queengilda.com

hallelujah!!!

i finally imported all my files over to queengilda.com!!

it's still gonna be a little glitchy (because i stayed up 2 nights trying to figure this out and my poor brain isn't working anymore), but basically, this freebird has flown away. catch up, honeys!

it's basically functioning, but i still have to import all my comments over from haloscan. i don't even know if it can be imported... there has been so much spam comments recently, i think i'll have to go over one comment at a time and copy and paste! if any of you spot anything weird with the new blog, please let me know.

well thank you blogspot! it's been a good year. it was good while it lasted.

update your links, y'all!! it's http://queengilda.com! (god! am i a nag or what!) go see it already! shoo!

i know i know

i know what you're thinking. "where they hell is this girl!"


i am
1. sleeping and growing roots to my bed
2. trying to learn wordpress to move my blog to my own url.

i always thought i was quite average in terms of the technological world. i mean, i know how to operate both a pc and a mac pretty well, i taught myself html and java stuff when i was 14, etc etc.

of course, html seems quite obsolete now and no one is even using it. and wordpress is supposed to be really easy but... i must have either grown dumb or everyone's lying and it ain't as easy as it's supposed to be.

UGH.

i wanna hire someone to do it but i have 3 dollars in my pocket.

by the way, school's out! woohoo!!! i give myself a week to get this show on the road so i can upload all the great pictures that i took with my fabulous class. it's been a really exciting week! 2 fabulous internships with seriously cool companies (more on that later), meeting the great gala darling, and a super exciting party to go to next week!!! ooooh i hope richie rich of heatherette is gonne be there!!!

*crossing my fingers*

till then, kisses and emails please! :)

25

i just celebrated my 25th birthday yesterday, the 19th of april. it was also freebird's 1-year old birthday. whoopee!

i started freebird a year ago when i turned 24, just to blog about my boring life which is really quite drama-filled sometimes. it was an avenue for me to put my thoughts into words, to share what i had to offer, and to update my friends and family from back home about myself.

i think i have quite a different take on life, as compared to other people. i get emotional about things, but i try not to take it too seriously. i bitch about stuff, but then by making a joke out of it, it lightens up the entire situation and sometimes, i manage to make myself laugh. heh heh. so i think freebird has actually been pretty good to me.

there are a lot of things i want to achieve with this blog, but unfortunately i haven't been able to blog as much as i would like to, ever since i came to new york. i guess life takes its own course and sometimes you just can't pre-determine stuff. but i'm finally getting better with managing my time, and yeah, i definitely have bigger plans in the future! (although i have to come up with the money for it. hmmmmm...)

so anyhow, it has been such a busy busy week. so much happened and there was no way i could really plan a real party, but i did want to have some dinner with friends. i was dead tired on friday the 18th. after all, i hardly got any sleep that entire week. i came back home and really just crashed into bed at about 5pm, and slept all the way till about 11pm or so. i woke up to shower and watch some tv, but crawled back into my glorious bed.

i mean seriously, when you're that tired, who cares if it's your birthday. all i could think of was my mattress, pillow and snuggalicious comforter.

however some friends decided that birthdays are not meant for sleeping, and called me on my phone till i picked up (even though i tried to put it on silent and ignore them for a while. hahaha!). i went over to their house for a few drinks at about 4am in the morning, before coming back home to sleep even more!

just in case you're thinking, "oh my god that pig slept through her whole birthday!", well, yeah and i loved it. sleep was the best present!

well, actually i crash into bed for hours every friday.

but anyway, some of my classmates and my roommate came to have a cheap dinner with me. i had invited some of them out for greasy fried japanese food and when i wanted to pay for dinner (i mean, there were just 6 of us and the bill was waaaay cheaper than i thought it would be!), they were like, "honey you're so asian! this is america, you don't pay on your birthday."

ahahahahahha it was so darn funny.

the cheap joint that we went to had a cotton-candy machine outside, and when we paid up, they gave us little cups with sugar in it to make our own. it was hilarious. two of my friends were making it for the 6 of us, but my guy friend turned out to be such a super pro at it, they all turned out perfectly shaped! we decided it was a career opportunity he should think about.

right after cotton-candy, i found out that they were so sweet! they had actually bought a little cake for me, so we decided it was best if they just came over to my apartment. we also pretended to be cool adults and drank some champagne. (hey! i AM 25 ok!) and from like 10 pm to 3 am when they left, we spent the hours bitching about parsons and other random stuff.

ooh it was so fun. it's amazing how much there was to bitch about. hee hee!

we've been so busy at school, this was the first time this semester we ever really hung out (besides all those group projects and stuff). this section has been really fun and i'm a little sad that we're all splitting up into different classes soon, but hopefully we get to hang out again during summer, when school isn't making us into zombies with bad tempers.

so! it wasn't a big birthday bash, but i don't like those, so i'm happy. it's nice just to get together with friends and sit down and talk. some of my other friends who were supposed to come, couldn't make it in the end. i got messages later saying they were so so so so so so sorry but they slept through the day. hahahahah i don't blame them; i can totally understand.

i wanted to sleep through my own birthday too!

so happy 25th to me, and happy anniversary to my little baby blog. i've made some friends through freebird, who i hope i manage to keep, and i want to thank those of you who constantly check back to see if i've made new posts!! i'm sorry if i've disappointed you on more than one occasion, but i promise i'll be posting more!

i want to leave you with this photo, which proves that even trash can be inspiring.

