Sengkang.

A new house, and soon to be a home. 

It's been almost a week since we shifted into our new house, and it's my, well 8th time shifting. Yet this time things feels a little different, perhaps because it's a new BTO, perhaps I have grown old enough to appreciate a new house, perhaps it marks many new beginnings, to many more experiences and memories. People love occasions like this don't we? New school term, new year, new house - all these symbolising a new phase in our life. I love these cliche moments; new stationaries for the new semester; new planner for the new year; constantly looking for something that kick off a fresh new start. 

To be frank I did not expect anymore of shifting around ever since we moved into Bedok 10 years back, despite moving numerous times from Amk to Bishan to Geylang Bahru to Boonkeng to Balestier since our arrival in Singapore, I always thought Bedok is where I would grow up in, and eventually moved out to have my very own flat. It was a tough journey, as we settled down longer, we have got more things with us. We came to Singapore with merely two luggages, and I couldn't even recall what we' packed into them back then, and right now look around us, we had so much more possessions, and we found ourself a home, not just a shelter. I remember my first night in Amk, sleeping alone for the first time while my mum was chatting with our landlord back then, I remember discovering the bed-full of used phone cards under our bed at Bishan, I remember the quarrels and fights my mum had with her then lover in Geylang Bahru, I remember the little storage room I stayed in at Boonkeng, I remembered the Balestier old mansion with wooden plank doors, and I remember stepping into our Bedok house for the first time during renovation and I was so excited, and unbelievable at the same time, that we are going to have our very own house. 

Everything has passed, and here I am, sinking in comfortably into my chair in a spacious 5 room flat. Life has improved so much for us since then hasn't it? For all I know, I could be alone in Singapore now in a rental room while my mum had to go back China when I passed 21. Well, I'm sure a fortunate one. :') I always have the habit of looking across the HDB flats, and get astonished at the number of households within a block, the plethora of different stories each household contains, amazing isn't it. Chinese has a saying; 一种米养百种人. We may grow up in the same environment but we grow up to be so different individuals. Our new flat is relatively, very new, and we are perhaps one of the first few household that has moved in. It's not very accessible for now as only one bus operates along the road, and I'm still trying to adjust to taking the NEL almost every other day, getting off from Sengkang and walk a distance to the bustop and wait for 85. Since secondary school times, I have been start hearing friends around me moving into Sk or Punggol, and now I have become one of them. But I have stayed in Bedok long enough to grow a special sense of place there, the familiar routes, the buses that passes my house, even the playgrounds that I have enjoyed lingering at. It never occur to me how convenient Bedok was until we moved here. Well, I will slowly adapt to the environment here too I guess, it all takes time.

Apart from limited accessibility, I'm very delighted at the location still, with a sports center just across a bridge, and a park connector just a block away, strictly speaking it's not very far from the center, just four bustop away, it was always the waiting that kills. This new house made me feel all ready to form a healthy active style, something I have always been trying to made myself into. Developing a healthy lifestyle, one that feels out of place if I did not exercise in any form, be it yoga jogging swimming or doing weights. Keke, honestly to be able to see the sports center just a river away from the house is the biggest bonus to me. 

The renovations are almost done for now, as a result of me stand by at home for almost the whole week to be the 'door opener' of the house. I would really love to boast the interior of the flat while it's new and once it's ready, very soon. I would really just like to have some light source in my room for it's absent as of now. And by then, all are welcomed to stay over in my big house hehehe. :D So contented with life right now though I was still a little emotional thinking back to the old times a while ago. But life ahead is great, some times while I sit in the house, I start to get a little worried at how perfect life now is and what if something bad happens to anyone in the house and tear us apart. Ohwell, let's not worry so much and live in the moment instead :)