I loved writing before I enjoyed reading.
It took me two years and a few cases of having nobody to play with during recess and lunchtime that I was able to read pictureless novels. Before a group of boys welcomed me into their group, a pile of books was readily made next to me, waiting to keep me company for the next hour on a mint concrete floor inside the toilet stalls. Back then, I heavily relied on reading books that had images to consider the book a worthwhile read (and to have a general idea of how the novel was progressing). I guess it was because the ten year old me was still coming to grips with understanding English as I was still heavily reliant on communicating in Cantonese. This constant translating back and forth between two languages as I read a novel was taxing, moreover made it difficult for me to set up the scenes the author has crafted through text.
Read MoreThere's a fine line between morals and doing it for your own sake. Every now and then we would be presented with some kind of catch twenty two situation that could eventually haunt us a lifetime.
It's quite a morbid situation to consider really.
Last year on a trip to Venice, we spent two days at the Venice Biennale to understand the types of issues (the exhibition was titled 'Reporting from the Front') that have been raised in the past years. Issues ranged from underpayment, exploitation to poverty and social housing.
And then there was the past.
Read MoreI sat back in a daze when our lecturer for art history explained to the crowd of half awake students that women were subjects of the gaze, the muses and the inspiration for a lot of the artists and architects that are well known today. To simply put, we were the embodiment of a walking entertainment.
Read MoreAh languages. I always have fun teasing my friends and my father in particular when I start combining Cantonese, Mandarin, Japanese and English in a conversation (this happens too when I become stressed or alone). It becomes more entertaining for me when to my dismay, I unconsciously start talking about the buildings surrounding me, which to some of my family and friends, I am speaking another foreign language to them again.
Read More“So what made you decide to study architecture?”
A lot of my friends and strangers I meet seem to dread this question whenever I have nothing else to ask despite wanting to carry on a topic of discussion. In fact it surprises me when they answer me with widened eyes and a gaping mouth while their brains start to panic and search for what deemed to be a reasonable response. “That’s quite a hard question…”, would be the first thing they would say and also an innuendo for asking me to spare them from scrutiny, however, to their dismay I was not going to let them go.
Read MoreI picked architecture on a whim when I was forced to make a decision during my second last years in high school. I never knew who Hadid, Foster or even Gehry were before I stepped foot into the world of architecture - rather I went in with a mindset that I was going to create structures and shelters that would allow me to look after people indirectly with my creativity. This ignorant thinking was carried along with me throughout the first semester of my first year of university, and soon it developed into having a desire of wanting to know more ways in shaping and making a difference to the community through architecture.
Read MoreIf I was facing the five year old me, I would watch her in amazement as she tries to explain to me what was happening amongst the strange arrangement of chairs and cushions, she would point her finger rapidly at the drawing that would make no sense to me while to her it was a map telling us how to navigate through this world full of lava…
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