"become your dream, y'all!" (in a trashy, southern, britney spears sorta accent!)

don't mess with me

so i was supposed to register for next semester's classes on friday at 8 am. i've been having such a busy week, i've hardly slept at all. well, to be brutally honest, most of it was just due to my utter lack of time management. i was supposed to do things over the weekend that i didn't, and everything just got pushed back, such that i was really just doing homework the nights before they were due. and of course, according to our favorite murphy and his (or is it her) law, everything that could mess up messed up, and i spent hours working on something that should have taken me less than half that time. in other words, i hardly slept all week and was a walking zombie. and i sure looked and felt shitty too. in the words of my darling friend anthony, i was a "train wreck".

on thursday night i spent a couple of hours pouring over the online registration page, deciding on my classes, and writing everything down. "all set!" i thought, and looked at the time. it was like, 3 am, and i was about to faint from physical exhaustion. i contemplated going to sleep because my bed and blankets were looking rather delicious, but i knew that if i had gone to bed, i would NOT wake up at 8 o'clock to register and get into the classes i wanted.

so i did what every crazy idiot would do (don't try this, kids): i stayed up all night. la-di-da-di-da. doing nothing. so what, right? well like i said, i hadn't slept in days. well yeah i wanted to get some work done, but seriously, my brain was not having it. it was shutting down, just like my eyes were, so i just sat around and watched x japan's yoshiki videos on youtube. (yoshiki is so damn cute i can't take it. sorry takuya, but i'm having a huge affair with yoshiki now. ooh! but don't worry you're still my one and only true love.) i had never heard him speak english before, and it was only after this youtube-ing episode that i watched videos of interviews that he had given in english. (here's one that i thought was hilarious. and here's another one when an employee pissed him off.) he's much better than i thought!! well he should obviously be fluent enough after living in los angeles for 10 years eh? he still speaks very much in japanese-english though. it's hard to explain but they have their own accent. and excuse me, why didn't anyone tell me he had a myspace page??? and he actually writes a blog too, for his own myspace as well as violet uk's. oh my god the way he writes is so cute. the best thing? he personally views each comment before they are published. (which also explains why the comments on recent entries are "0", because it's taking him months to go through hundreds of comments for each post.)

i gushed to my friend about yoshiki the other day, and she's no fan of all these japan bands that i love. (and to all you haters, i'm really not a teenybopper but when it comes to smap and x japan, i'll become a groupie if i could. pffffffffffft!!! *major wahahas*) she took one look at this video of yoshiki that i showed her, and she was like, "wait. isn't he really similar to that other guy you like?"

and i'm like, "his name is takuya and whaddya meeeean? what are you talking about? are they?"

"honey, they speak the same way they act the same way they smile and laugh the same way and they look like twins when they have sunglasses on. maybe you just like their noses and cheekbones. and maybe you just like it that they are so passionate about something."


wow. i felt like i had been to some quickie drive-thru guru or holy psychic mind-reader, who pointed out in simple words exactly what i like in guys!! i wanted to pay her 10 dollars. but of course, friends shouldn't pay friends. services like that within friends are for free!!! hahaha.


erm, strayed too far from my topic.

well i youtube-d yoshiki all night, and spent a few hours smiling like an idiot at my computer screen. at about 7:45 my roommate's alarm started going off (she's from parsons and had to register too), so i took a final look at all the classes i wanted to get.

at 7:59 i tried logging into the registration page. "you are not permitted to register at this time." said the system. "ok fine, so i was a minute early," i thought. i tried again at 8:00. at 8:01, at 8:02, and about 47 times at 8:03.

WHAT THE HELL WHAT'S UP WITH THIS PAGE!!!!

i walk over to my roommate's room and ask her if she's managed to log in. "yeah i'm in but like all the classes i want are already filled up."

"WHAT!!! i can't even log in!! ughhhhhhhhhhhhhh."

i went and dug through my mountain of random papers, and found the number to call up the registrar's office. when i called them, and complained that i can't log into the system and theybettergetmeinthereasapbecause *gasp* idon'twannagetintosomelousyclasswithlousyteachers, guess what the woman told me?

"the system says you're not permitted to register at this time."

HELLO WOMAN, I TOLD YOU THAT!

she wanted me to call up my fashion advisors and have them call her again to fix the problem, because they had to be the ones to give her the go-ahead and let me register. "why can't you call them directly and speak with them on the phone?!!??!"

i was nearly yelling.

"i can't do that ma'am."

"HUH?!?!?!? why not?!?!?! that's just pointless and makes absolutely NO sense. i'm losing out on precious minutes here."

"so you should put the phone down and call them as soon as possible ma'am."

i realized obviously that i was talking to a friggin' bafoon (is there such a word?? it's a mix between a baboon and a fool. i like this word. i just came up with it while typing. because she really was a fucking bafoon.) so i went "WHATEVER!!" and hung up on her, and tried calling my advisors in the fashion campus.

the head advisor didn't pick up the phone. but i got over that quickly since she never helps anyone anyway. i didn't know the extension for my other advisor but managed to get to her through the voice activated machines. i told her my problem and she said that she will have to call the registrar's office, let them fix me up, then they'll call her back, and she'll email me the moment she gets the phone call.

"b, b, b, bu, but how long's that going to take!?!?" i was boiling so much i started to stutter.

"i don't have control over the system so that's the route we'll have to go."

"ok but please hurry because my roommate's telling me that the classes are filling up really fast."

"don't worry because there are enough classes for everyone."

"that's not the point. the whole reason everyone's rushing in to register at 8 am is because there ARE preferred classes, and i'm not getting anything i want even though i tried to register on time, and it's not even my fault! someone on the school's side messed my system up and i don't see why i need to pay for it."

