they are all 2nd hand toilet bowls from an old hospital or something... Well if you think this isn't something to make a fuss about... imagine this...

Earlier in the afternoon our 3 dear friends departed for their journey back to London. It was nice to have them around... Haha. Been having some late nights lately, as there is always presentations on Wednesdays and Thursdays (for tech studies and design studio). I hope I can rest well on Friday.

Another webcam session with chet. Just woke up after a short nap before doing site analysis so the hair's a bit buang. The 6 hours time difference is really something; we usually meet online at 0030 in Netherlands, which is 0630 in Singapore -.-" Hee... sorry lah, make u climb out of bed so early all the time...

The weather's been warm these days and so our faculty bar (yes, we have a bar in the faculty!) decided to bring out the beer to the lobby so students can sit in the open area just outside the faculty entrance and enjoy the lovely weather! Beer was 80c / cup. In the picture above are the usual Singaporeans, followed by Ramiro, Federica, Ana (fellow Erasmus students) and Olav, a local student helper. It was Federica's birthday so we decided to go out together for dinner in celebration!



Mienhui, Jessica and Ziqi's came by campus to join us after their Amsterdam daytrip. They bought gifts: seeds of a funny plant... err... yea a funny plant. Not all of us had bikes so the girls pillion-rided on the back of the bikes. The journey back to town centre was great fun!



There was a carnival going on in the city centre. We ate at a pizza restaurant near the house. Check out the pics! Urmz... Heh heh... Elita took the last pic. Nice hor? Hiakz hiakz! I wish to say more but don't dare to... Urmz... JU-icy details upon request :)

Staying up late to piah technical studies module... Sigh... maybe I should take Matt's advice ("enjoy is priority") more seriously...

Mienhui, Jessica and Ziqi arrived in Delft today! Their backpacks were shockingly huge! Listening to them talk about their 1 month journey is was nice. We cooked a feast: breaded chicken cutlet, to celebrate their arrival.

Cheewee + Juliana + 'Mysterious SMU girl' + the 4 of us here are making plans for Berlin + Munich trip end of September. Looking forward to it.

Tenants of 652 Roland Holstlaan level 2 had a party in the kitchen. Luckily I wasn't too late when I reached back to my apartment. Got to know the people staying around me a bit better: Italians, Austrians, Romanians, etc from architecture, civil engineering, etc. It was nice!

Learning how to cook from our Mr San who turns out to be a pretty good chef! Actually I've been helping out with cooking for dinners, but this was a breakthrough! Dinner is served: Pork chop with potatoes, carrot, long beans, cauliflower and corn, topped with red wine sauce! Yummy...

Plans for a visit to Haarlem were made hastily after design lesson ended on Thursday. We didn't know that we were supposed to visit the site for our design on our own until then. So after the lesson, Maarten (kewl Dutch group mate) came up to Ramiro (funky Brazilian group mate) and I and said, "Hey guys, I've got a small car of my own. We could drive down to Haarlem tomorrow to visit the site if you want."

My immediate thought then was: oooh... Roadtrip ;)

So on Friday afternoon I printed the maps out and we hopped into Maarten's car and our hour long drive to Haarlem began. Here's the view from the backseat. Car's a red box w/ 2 doors on 4 wheels. Like Maarten says, "I don't care. it's cheap, drinks little petrol, and for a student it's a luxury." I second that.


Fun facts of the car: one day while cruising on the freeway, the inner lining on the ceiling of the car fell off (see pictures)! Maarten tried to stick it back but to no avail... So now when it rains, the inside of the car sounds like a tin can :) Still, it was a thoroughly enjoyable ride all the way. We drove past Schipol Airport, as part of the highway goes below a bridge that planes cross to reach the runway for take-offs. It was too bad I couldn't take a photo of the close proximity we got under the wings of a plane. Schipol is so busy that for the brief few minutes we were on the highway next to it, we saw a couple of planes land and take-off.


Paranoma of one of the sites (we could choose between 2...) and the wind-mill upclose. The weather was sunny and windy. The site was quiet and serene. The 3 students making some observations about the place were contented but a little hungry... -.-"


We took a spin around the corner to the Grote Kerk (Great Church, or St Bavo's Church). Like most churches in Holland, the front is a big, open public square or market place (recalls the Nieuwe Kerk in Delft). And like most market places, its perimeter is crowded with cafes. Ramiro and I took a few shots of the place and Maarten went, "tsk... tourists..." We had a late lunch at one of the cafes:


A prison near our site. The circular form it takes facilitates the guard in keeping an eye on the inmates. Supposedly he sits in the centre under the dome, and the cells are arranged in a circular ring that forms the tower. My local friend says that there are only individual cells in there, each equipped with its own television and stuff. "As the saying goes, how developed a country is can be judged by how the prisoners are treated; well if it's true, then Holland's doing pretty well."


A random low-rise housing storey housing behind our site, and Ramiro checking out some bikes. We saw a lady who looked pretty pale and fragile cycle into the bicycle yard, gave her bike to the owner and went into the shop, which looked pretty run-down. Apparently, junkies who steal bikes for some money to buy drugs are somewhat common in the country.