The alternate gardening

This year during STM gardening time, I have decided not to do gardening.. Hahaha.. no- it's not that I've been exempted from or 'ponteng'(play truant) gardening. Earlier this year, my friend and 'big brother' Matthew Chay told me that he would be heading a small team(2-3 persons) who will be helping out with doing some minor maintainence in STM and asked me if I would like to help. I readily agreed as I figured that it would be more interesting than gardening - which usually consists of sweeping the ground, throwing dry leaves, cleaning the drain and cleaning the dining hall and common room and I was right. :)

This afternoon, Matt and I did some painting on the road - it was one of those painting the lines of the carpark. It was a fun experience (and definitely heaps better than gardening)! Of course there were some jibes about me being a girl and whether I'm capable of doing such stuff, that the paint was not yellow (hey - Mr Lee,our STM maintenance guy gave us the white paint ok?!?), that the lines I painted were crooked (:p it was pretty straight upon closer inspection by the accusers. *grin). Nevertheless it's was good fun!

Besides painting, we've done some woodwork (built a funky looking shoe shelf - a prototype which Mr Lee says that will be eventually be done for all the dorms, reconverted an old computer desk and last week we built some sort of netting), some electrical stuff (we replaced a ceiling fan and the control in two different rooms) and other odd jobs (checked out the wiring for a water heater, fixed a fuse in a cooler and got it working, and fixed a railing in one of the dorm rooms). I've really enjoyed working with Matt. Of course he's been quite a gentleman and do generally do the heavier stuff - but lets me have my turn as well. He reminds me of my other big bro in Australia -steady and dependable and good natured. :)

Anyways, it's been quite a learning experience for me - who knows, it might come in handy one day... Doing stuff like these have been infinitely more satisfying too - especially when one looks at the created stuff (like the bookshelf or the painted stuff).