"....well let me just call them and we'll try to hurry this process."

i know she is actually a really nice advisor. but seriously, this is NOT the first time that the parsons administration people have fucked up big time. i mean, they fucked up before i even entered the school. i am learning a lot in that school and (most) of my teachers are really imparting a lot of knowledge and skills to me which i totally appreciate. (although the key word is, "most".) but for god's sakes, someone needs to take all these admin people by the toes and hang them upside down so that blood will hopefully rush to their brains and start up those rusty machines in there.

it's terrible and i know i'm not the only one bitching about them, although i bitch quite a lot at any chance i have. UGH!!!!!

i couldn't take it because my head was pounding, so i went to lie down and set alarms on my iphone like, seriously, every 15 minutes. just so i keep myself at a half-awake mode and not fall into deep sleep ala sleeping beauty, and wake up a century or two later.

i received an email from my advisor at 9:39 am.

i'm not the greatest person on technological stuff, but i'm not that daft either. how long does it take to locate my name in their system, especially when no one else has my name and they already know my student id? how long does it take to check a few boxes like "allow student to register for fall 2008?" and click a few mouses? does it reeeeeeally take more than an hour?

i could have baked an entire pie in that time, ok. not that i bake pies, but i could have!

and of course, all the classes i wanted were filled and the sections were closed, and i had to settle for classes that were not my initial preferred classes.

i hate them hate them hate them.

when you're operating a university as big as the new school is, and a school as old and as famous as parsons is, you really have to get your act together. don't bitch to us about our attendance and about how we should do this and that, when as a university, you mess things up yourself. the only reason why this school is fabulous is because of its teachers. as for all the administration, it's a pity that those who really try hard aren't getting praised, because there are bigger idiots who mess things up so big all the time it's hard to even realize their good moments. i don't know why my parents are paying US 40 grand a year for fees when we have idiots like that running the school. where the hell is my money going to??? why can't we even get decent irons that work properly? how much is a freakin professional iron? i don't want some lousy 300 dollar piece of crap that at-home seamstresses can buy. did you guys watch one of the later episodes of project runway in season 4, i think it was when roberto cavalli was guest judge, when jillian was panicking about not finishing her dress on time, and she got fed up with the irons in parsons? i remembered watching her curse at those stupid things and i remember saying, "YES!!! EXACTLY!!! thank you!"

plus, they send out emails telling us to vote for some student senate, and some other email about a competition on "what would you do if you had $2000 to spend?" or some amount like that. well how about updating the machines in school?

it's disgusting and i'm dumbfounded. flabbergasted. i don't even wanna compare it to bunka because bunka's facilities were top-notch and amazing. parsons should be ashamed of themselves. and they should really take a trip to tokyo and have a look at how great the amenities are there. HMPH! with a capital H!


another hellava bitchy post
from your favorite first-class bitch,

gilda xox

today's get-up 10feb2008

wow, i just found these on my mac. they're like old already, but i thought i'd put them up anyway. whoops!!! i mean, it's not even winter anymore!!

ugh, i'm sorry the pictures are so blur and grainy ok... i have no money to buy myself a spiffy camera yet. this was like the only winter-ish day in new york. i was in soho and it started snowing all of a sudden. seriously, it was howwwwling. after a few seconds my entire coat was covered in snow flakes!

• navy pile bear coat by mercibeaucoup;
• checked muffler by ne-net
• evil heart tee by comme des garcons
• navy wool dress/cow suit by mercibeaucoup;
• red tights
• black lace slip-on shoes by undercover

new hair!! (then) now it's old. i got it cut when i was in japan in january, by my super darling, manabu. he's the hair whiz whom i entrusted my hair with for 3 years while i was living in japan. he's more important than a boyfriend. no, really!! i need him so bad. my hair is now flat and not very cool at all. in fact, i sent him a postcard that said something like this:

dearest manabu,
thank you for 3 beautiful years.
i'm lonely in new york. i need you, i want you, i love you!!
please come and save me asap!!
love, gilda

i'm telling you, when you find someone who knows your hair, it might be a more important relationship than some other guy who just holds your hand.

life is beautiful

i spent the whole day sleeping today. but ah well, i've really been working really hard. we just ended our group project in school. we've been working on it for more than a month, with all of us doing 2 rounds of design croquis. we had 4 people in each group with 4 groups in our class. i'm sure you all know if but hell, group project was not easy at all. having to coordinate stuff ain't ever easy. plus sometimes you might get people who don't bother to give an opinion or don't even show up at school and you have to work extra hard for things to turn out right. you know what they say, whoever they are – "when you want something done right you've gotta do it yourself." that was exactly what happened. i was in charge of drawing the figures (and drawing 21 ain't easy peasy), but had to help with the painting to make sure the collection really looked good. thank god i had 2 other group members who were amazing and did their job well. phew!!

overall i think our collection was pretty successful! we got quite a good grade too. once i get them scanned i'll upload for you guys to see.

other than that, i've been busy but somehow, in the last few weeks, it has been a very exciting time for me. i'm happy doing what i love doing, and i guess that's what matters most.

i've also been watching a lot of japanese tv recently. (don't you love the internet?) i miss japan so much. how many times have i repeated that in the last year!! sorry if you're sick of it, but i do. i miss my friends, i miss the rabbit-hole apartment i used to live in, i miss the food, i miss the shopping, i miss the tv, and i really miss smap. i really do, as stupid as that might sound.

