CHANGE

Spent quite some time revamping this blog, but finally I have achieved the desired effect. Added songs, changed the background, and added a video of Utada.

Her voice is unique, and it entrances you whether she is singing a sad ballad or an upbeat number. After so many years, my favorite Utada song is still Wait and See, hence the video.

I realized it is nearly August. 7/12 of the year nearly gone, but it is ok, because I have been enjoying myself everyday, both the good days and the not so good ones.

This will be a new start for this blog, both the revamped layout and the direction of this blog, which might take some time to manifest itself.

Good things are worth waiting for, don't you think so?

『Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions.』
~Rainer Maria Rilke

Poetry ・ Destiny ・ Mystery

Poetry : I have not been writing poems recently - no inspiration, or simply no interest? No clear-cut answers. On a slightly different note, I am still trying to recall the contents/exact wording of my first poem, "Caged Bird". Maybe I can find my Sec 1 journal when I go back home. Somehow I feel that despite it being written over 10 years ago, this poem of mine is still relevant today.

Destiny : A friend asked me if I believe in Fate, which is another word for Destiny. We had an interesting conversation regarding this topic, although there was again no definite conclusion. An intriguing question was that if everything is fated, then do our decisions matter?

Mystery : The meaning of a name can be quite a mystery. If someone told you her name was Reina, you would probably nod and acknowledge it without a second thought, especially if you were Japanese. However, Reina in Spanish means Queen, so a Spanish would probably comment on that fact.

This time, I have found a quote for each of the themes in the title. Maybe what my namesake said is right; words can be insufficient at times.

『Poetry is an orphan of silence. The words never quite equal the experience behind them.』
~Charles Simic~

『Actions are the seed of fate; deeds grow into destiny.』
~Harry S Truman~

『The final mystery is oneself.』
~Oscar Wilde~

Iceman on Fire

He pushed her away. Not physically of course; he prided himself on being a gentleman. He pushed her away with subtle words, making her decide to leave him before he started to thaw, before he started to melt, the victim of his own success. Like the other girls, she was burnt by his flaming passion, and maybe she was hurt more than the rest, because she was special. After all, she had made him feel on fire. Something that had never happened before.

Nobody knew this, but he was an Iceman. Looks can be deceiving, of course. His exterior was nondescript, a lean but muscular young man with a boyish countenance. Nothing about him looked extraordinary, except that if you looked closely, if you dared to, that is, to look into his dark hazel penetrating eyes, you could see the slightest hint of an icy glint.

He was not very popular at school, because he seemed aloof. However, the few friends he had loved him because he was their friend, and they were his. To friends, he showed his interesting side, his gentle side, even his silly side, but never his vulnerable side. They all thought he was like a fortress, with no weak points. In a sense, he was a fortress, albeit a frozen one.

But his coolness was an advantage when it came to dating. Rarely did a girl he ask out turn him down. Of course, he would never ask the same girl out more than 3 times.
Date 1 : "Nice to meet you"
Date 2 : "I had a great time"
Date 3 : "See you again sometime"
He was becoming an expert at this; after all, he had been doing this all the time.
As they say, practice makes perfect.

J asked him one day, "W is getting married soon, A has gotten married, and I intend to in one or two years' time. How about you? "

He replied nonchalantly, "I am still single."

"But not available, are you?" J said perceptively.

"Who says I am not available? I go out on dates, don't I?" he retorted.

"Sure you do, but they all fizzle out, don't they? Come to think of it, you have not gone out with the same girl more than 3times" J pointed out.

"I guess they call it 3rd time (un)lucky. hahaha" he laughed.

"I'll ask S to talk sense into you when he's back." J said in a half-exasperated, half-joking manner.

S will understand how I feel, he thought to himself.

How I feel about her. Even now, she still appeared in his dreams sometimes. She was the first, and maybe the last who managed to enter that crimson chamber of his. Even he himself was amazed at the speed with which she broke through all his defences. His masks were ripped apart one by one, his walls torn down faster than you could say L-O-V-E.

He found himself falling in love, and that fortress of ice thawed at an alarming rate. He lost himself for a while, in the flames of passion. When he rediscovered himself again, he found that she was gone, leaving only a letter behind.

