Watching some of the new SLs leading the different tribes and meeting some juniors from cchy at RED Camp this year certainly brings back a lot of memories from the time when I was still actively participating in these camps and NP's outreach activities as an Ambassador/SL. A lot has changed since the last time I was part of the community, and sometimes I wonder if I should have stopped all of it in the first place.

But then again, at that point in time during the first two years in NP, I placed other matters and people in my life as my priorities instead of all these extra-curricular commitments.

The low-res iPhone5 photos makes their comeback today cause I haven't been taking anything pleasing with my DSLR lately.

On Saturday, zee and her jc friends planned a staycation for lixuan's birthday at Siloso Beach Resort, which Zhiyi and I were invited to! It's been a while since the last staycation and I was so stoked to see two of my bffs and meet the rest of zee/xuan's jc crew. I brought my instax with me this time to take new polaroids hue hue.

I guess one could the sum the night up with games, alcohol and people in their drunken stupor HAHAHA. Despite the amount of drinks I had, I was still somehow totally sober aside from the short-lived high from the continuous shots of jager. Maybe I have built some sort of tolerance lately...




Initially I thought that it was gonna be kind of awkward since I only knew ziman, zhiyi, lixuan and *cough* justin/joseph but the night turned out kind of unexpected??

There were some of us that were still sober (total count: 4 + 3 who went macs), so we played card games from 3ish am all the way till the it was bright out. That was about 5 hours of daidee/bridge... With the dudes whose names I don't even remember till we started playing cards LOL. But omg the game of bridge was damn intense I like HAHAHA.
I guess I do enjoy meeting new people through these social events after all. :)


So I didn't sleep the whole night and crashed at about noon when I was home. I woke up around the evening to head to my grandma's place, and then back home for a few rounds of dota before crashing. That pretty much sums up my weekend.

It's intern now and I'm so burnt out. I need to catch more sleep lol.

There was a time about two years ago where I was totally obsessed with polaroids. I can still remember spending a bulk of my money on instaxs, 600 polaroids (for Zhiyi's camera) and film rolls, which I'm still using but haven't gone around to developing them in forever.

Looking back at some of the polaroids taken back then with the Instax mini I got as a gift for my 17th birthday, it brought back waves of melancholy.

These memories, no matter how happy, are merely just frames frozen in time.

"怎麼我和你之間, 兩個世界再也沒有交接?
如果告別, 我们能不能再見?"


Maybe it's time to take out that dusty instax to capture new memories.

It's almost two weeks since I last updated this space, and I never really meant to leave it this way but I haven't been doing anything productive lately. I'm trying to recall what I did the week before but I don't even remember... I'm just barely living, really.

Weekends have really become so precious now that internship occupies all of my weekdays. With the best friends in their respective internships, unis and NS vocations, friday nights and weekends are pretty much the only time we could spare. And it's kind of upsetting sometimes how girlfriends would give your time up with them for their other half, even though they might meet every other day. Sigh okay it's just depressing lonely talk LOL but that's practically what you get pretty often when all your friends are attached. But all is well I still have work and dota :'-)


Anyway, I've been tasked a relatively big design project for intern and I'm feeling the excitement and anxiety altogether. I really want to take up this opportunity that will certainly bump up my portfolio, but I'm not sure if I'm up for the task. Ugh... And on a side note, I've been coming across some really inspiring people with impressive online portfolios, and that kind of spurred me to finally move my lazy hands to start on one for myself. It's currently in the works but I can't wait to share it once it goes live!!

That's pretty much it for my mundane intern life. I haven't been out shooting at all and I've been itching to do so but plans just keep canceling on me lol. Oh but I did attend RHW's Halloween event (Back to scare) on Friday after doing saikang preparations for it the whole afternoon, and I did put on some makeup for it!
Then Saturday was watching 我的少女時代 (Our Times) with zee and the show was really good everyone should watch it!! I'm always a sucker for stories about memories in high school because of the nostalgia and melancholy that comes along with it. It's kinda gay but we teared up a bit.


That's all the updates I have. Till next time when I actually have some decent photos to post.

The New Zealand posts wound up taking over a month to blog after all... I blame it on my really busy schedule. It's been internship on weekdays and lunch/dinner/late night dates catching up with pals.