in other exciting news, did you hear that comme des garcons is going to be doing a collaboration with h&m??? holy crap, i was checking my mail on my iphone, while totally half-asleep in bed, and read it in one of my hundreds of fashion email. i can't even begin to tell you how big my eyes opened up and how wide awake that made me in an instant! haha.

i don't buy a lot of things from h&m because it isn't the best quality, but i do go in once in a while and get some stuff that are better made. when they did the collaboration with robert cavalli i was tempted to buy a leopard-print dress but decided against it since i have nowhere to wear it to anyway. but a collaboration with comme des garcons!?!? i'm gonna buy EVERYTHING. if you don't know how big of a fan i am, you haven't been seeing enough of my get-ups. (which reminds me, i haven't posted one of those in a while.)

in other exciting news, x japan is coming to new york in september!!!!! if you call yourself a music or a japan fan, and you don't know x japan, then seriously, shame on you. yes yes yes they jumpstarted the visual rock phenomenon in japan many years ago (and serious they looked quite horrid). but they dress like any other rocker dude now, and they have such amazing melodies, i can't even express it. x japan is a legendary band in japan. they broke up 10 years ago and one of their members had an accidental death after that. it was only just last week that they did 3 reunion concerts. everything that you might have seen or heard about japan's music, has probably had an influence by x japan. not just visual rock, but rock and manga and anime and all kinds of music. even the ex-prime minister, mr koizumi, was a fan and used to go to their concerts.

do yourself a huge favor and search for their videos on youtube. i am in love with yoshiki, the band leader as well as pianist and drummer. yes, he plays both those instruments in concert, and he is probably one of the most talented musicians of our time. i've never seen anyone playing the piano or drums with that kind of passion before. he's truly amazing. he's said to be able to hit the drums at like 800 beats a minute. i don't know if the reports are lying, but anything over a hundred sounds pretty amazing to me. he wears a neck brace during performances because his neck has been injured for years, due to the crazy drum bashing he does. and his fingers apparently always swell and when not playing the piano he has to wear a wrist brace because he's had injuries from over-playing the piano.

i can't express what a talent he is on either instrument. you've really gotta just watch it yourself.

they just announced like 2 days ago that they're gonna be coming to new york as part of their world tour, which they haven't really planned much on. they'll be playing in madison square garden on september 13th. i don't know if i would even be able to buy tickets, considering the number of fans they have worldwide. but you bet your ass i'm gonna try. ahhhhhh!!!

i'm like soooooo excited!!! i've always wished i could go to their concerts, and i never expected for them to ever reunite! holy guacamole!! please go to itunes and listen to their songs. my favorites are their ballads, "tears", "endless rain" and my favorite, "forever love". if you like rock songs, listen to "dahlia", "kurenai" and "rusty nail". oh but whatever, just "forever love" at least. it is so beautiful.

i could listen to it over and over again and find myself loving it even more.

ah-ha-ha-ha stayin' alive, stayin' alive

stayin' alai----hi--ay----ay-aive

hello, give me some credit please, i was trying to type out the words in the same way those beegees sang it.

contrary to belief, i haven't died yet.

no, i've just been busy as a bee. in fact, busier than a bee, and just about as busy as a queen ant. in the last 3 month's, i've returned from a holiday from singapore and japan, had an argument with my roommate, been put in a situation where we didn't talk for over a month, went to view apartments, and i mean at least 40 different places (no kidding), packed up and moved out of my old place and into the new, forgave my old roommate and talked things through, found a new roommate, bought and installed new furniture, decided i had to kill myself because i had so many clothes and no where to put them...

and all that while going through regular classes!

you have no idea how tired i was!!! oh man!

it was really hard. trying to keep up with being a full-time fashion student + moving house (especially when you have as many things as i do) is not recommended.

i know a lot of you have come back to visit this blog and sent me messages asking if i've disappeared. after i've manage to build up a reader-base, it was really silly of me to stop posting for so damn long because i probably have like zero readers now... or worse, more like minus 5.

basically it was a very difficult 3 months and i had very negative qi. my ex-roommate and i could not get along and she spent her days practically thinking about "revenge" and how she could send me emails that would anger me. to be honest, her emails did piss me off at first, but after a while, i realised it was so ridiculous and it became like a joke to me everytime i got one of her emails dipped in poison. i knew i had to move out of the place because i definitely wasn't happy there and it didn't help that we hated each other. i was coming home extremely tired from school and keeping to myself in the room, only leaving it to go to the bathroom or the kitchen. i had never experienced something or someone like that before, and believe me it was a real eye-opener.

anyway i moved into a new place about a month ago, and guess how many boxes i left my old place with? 3-fucking-0!!! there were big ones and there were small ones, but there were 30. crazy shit. i wanted to slap myself. the room that i have now is way smaller and i've had to learn about being organized. but it's quite newly renovated and it's in an amazing location. my new roommate seems really nice. she goes to parsons too so we can bitch to each other about our crazy teachers and how tired we are and how expensive the school fees are. yay!

my ex-bosses (roger and yvonne, a husband and wife team) and edmond, a great mutual friend came over to new york at the end of february for a few days. edmond used to live in new york for 10 years, back in the days when it was still very dangerous and the parks weren't safe and the lower east side wasn't a shopping area. so he brought us around to his favorite restaurants and it was so hilarious watching this grown man get all excited saying, "ohmygodiusedtolooooovecominghere (breathe) thefoodisamaaaazing." and he'd give us instructions on how to eat this and that. yummm!!