"I am sorry that I had to leave. The days we spent together were the happiest days of my life, but your fiery love was too much for me. I am just a young lady who is still unsure of what I really want, and I am not ready to reciprocate your affection the way you want me to. Maybe if I were more mature, or if you were more ... Never mind, I just want to say, thank you for the memories. You will always be someone special, someone who made me happy during that melancholy season called Autumn. Goodbye"

He reread the letter and folded it again, keeping it in his notebook that he carried with him all the time. Next to the letter was the photo of the two of them, in happier times. Since then, he had been to many places, done many things, met many people. However, whenever the leaves turned crimson, and the autumn wind started playing its melancholic melodies, he would feel something in that frozen crimson chamber, as though there was a fire inside.

But it would last for only an ephemeral eternity, because an Iceman can never be on fire, can he?

Style won...

The best team won, and it would be hard to refute that, since the German team could not cope with the speed, skill and style of the Spanish. It has been a while since attractive, attacking football garnered the prize it deserves, and you can say that it was worth the wait. The Spanish team that came to this Euro2008 proved their credentials over and over again. They won all their matches, and improved as the tournament progressed. In the group stages, they let in one goal per match, but they managed to plug the holes in the defence and kept 3 consecutive clean sheets in the quarter-final, semi-final and final, against Italy, Russia and Germany respectively.

The entire team played well, and it is hard to single out a single player as the Man of the tournament, although Casillas, Torres, Senna, Villa, Fabregas, Xavi, Xavi Alonso, and Iniesta all come close. For me, I think the real Man of the Tournament is Aragones. His tactics and ability to make the players gel was the key for this victory. Being able to substitute Torres and keep Fabregas on the bench, being able to bring a previously uncapped player (Cazorla), and being able to take off both Fabregas and Torres in the final, all of these showed his belief in his team, and his faith in the might of the Spanish Armada. Of course, it helped that the players themselves were all winners at youth level, and perhaps what they said was true : they had that winning mentality that all champions have.

This team is still young, so hopefully we can see them adding the World Cup to this trophy. Till 2010, adios!

『The first and most important step toward success is the feeling that we can succeed.』
~Nelson Boswell

Winning Eleven & Super Seven

Here is UEFA's squad of the tournament:
Goalkeepers: Buffon (Italy), Casillas (Spain), van der Sar (Holland).
Defenders: Bosingwa (Portugal), Lahm (Germany), Marchena (Spain), Pepe (Portugal), Puyol (Spain), Zhirkov (Russia).
Midfielders: Hamit Altintop (Turkey), Modric (Croatia), Senna (Spain), Xavi (Spain), Zyryanov (Russia), Ballack (Germany), Fabregas (Spain), Iniesta (Spain), Podolski (Germany), Sneijder (Holland).
Striker: Arshavin (Russia), Pavlyuchenko (Russia), Torres (Spain), Villa (Spain).

For me, my winning formation is the 4-1-3-2, with the starting eleven and seven super subs as follows:
Goalkeeper:Iker Casillas (GK)Spain
Defender :Yuri Zhirkov (LB)Russia
Defender :Carlos Marchena (CB)Spain
Defender :Hamit Altintop (CB)Turkey
Defender :Sergio Ramos (RB)Spain
Midfielder :Marcos Senna (DM)Spain
Midfielder :Andres Iniesta (W/CM)Spain
Midfielder :Xavi Hernandez (CM)Spain
Midfielder :Wesley Sneijder (AM/W/PM)Holland
Forward :David Villa (S)Spain
Forward :Fernando Torres (S) Spain
Super Substitute:Andrei Arshavin (AM/PM)Russia
Super Substitute:Cesc Fabregas(AM/CM/PM)Spain
Super Substitute:Robin van Persie (W/S)Holland
Super Substitute:Xavi Alonso (DM/CM)Spain
Super Substitute:Semih Senturk (S)Turkey
Super Substitute:Arjen Robben (W)Holland
Super Substitute:Luka Modric (CM/PM)Croatia

Of course, the formation can easily be changed to 4-2-3-1 or 4-1-3-1-1, or even 4-1-4-1, depending on the players used. The abbreviations are as follows:
GK:GoalKeeper
LB:Left Back
CB:Centre Back
RB:Right Back
DM:Defensive Midfielder
CM:Central Midfielder
PM:PlayMaker
AM:Attacking Midfielder
W:Winger
S:Striker