D05 midweek

today was a productive day, sent a copy of the tender drawings of the park to the client.
quite a few things to coordinate. a strange state as in, sometimes the thing that actually gets built, is the attention to detail at the last stage. not so much the first pump of effort to get it right.
guess this is the difference in an overall mindset as well. no point, or yes point to get so upset/ wound up about something as sometimes it doesn't matter. from the design to actual building stage.

as an architect, sometimes i wonder how daring we should be.
even in terms of lifestyle, like in Andos' famed house of making the client walk across 2 sides to feel the rain. here, for this house, it feels too safe. too cocoon. and then i think of Alex Honnald; when he said no one actually achieves anything by being too safe. too comfortable.

perhaps one of the quote each day is to do something to feel alive.
to remind oneselve of it.

D04_Ate a magnum icecream

had portugeuse class earlier
sent out the retender for BBNP
chatted with L on skype. glad to see L warm and getting alot of things done. though this video skype used up 2.4GB of the 9GB already

Listening to a john pawson interview now.
He talked about having to define the notion of simplicty for Phaidon in architecture.
One of the things, he mentioned was " repetition"
spaces that people feel good. somehow i need to read more.

going to brush up and sleep now!

D02_L in Tokyo

wanted to start a new blog but all the ones i proposed were already taken. so perhaps it is best to keep to this one.

L left on Friday night.

Saturday went by fast, as i went to Sim Lim in the morning to drop the printer. and bought a laptop. am pleasantly surprised by this model asus zenbook. when i was planning actually the dell xps 15. actually a key downside of the dell xps was the unflattering webcam which captured the users' upturn nose due to its low angle. in light that i will be having much skype calls. this was a key consideration.
went to the boutique fair in the afternoon. dinner with S at night. a ramen dinner at uma uma. the aircon wasn't cold enough. in fact it felt a little stuffy. read the atmospheres titled book by peter zumthor. went away feeling inspired about materials, and the visual weight of things. he talked about 9 key aspects. materials, temperature, sound and others. chatted w L on skype

Sunday
didn't sleep last night though i lay in bed. googled a little about the breed of small dogs and cats for apartments. the chihuahua as too small temper a dog, dashund is that how you spell, as a serious barker due to their heritage as being bred to hunt badgers. woke up all pumped to clean the house. bought planta butter with the bread and miso soup. started cleaning at 9.30-11am. faster this time. 1.5hours including the wet areas. arrived at 1130 to change the bedsheets. had lunch with the Family. and then back here. all relaxed that the house is cleaned.took an hour nap then surfed the net the whole way about minamalism. have 2 new key designers that i ll be following more closely from now. Magdalena Keck and John Pawson.  i need to put together some schedule that i will keep to. lemme attempt here

Leave work: 6.30pm
Arrive Home: 7.30
Relax: 8.00
Exercise: 8.30
Dinner: finish by 9.00
Shower: 9.30
Revise Portugeuse: 10.00
Color/ Material Palette: 1030
Read an architecture book: 1100
Wind down: 1130

14 Jan 2018

Today is a good day. Woke up earlier, at about 8. L woke up with cramps and fell asleep at the sofa outside. Lunch started the day at Garibaldi, with an impressive ala-carte buffet. It never fails to impress, italian style. Had 2 rounds of oysters, there was burrata as well, poached prawns, pasta of fusili with alio olio tossed with bacon and brocollini. very delicious. lunch was booked at 12 with S too, last pour was 2.30, by the time we took the taxi was 3. Went straight to zhongshan, did grocery shopping, and before we knew it,it was 5pm. i managed to squeese in a quick shut-eye before heading out at 6.30pm for the presentation on BB at orchard parade hotel. It was actually another committees NY dinner, but they had arranged for us to present. it was set for 15 persons, and there was a member of parliement there who gave a long speech. Even Tay Kheng Soon turned up, which was unusual, but by the time we got to presenting it was quite late that everyone was kinda hungry. so i couldnt tell if they had any thoughts actually. it was great however, to be part of something so current. In the evening, still full from lunch, i had my second miso-soup and we watched "LadyBird". About adolescence and struggling with parental love. Eventful day.

10-Jan-18 Family can mean what you want it to mean

woke up earlier today at 6am. had a quick cereal and took the bus. nice for a change to see the evening sky all dark, and only the blue light up halfway when i was on the bus. actually traffic in the morning is also quite pack. arrived at office at 7.30am. 1.5 hour to work on the minutes for last thurs meeting. only finished typing it by 9, had no idea why i took so long. went through with S, made the changes, and by the time i sent it out it was 11am. one of the things i left out was the meeting to schedule with the LEW with TC. License electrical worker. An interesting point was that when the roof is thicker, lightning strip may not be needed. worked a little on the hill park sequence of slides. changed the layout of the page to have a more fixed template. wanted to eat a quick lunch so as to have more time to work on the slides, but ended up somehow going w the colleagues to the newly opened hawker stall. One of the new upgrades they did was to charge an extra dollar for a tray, and then spit it back out when you return it. i had a fishball noodle soup that was good. progress on the slides were good, and by the time i went through the entire set with S, it was with good time then i made the changes by 6pm too. Now mood imagery and text is needed with people in the perspectives.
maybe it would be good to consider going earlier tomorrow as well? Lets see. Today was also oyster night, i wanted to treat, and ended up paying only for 1 tray. The total french oyster promotion was over, but now they had a mix. so we tried the french and canadian one. the french one won. queried S on the potential of working on a house project, and he explained patiently the considerations. whether it was self-stay, budget, etc.

09-Jan-18

Today woke up at 7.15am. Got to office at 9.15, will need to make the alarm at 7am. today was a little rush in the morning to arrange the sequence of the slides, and so just after it was done. A whatsapp msg came in to S to say that the client will be sending us a re-arranged set of slides. It does take some patience to extract only the good. It is best to let the designers work on presenting the slides.n that in the evening as i was the last to leave the office, i realise i forgot the key. so it was a bad rush to msg everyone to ask if they were near, and later arrange to meet T to get the key, but S called back. so i could come home. ate some noodles near home. watching winter paralympics now. very inspiring.

08-Jan-18

woke up at 6.30am, with partially my cough and partially the alarm. arrived at office at 9am. was a quick day as i had to put together the solution for the community garden which was to be very accessible but not too visible, as on the occasion that it needs to be fence up, it can be quite a massive structure. So a linear garden was proposed. i was inspired by the gardens in Rio, particularly the botanical garden there. somehow, so simple, yet so pleasureful. the S and S were rushing a thick set of tender out in the morning as well, so upon their multi-tasking and me presenting, we went ahead with the 4pm work-in progress showcase that went overall well. Just some re-organising of the content, and 2 more specific section cuts along the elevated boardwalk and widen footpath. A lesson i took away today was that "the best solution is not always the right answer to the question", in that what matters is the "best solution for the moment"- that point in time, also perhaps the clients concern. coughed all the way in the car to J-C. a flower boiled with black sugar was recommended, this i bought but will probably boil tomorrow at work. for now, i need to finish a jug of honey lemon water, dinner was a delicious broth of broccoli and cauliflower, Brazilian frozen beef, egg and tomato soup. yum yum very delicious! I quite like the geometry of how the overall plan is turning out. sometimes i think what i m doing is so simple, no proper m&e to be concerned of, no circulation, yet the answers sometimes takes longer to come.