el faro (823 greenwich street, 212.929.8120) is a spanish restaurant with sme very homemade dishes. the space was cramped but edmond made reservations so we didn't have to wait, and he had made orders ahead of time so food came pronto! and the garlic bread, is the devil. in a good way. like i want it everyday. *lick lips*

edmond's friend, steven, lives in new york and works at artsee eyewear (863 washington street, 212.414.0900), a really cool shop with unique glasses and sunglasses in the meatpacking district. he brought us to this tapas bar called pamplona (37 east 28th street, 212.213.2328). we ordered like everything on the menu and holy crap it was so so so good. some of the stuff we ordered aren't even shown in the pictures above. particularly amazing were the celery root soup (coming from a girl who hates celery and celery root), the dates wrapped in bacon, fried chickpeas, and the peanut butter ice-cream!!! hello!!! peanut butter ice-cream!!

they stayed at the W in union square on the 20th floor. who knew new york could have pretty sunsets?

spring break just ended yesterday. a friend of mine from japan, yuka, came over for a few days so i was tour guide for a week. it was more tiring than i thought it would be, because literally, i was planning each day!!! i'm such an ass for complaining, but she basically came over with no clue as to what she wanted to do, and she didn't really care so much about what we'd be doing. so that made planning even harder, because then i had no idea where i should bring her and all that. but we got through it, walked a hell lot, ate even more, and spent too much money. sounds like fun eh?

i don't know what the hell i was doing shopping with her when i'm not even on holiday. did i mention that i'm broke and that i had no space to put anything in my puny room!!!!

and oh my god, did we eat or did we eat.

i regretted not taking more photos with her while she was here. i think we took like 4 pictures together. the rest of our pictures were all of the glorious food we had.

what disgusting pigs!!! we just ate and ate and ate more!!

pizza at lombardi's (32 spring street, 212.941.7994). some people hate it, i think it's yummy and i love the crust, and the meatball toppings! it's apparently new york's first pizzeria, but who cares about history when you've got amazing mozzarella and meatballs in your mouth! hee hee.

cupcakes from magnolia bakery (401 bleeker street, 212.462.2572). made famous by sex and the city, i'm sure there are many more cupcake places that must be better than this place. but for the moment, it makes my sweet tooth happy and who can resist all those cute colors! (although i have to admit the purple icing was way too much even for me.)

korean fried chicken at bon chon (314 5th avenue, 212.221.2222). introduced by a korean friend of mine, this restaurant is apparently also famous in korea and every korean in new york is supposed to know this place. the thing is, this is the best fried chicken i have ever had in my life. i've brought 4 different groups of friends there, and we can't get enough. you know it's good when you're so full you're about to puke and you still wanna gobble some more. it's fantabulous.

at the hershey's store in times square, 4 outfits from the project runway challenge were on display. jillian's (the one of the red corset) was really pretty amazing.

we had a huge lunch at the peter luger steakhouse (178 broadway, 1.718.387.7400) in brooklyn. i was told that the single steak wasn't as good of a cut, so we ordered the porterhouse steak for two, which was actually steak for 17. it was cooked in 4 pounds of butter or something and we all know how good that smells and tastes. also amazing was the bacon that we ordered as appetizer. give me a strip everyday please. the second shot was taken while on the subway back to the city.

i hate making the rich richer, but dylan's candy bar (1011 3rd avenue, 646.735.0078) was too cute not to mention. never mind that a lot of the stuff were all about easter when we went. the whole place was so colorful, even the stairs were cute! the place was also stocked with tons of very nostalgic sweets. i wonder if the kids these days even know what those are! i used to have those lollies that you wear as a ring and all that! loved them. and yuka spent like 70 dollars buying a basketful of pez! crazy girl! she collects them!

i also brought yuka for cheese fondue at the bourgeois pig cafe (111 east 7th street, 212.475.2246). i love fondue and i quite like it here. plus, the place has pretty great atmosphere. i had a glass of champagne with a strawberry reduction. it was so delicious.

our last meal was at florent where fries are always amazing. i had a huge bowl of mussels. i don't think i've ever eaten that many mussels at one time. i was telling yuka that i doubt it'll make me full, but halfway through my tummy was overfilled. they gave us these paper placemats with empty faces, so it was fun to fill in the blank looks. i think if i ever had a restaurant of my own, i want to have something like that too.

at the m&m's store in times square, there are m&m colors that i had never seen while growing up. there's also this huge-ass machine in the middle of the 2nd floor where you stand under and they tell you what color you are. i had never tried it out before (very embarrassing), but since i had yuka with me this time, we both decided to join the line. yes, we were the only grown-ups in line. among all the 5 year old kids. ugh. as you can see, i'm sugar and spice but mostly spice. i think this fortune teller is pretty accurate. it was so funny! i'll have to go back again one day to see if that has changed.


and lastly, on saturday, after yuka left to go back to tokyo, i walked out to the supermarket and realized that there was this ultra-funny event taking place outside the union square subway station. pillow fight!!! the air was filled with feathers and i didn't wanna step nearer even to take pictures because i could see the people who had stepped away from the fight, and yes, they had feathers in their hair, on their coat, in their nostrils. there were soooo many people, i would imagine getting a neckache after getting slammed on the head one too many times by someone's hard-ass pillow!

so that's it, i've been away from my blog for a while, but if you've read this far, you'd know where i have been:

fat camp.

i'm so disgusted with myself i could hurl. yuck! stop eating you fat pig!

working girl

this is another one of my projects from the previous semester. it was for a bridge collection. for those of you who don't understand what a bridge line is, well it's a little hard to explain because it means a lot of things. we have the high-end designer lines, like donna karen, and then her bridge line would be considered dkny, where it is more affordable for the masses, and consists more of separate ready-to-wear outfits (although there are, of course, dresses). bridge collections are usually for everyday use, especially for the working career woman, sometimes to take her from the office to dinner. there are also some well-established bridge lines like dana buchman, tory burch and so on (although some people consider them more contemporary).

we were supposed to design a working woman's wardrobe, inject our own design aesthetic into it, and yet keep it wearable for the masses and to be able to carry someone to the office and then to a dinner.

