Wandering Feet

I headed out around 1pm today. Didnt feel like eating at home, though I have been eating out for the past few days, I wanna eat something else. Hence headed out, went to hawker centre next door and ate Mee Siam with Coke Zero.

After that, headed to Driving School for Basic Theory Evaluation. FYI, must pass the evaluation before can take the actual test. From the Bukit Gombak MRT, I walked 900m to arrive there just before 2pm. The reason why I walk instead of taking the free shuttle bus provided by the school, is that I wanna exercise, hence I have been walking to and fro everytime I head there.

From the time I sat on the bus, even until I reached the school, I was listening to the radio on my Walkman phone. Guess nowadays I cant stand having no music to drown out the noises of daily life. Sometimes the music can help my wandering mind drown out the thoughts, others at times, it helps focus the thoughts or lead to thoughts.

I read through a bit of the Basic book, then started reading the Advanced book. Later around 3pm, went in to do the Evaluation test. Its 70 questions taken from the system, the practice session consisted of 4 booklets, about 265 questions to try. So they randomly take 70. I read carefully and did quickly. Passed 68 out of 70, so now left doing the actual test on 8th Oct, Thursday. That was the earliest slot I could get.

Then walked back to the MRT station to head for a swim. I was undecided whether to go get train tix to Segamat first or swim first but decided to swim first cos I didnt want to become lazy. I actually went into the swimming complex already and then saw a huge bunch of kids having their lessons, 3 groups in the medium pool and even half the deep pool was taken. Alright, no swim instead, went for a shower. After showering, I dried up and headed to buy train tix. Kinda felt hungry a bit, so ate Sesame Sauce chicken with rice and Sugar cane drink. Hopped on the mrt towards Tanjong Pagar.

At TP, got out and walked towards the Tanjong Pagar Railway Station. It was a long walk, think I under-estimated the distance from International Plaza to there. I had taken some bus before and it felt not that far away. Hmm.... must remember sitting on bus is not the same as walking. K walked, looked around and finally arrived there after 20mins+ of walking, around there cos I didnt look at any time. I bought a ticket for this Thursday 2pm. I also enquired about the train tix to CitySquare, they depart daily 7am, 2pm, 6pm and it costs SGD$3, good to know in case I need to head over. At least can avoid the jam over and also the Curvy Malaysian Immigration.

After that, I was contemplating whether to go home or walk around. Sent out sms to ask if anyone was heading out but no reply. So I walked towards the Tanjong Pagar area, the shophouses and pub area to explore. It was around 5.30pm by then and people were knocking off from work. There were throngs of people and I somewhat followed a bit and continued walking around. Ended up at the NTUC near TP, bought some drinks and a bar of dark chocolate. I kinda needed to munch a bit to fill up the tank after all the walking. Continued, though at the shophouses area, there were a few ways to walk, I just chose one way and walked until I reached another point that branches out, chose and continued walking.

Walked and saw quite a variety of shops/pubs/food places. Some areas I have passed by many times via bus but not actually walked. Dunno how, ended up at China town area, went towards the Maxwell Food Centre. I contemplated eating but after the dark chocolate, my appetite kinda spoilt. Remembered a time long ago, when the whole bunch of us headed there to eat. I remembered eating Samba Stingray and some other stuff or porridge. Then continued onwards, finding some Arty-Farty shops selling Atas-looking stuff, continued on. Reached the back of the Chinatown area, stopped at M11@Chinatown Square, and looked around a bit. Basically its a building with coffeeshop, HK food, Pasta@sakae, Mos burger. Walked around a bit and reached Chinatown Square, where I bought a Ice Teh Halia from Mr Teh Tarik which I remembered from previous temping days to sell very worth-value drinks. A huge cup cost only $1.60 and continued walking around. Passed by a whole bunch of eating places over there and somehow reached the back of ChinaTown Point. Where I decided I had walked about enough. The skies had darkened much already. I walked passed Hong Lim Garden with a whole bunch of ladies doing some-sort of towel exercise. Hopped on my bus and sat and stoned on the way home.

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Lots of thoughts did pass my mind today.

Starting with 'What am I doing?' when I first headed out towards the driving school. Thoughts about what exactly am I doing with my life? How its kinda meaningless, repeatitive, dull, boring... and also what are my plans about the next job and stuff. Guess this no-income stability thingy is somewhat bothering me. I had to remind myself that there are many who are less fortunate, handicapped, living lives which were worst off financially, mentally, physically. I am lucky to be able to move around independently, have money in bank account for expenses and not worried about a place to stay. Reminded myself have to count my blessings for that. Yet on the other hand, what I feel about this is that it is not the material needs that is bothering me, is another, maybe emotional, spiritual? Dunno.

Everyone around, cos they seem to appear to know where they are heading to, seems contented with life, seems to know where to head to, what to do. At least it 'seems' so to me. Yet when I was in the 'race', I still didnt know where I was heading. I wasnt contented to just blindly continue on.

Yet I asked myself IF being too forward looking meant missing out on things currently. I also have no idea of where I am heading to. I am not sure if I am of any VALUE-ADD to any other jobs, also the skills that I have are mostly generic skills. I dont see anything special or high-value adding. This part has me a bit worried. Cos being an Educator, the job experience is still related to Education yet not specialized enough to go higher up or what. So some worries and self doubts passed through my head in the form of questions that I dont have ready answers for.

While I was eating, after the shower, I answered my own doubts, things WILL work out somehow. Its just that simple fact that LIFE has to go on, the WORLD continues turning and its just whether you will be happy with how things turn out later on. No point having worries.

Then after I got the train tix and explored TP area, thoughts turned instead to Nostalgia. As I walked through, I remembered some time back, exploring with Tab, then remb a bit of temping days when I came upon the familiar eating places in some of the shophouses. It became a sort of trip down memory lane with exploration. Came upon new stuff too.

When I got on the bus heading home, my thoughts somewhat calmed down, think a whole day of thinking, processing and reminscing is enough. Thoughts just shut down as I listened to the radio and stoned.