So for the remaining of my trip, I spent my time in the most populated areas in NZ's South Island - Queenstown and Christchurch. So that means less of the nature walks and trekking to mountains summits. While I was at Queenstown, I spent most of my time just wondering around town, trying new food and visiting some cafes with my dorm mates and visiting the Loco Bar just right beside the hostel (Base Backpackers) that I was staying at.










The highly raved FergBurger!! The burger was about the size of my face? I got it ala carte and the portion was more than enough to fill me for a day. But I really enjoyed it!!

Undoubtedly, my spendings while at Queenstown was much higher than anywhere else. But I really had a lot of fun, especially with the nightlife that Queenstown is so popular for. I got to meet some different groups of people to hang out with every day, and one of which I went club crawling with! They were a really nice group of Germans/Italians who have been in NZ with their working holiday VISA for a while now, and they basically introduced me to the nightlife there.

Everyday's really refreshing, and I never know what to expect. Meeting people from all walks of life and hearing their life stories is something I don't think I'd ever get enough of. Like in the pictures below, I met this piano busker who was so talented in his trade I had to buy a disk.
Talking about all of this makes me so excited for grad trip!! Just another five more months of internship to go...





Halfway through my stay in NZ though, I lost my debit card. I'm not sure if it's stolen or if I dropped it somewhere but I highly doubt it's the latter because how could I have?? Just the night before, I spent all the cash I had on hand (which was about $60NZ for the day) thinking that I could just withdraw more the next morning. Little did I expect my debit card to disappear so I was basically cashless... Wtf.

I was worried nuts thinking about what the hell am I supposed to do because I still had four more days in NZ and I couldn't possibly starve for three days? I contemplated begging LOL but okay lucky me had better ideas to get myself out of my sorry state.

I managed to find a Singaporean family while I walked around town (I found them based on their accent actually LOL) and I explained my plight to them. Thankfully, though skeptical at first (who wouldn't be), they were really kind souls who in the end loaned me some cash while a friend of mine back in sg transferred the balance that I borrowed.
The problem with borrowing from dorm mates/friends I just met was that they all use different banks, which was kind of hard to get around. Lady luck was really on my side, since they were the first Singaporean family I chanced upon and I honestly can't be more grateful for their help!!






With the Queenstown drama is settled, I spent my last night before departing for Christchurch at 7AM the next morning. How I actually managed to drag myself out of bed then (it would have been 3AM sg time) when no I can't even wake up at 9AM is a miracle I cannot comprehend.

They're actually an eight hours drive apart so though so I spent one of the days just on traveling. My last two days were at Christchurch, which is basically one of the cities in South Island. However, it's mostly renovations all over after the major earthquakes four and five years ago.

Similarly with Queesntown, it's a lot of wandering around town, visiting cafes and some random malls adorned with painted murals and street graffiti. I wanted to take a day trip to Akaroa, but due to money limitations, I didn't):

There goes my farm experience sigh I thought I would get to sheer sheeps or play with llamas this trip... But that's fine I'll do it on my next one!!









And that's the end of my NZ trip! I will be coming up with the last post, summarising my expenditures and information on food, accommodation, transport etc that would probably be more helpful/essential to trip planning. I apologise for my draggy six-part-long rant hahah.

I've been receiving some emails/messages from friends and strangers alike, and I'm really glad to be of help!! Having been in the situation where I was pretty clueless about my budget and what it's like to backpack solo especially as a female, it's heartwarming to know that I'm able to help others with the trip planning, even if just a little.

Anyways, I'll be happy to answer any questions if you've them! Just drop me an email (mirabelle.koh@gmail.com) or message on fb and I'll get back to you soonest. Just like how some other travel bloggers have offered their tips and advice to me, it feels like I'm giving back to the community as well :)

Goodluck to those planning on their solo trips or New Zealand itinerary!!

Check out my other posts on New Zealand:

▶ Backpacking New Zealand (Part 1) - Why I backpacked solo
▶ Backpacking New Zealand (Part 2) - Tekapo
▶ Backpacking New Zealand (Part 3) - Mountain Cook
▶ Backpacking New Zealand (Part 4) - Cromwell & Makaroa
▶ Backpacking New Zealand (Part 5) - Wanaka
▶ Backpacking New Zealand (part 6) - Queenstown & Christchurch