BOY it was hard. i decided i wanted to do a masculine collection with a male touch, because although i do love crazy stuff, i also love the suit and i love jackets and i also love menswear, so i wanted something menswear inspired that a strong woman could wear.

besides my favorite white, black and navy colors, i also wanted to inject some brights in there with my two beloved neons, pink and turquoise. yes, ladies and gentlemen, you will see these colors in a lot of my clothes!!

ps: although i do wanna show you guys more of my croquis and the planning stage, i've decided that that might not be a good idea after all. i guess i have a need to keep some of my ideas to myself! heh heh!

ready to kill my flatmate

i got back in new york yesterday morning, and was so tired, i slept all day. like seriously, ALL DAY. like from 2pm to about 9 am this morning. i woke up once in between just to go to the toilet, but i went straight back to bed each time. not being able to sleep on the plane really sucked, and is a great shock to me (and perhaps also to all those who personally know me, because yes, i am a pig and i can usually sleep everywhere and anywhere at anytime. no joke.)

anyway. school starts on friday and i am not looking forward to it. i had a fabulous time meeting up with all my friends in japan, and really, although i am learning a lot in parsons now, i regret moving away from tokyo. regret it so much i can't even explain it.

so i've been looking for a new place to move to for a while now. although this apartment i'm living is really old, it's close to school and i love it for the convenience. the doormen are also really nice, and the room is really quite large. however, i hate my flatmate and her fucking yappy dog. hate them. ok maybe "hate" is too strong a word. but i seriously dislike them, and i don't think i've ever disliked a dog before.

i first wanted to move after a very very traumatic trip to ikea with my flatmate. i wanted to go to buy stuff for my room (i had not much furniture), and i needed her to drive me, because i wasn't confident driving on the left side. (in singapore the driver's seat is on the right.) it was a nightmare, and she was the biggest psycho bitch i had ever met in my life.

first of all, she wasn't the best driver. i mean, she can't drive and look at signs at the same time. like, what kind of fucked up driver is that right? how did she manage to pass her driving test? is it so easy to get a licence in canada and america?!?!

i was in charge of reading the map. but look, i'd only been in the states like what, about 3 months at that time, and i definitely haven't been on the road, nor read any american maps. i read out to her what the directions say, and tell her turn left or right at whichever crossing and whichever freeway and all that. and she's like, "no read me exactly what it says."

i'm like, "it says exactly what i just said!!!"

and she goes like, "well you have to look out for it and tell me where to turn because i have to concentrate on the road!"

and i'm like, "well i'm looking out for it but what kind of driver are you if you can't drive AND look out for signs?"

and she goes, "you're really bad at reading maps."

and i go, "well i'm telling you whatever's written on this thing, and i have no idea how american roads are like so i don't even know what i'm looking for. i don't know what a turnpike means, i don't know what a i-94 means, we don't even call it a 'freeway in singapore. i tell you to turn left and you say 'what?' and we miss the turn because you claim i'm not reading the directions right."

i mean, after a while i just let her go off on her rockets. if not because i needed her to drive, i would never, repeat never, have wanted to go along with her. she goes crazy swearing at other drivers, honks at people like a million times (i'm not joking), and while honking, she screams "fucker you mother fucking mothing fucking fucker!!!" nonstop. i'm serious.

the most terrible thing was that the car we rented had a technical problem with it, and we had to call in to the car company we rented it from. she doesn't have a mobile phone, so i used mine to call in. and one of the steps to prove one's identity was to key in one's birthdate, and although she was driving, she refuuuuuuused to tell me her birthday and i had to pass her my handphone for her to key it in herself. i can't even explain to you guys how much i rolled and rolled my eyes. and rolled it again.

what was worse was that i had to go to ikea a second time. i thought, maybe she was having a bad day and it was mean of me to write her off just because she went insane on me one time. but the second time was just as bad and each time she went crazy at various things, i'd just roll my eyes and swallow hard to keep myself from arguing back. after all, what's the point? i almost laughed a few times because she was just so ridiculous. i did all i could to stop myself from recording a short movie on her going crazy and putting it on youtube. especially each time when i read her some certain direction from the map i printed, and she would say it didn't make sense and in the end we'd miss it. then she'd go on her "fuckfuckingfuckmotherfuckingmotherfucker" screams again, and then shout at me that it's my fault and she doesn't know how to go back to where we want to go. i'm like, dude. i don't know american roads, but if you can get here, you can go back to where you were. if we took a wrong north turn, we just have to find the south way back.

like, duh?

and she'll be like, "well i'm concentrating really hard on driving and it's your fault so you go figure out how to get back to that road."

seriously at times it was so ridiculous i wanted to laugh and tell her, "i think you're one of the dumber americans i've seen."

after the second trip to ikea together i decided that i couldn't stand her and that i had to look at other living options.

but it wasn't until my macbook and email and bank account got hacked into, that i really made up my mind. at first, i thought that it was just my online stuff that had been hacked into, but i realised later that the hackers probably hacked into my computer, and that it must have been through my internet cable. so i talked to her about it and said that i had spoken to a few of my really techie friends and they all agree that the hackers might have hacked in through the internet. i said that i think it's possible and i asked if she had firewall and a password set. she said she didn't know. so i asked if i could get someone to put a firewall and password up, and her answer was something like, "i don't know what's a firewall and i don't know how to do that and i don't wanna touch it and mess anything up and i don't want anyone touching it either."

fucked up eh? i wanted to slap her and i secretly wished that her computer would get hacked too.

at that moment i decided, that was that, enough was enough, i cannot live with someone like this.

i was in the middle of my final projects at that time, and once school was over i left new york to go back home. i was supposed to leave her my rent cheque for the month of january before i left, but i realised at the last minute that my bank had yet to send me new cheques for my new account, and i only had my old cheques from the account i had closed after the hacking. i didn't feel comfortable leaving cash behind, sitting on her desk (she had gone back home to toronto), especially since i knew that she had left her keys with two other neighbours and that they would be using the house to keep things for their year-end parties. so i emailed her and she said i'd have to pay a late fee of $35 when i get back.

fine, i thought.

as my holiday ends, she emails me to double-check when i'd get back. and holy crap, she even emailed my dad for god's sakes. when i got back to new york and turned on my mobile in the airport, i realised that she had also tried calling me a few times and had left voice mails. my iphone was not usable while i had been in japan, so i only realised she made those calls when i turned on my phone when i got back in new york. and i don't know why she even bothered calling because i specifically told her in my emails that my phone will not work in japan!!

so i got back to manhattan yesterday morning, tired as hell after a 12 hour flight and lugging 46 kilos of luggage (i brought a lot of books back). i said hi to her and told her i'd give her rent first thing tomorrow, and i go to sleep after a shower.

fast forward to 3 am, like 13 hours after i had first gone to bed. i woke up to pee and she had already gone to sleep. i walk into the bathroom and guess what i see?

yep. there it was, a yellow post-it, stuck on top of the toilet bowl. "good grief" i thought. and went about my business.

i flushed and turned to wash my hands. guess what i saw again?

yep! you guessed it right, another yellow post-it!!

like hello?? i'm not stupid, blind, nor as forgetful as she is, ok. and i've never been late with my rent and my reason for not leaving my rent behind was very valid. and i was already fine with paying whatever late fee, so i don't know what the fuck her problem was. and was i paying the fee to the landlord or to her anyway?!

best thing is, she kept emphasizing a.m., which i'm not sure why because she never wakes up in the morning anyway!! she used to work at a sony studio nearby as a receptionist, but her shift always started in the afternoon so she was never awake in the mornings. after she got fired a few months ago, she continued to wake up after noon everyday, and the only times she would wake up earlier than that was to go to the bathroom, because believe me the lady has bladder problems. no normal person goes to toilet that many times a night.

i got out of bed at about 9 am to go to the bank to get money for my rent, then realised while i was walking there that i was famished from not eating all of yesterday, and having only lousy aeroplane food that i hardly touched the day before. so i bought a huge breakfast, went back home, and really ate too much.

as i expected, she didn't wake up in the a.m. morning. instead, she only woke up at about 2:30pm when i opened the front door to go throw something, and her fucking yappy dog barked her stupid head off. so why the hell did she have to write two idiotic post-its to tell me to pay rent in the morning??

and don't even get me started on that dog. i want to smack it so bad and if it irritates me anymore, i just might. it's one spoilt little brat of a pomeranian with the most irritating high-pitched yap, and trust me she yaps at everything. and once she starts it's like 5 to 10 minutes before she stops. i hate that stupid dog. and my flatmate talks baby-talk with her dog. i think that's gross. i can't stand people who do the baby-talk thing. when i speak to my own dog i speak in a higher pitched voice sometimes, but i don't do the baby-talk thing unless i'm talking to an actual baby.

and can i just go back to bitching about my flatmate again and mention that she has lived in this apartment for 12 years, and some of the things she uses in the place is just as old? example: i bought myself a can of lychees that i had found in the supermarket. i love lychees and it's something i grew up eating, so i was quite excited to see that it was sold in my local supermarket. i came back to my apartment and tried looking for a can-opener, but there wasn't one in the drawer with all the spoons and forks, nor the drawer with the knives. i opened the other drawers and found a can-opener.... but it was super old and super rusty it had things growing on it like a habitat. i nearly puked. "surely this is just lying here and not used??" i thought. i kept my lychees in the fridge and refrained from having to use that disgusting can-opener. when i went down the next day to buy a new opener, i came back and saw that crusty old one, laid out to dry after being washed, but still rusty and crusty and disgusting. "GROSS GROSS YUCK *pui!!*" i said to myself. how could anyone use that kind of thing to open a can of food that would eventually go into your mouth!!! disgusting. as i'm typing this i feel like i should go into the kitchen and take a picture of that gross thing, but she's at home now so i can't do that. which is a pity because seriously, the only way i can prove how gross it is, is with a real visual image.

so anyway, here i am, looking online for apartments in new york, instead of finishing my holiday homework. i was doing my homework all day, but i put my sketchbook down a little while ago when music from the living room was blasting so loud i couldn't concentrate. it was blasting so loud, it drowned out the sound of my tv, even though i turned the volume of my tv up to the loudest notch. oh my god i'm so pissed i'm boiling.

i think it's gonna be more expensive to rent an apartment by myself, but i'm seriously never going to give myself more headaches like this and share a place anymore. no way. no fucking way. i really don't need any of this crap!!

and that music from outside better get turned down soon before i go out and give her a piece of my mind. ugh.



update!!
thanks for your comments. you guys made me laugh. i managed to take a picture of that can-opener. seriously i think it's gross. hope it doesn't spoilt your appetite. hee hee! open up the picture to view a larger image! *wink* click click!

i honestly cannot imagine using that. bleah!

back in tokyo

hello my darlings. it's been while since i wrote in... but actually i've left singapore and am in tokyo now. woohoo!! i flew in yesterday and will be here until the morning of the 15th, tuesday, tokyo time, and then leave for new york.

it's been crazy, and i have a week left of my break before school starts.

coming back to japan has been rather difficult.

i miss it so much, i really regret leaving.

oh well, depressing stories are boring. i'll upload photos (i have tons. no, really. tons.) once i get back to new york. hopefully i'd have finished all my stupid holiday homework by then!!!

in the meantime, take care!

love, gilda
xoxo

happy new year!

it's the new year! i can't believe 2007 went past so quickly. i was in japan till may, then i came back to singapore for 3 months, which was my longest break back home since i had moved to tokyo 4 years ago. then i moved away to new york, and now i'm back here in singapore again for my winter holidays. it all seems so surreal.

i made some new year resolutions at the start of 2007, and, if i may say so myself, i think i did pretty well in making most of them come true. here are my new ones for the year:

1. practice my japanese relentlessly and never forget it!
2. pick up french.
3. stay in touch and not get lazy about keeping in contact with friends
4. learn how to cook better!
5. sleep.
6. eat healthy.
7. laugh. and laugh.
   
8. be thankful for each day.
9. grow up and act my age.
10. love myself more so i can love others more.

i also hope to start my own business on the side, and hopefully not burn out from lack of sleep or poor time management. i'm really hopeful for this new year.

i'm going to turn 25 in a few months. it's kinda scary. when i was younger, i had envisioned all sorts of things happening by the time i was 25. but things don't always go according to plan, but i am quite happy to say that i'm really satisfied with how everything has turned out.

i have had opportunities that would never be available to most people, and how many people can really say that they are really living their dream? i know i am, and i'm really grateful.

one thing i need to think about though, is that after over 4 years of getting used to living alone, i have gotten used to being by myself. although i have had relationships in that time, i still kept my own private space, and i like it that way. now i'm thinking, am i ready and willing to give up my space and time, and open up my heart to someone else? i don't open myself up very easily; i've always had problems doing so. i take a while to warm up to people, and i don't openly show that i care even when i do.

do i go all out and reach for my own personal goals, or do i take a step back and let myself enjoy life a little more with someone else? i can't be bothered with childish, trivial relationships with a person i don't see a future with, hence i don't and never have gone on casual dates. i hate clubs where proper conversation is impossible, and on the extremely rare occasion that i do go, i find myself with an amused scowl and thinking, "all these kids rubbing against each other - thank god i wasn't brought up like that."

maybe i do need to change my mindset. but then again, i was brought up with a very certain set of values that i do treasure, and i'm not sure i'm willing to give that up for anything. i'm not someone with a super high IQ, but i know i'm not dumb and i believe myself to be intelligent enough. i'm stubborn and when i want something i find it hard to listen to others, even if i know i should. i love to laugh and i love to make others laugh, and while my sense of humor may be rather sarcastic and crude sometimes and offensive to some, at least others think it's funny! i know what i want in life and i know i can make it happen for myself without having to depend on someone to lay it out in front of me.

maybe when i get older, i'll regret going about on my solo goals and leaving no space nor energy in my life to find that perfect someone. but then again, i don't wanna slow down or wait around for that person to appear.

people always say that "the one" is always right there when you least expect it. i look around myself and all i see are people that i do love and have built great friendships with, but no, "the one" isn't there. maybe i am being really picky, i'm not sure. what i do know is that i am looking for someone who shares a similar sense of humor, and needs his own space and gives me my own to breathe, and who is really smart and intelligent, someone i can respect and learn from. i don't think i can spend time together with someone who makes me think he isn't all that smart, which is a mean thing to say but hey, at least i'm being honest.

so although i'm in a holiday mood now, in just 2 weeks, i would be back in school and busy with my life. a friend once said that one shouldn't be too satisfied and happy with his single life, or he'd never go out there and find a partner. my reply was that i can't be bothered to go out there and "look" for someone, and yes it's too much work and i don't have the time for all that. to which he said, "well you don't wanna grow old alone, do you?"

i couldn't reply.

maybe i'm not giving myself, nor love, a chance. i've grown up with a whole lot of stubbornness, self-pride, and perhaps a little too much independence. if you knew me personally, i'm really a huge tom-boy and i think i have more guy-is traits than some guys themselves - so much so that when i see some women who just pretend to be helpless when they really aren't, i absolutely scorn and detest them for whining their way through things.

ah well. the new year has begun and i have all sorts of plans for myself. i'm enjoying life now, although i have to admit that it gets lonely from time to time. hopefully, i would be on my way to greener pastures by the end of 2008. hopefully, i would be one more step to achieving my ambitions in life. hopefully, as i hit 25, the only lines i would get on my face are those from laughing too hard.

i am optimistic for the future. i know i will become the person i want to be. hopefully, there will be someone to share it with, somewhere out there. beneath the pale moon light. someone's thinking of me, and loving me tonight. somewhere out there, if love can see us through, then we'll be together somewhere out there, out where dreams come true.

and all that kind of mushy, positive stuff. heh heh.

"if you do things well, do them better. be daring, be first, be different, be just."

by the late anita roddick, the body shop founder, who passed away at 64 from a brain haemorrhage in september 2007. it's a really beautiful thing she said, and something we can definitely live by in 2008 and beyond.