Saturday, August 27, 2016
Day 191:
I had a pretty shitty week this week. Pretty dissatisfied with my life at the moment, everything hasn't been going quite like the way I wanted it to. My mind's elsewhere, not very content, unmotivated. Feeling plateaued. That would be the best way to explain it.
So I had this brilliant idea to practice driving by using Hatta's car to do Deliveroo orders with. Brilliant idea, sure. But it ruined pretty much my entire week knowing that I dented his front bumper just merely reversing out of the house. That little mistake set me back $667.50, an amount to me which is ridiculously expensive, never will I have ever thought of being able to pay that much.
Australian labour fees are just ridiculous and it shatters my heart to see that much money going down the drain. All the hard work and hours burnt for nothing. Life is definitely hard.
I recently had to buy a DIY sensor cleaning kit for $65 (which is merely just a stick with a cloth and some liquid to clean the sensor with. I ended up buying that as do send your camera for cleaning will cost you over a $100+ and that's like normal price here.
My bike has also gone through a rough patch after all the mileage and riding, the back wheel is quite out of shape due to shitty spokes and repairing them might cost even more than the amount I spent on it. Just not sure what should I do now, buy a better, much more expensive bike for the remaining 6 months here? Or just repair it and stick to shitty bike to save money.
Yup, of course, depressed in life all because of money issues. I remembered that I still need to pay the fine for the tram incident, which was initially just $70 but even that I was so unwilling to pay. Now it seems like I might have to pay about $400. Wonder if you guys know how heart-wrenching is it for me to come to terms that I have to pay $667.50 for the car repair.
Honestly though, I have very little aptitude for cars or anything that has wheels for that matter. Having all the minor accidents/near misses while scootering during my travels were pretty annoying to have. Fixing my pennyboard and bringing it all the way to Melbourne only to have it fucked a couple of times in the first few weeks I've been there. And then right now, first kind of accident that I had while driving (which already costed me such a high price... Life surely has something against me) due to the harsh truth that I just lack the basic awareness and control while being inside the car. Family's coming in two weeks and I'm not sure how ready I am to drive them around - will have to man the fuck up and practice a bit more in this few weeks, get better, hopefully I'll get the hang of it soon enough.
It's shameful, 100%, for me to admit these facts because surely everyone will judge me for this, but how I feel about myself right now. Lousy, incompetent, inept. I knew very little about stuff and glad to have learn a little whilst living and starting a new life abroad, but to be honest I have always been a slow learner for the most parts, and have to dedicate hard into something to get somewhere with it, and then again, I don't quite fully excel in them either.
Training wise, it's not any better.
I think I am currently at the worst form in the longest time. I thought I would at least have progressed a bit in the weightroom but I could only squat 125kg for 3 reps instead of the 5 reps I was able to pull off earlier this year. Which is weird as I thought I have been hitting the gym pretty regularly.
Jumps currently are at an all-time low, feeling heavy in my run ups and never felt like I could commit into stuff like I used to. And in a simple training day I hurt myself twice in both knees, never felt so shitty about a Saturday training session in so long. Not a single accomplishment. Kong pres scare me so much now. Haven't had a proper training session that I was proud of in ages.
Also had a tricking session in the backyard oval this week. Backfulls are turning into shit. Definitely needa start drilling hard and getting back into form. I wanna go hard in Brisbane and eventually in Melbourne before heading into next year in full form. I just haven't had the time to fully commit to training. Busy weeks ahead is definitely not helping.
I've set a challenge up for myself starting from the month of September, but I think I'll start tomorrow. No more blazing, no unhealthy/unnecessary eating, no fap. Sinless September. For a month, restart my body on a clean slate. Start being productive and disciplined especially in this very important month of September. Start training harder to shred the extra weight I've gained in the past months and get my jump power/squat strength back on track. Gotta reset my mindset to be more positive. Hopefully this can be the change I need. Definitely will need to stay motivated to this goal and will try to update this blog regularly about the progress. I'm not known to stick to goals like this very well, but I'm pretty serious this time. I shall not falter.
Had only 2 days of shoot this week, which were both my first Melbourne set experience and it sure has some resemblance to shoots in Singapore. To be honest, I'm pretty nervous of how my shoot will turn out to be (it's happening this weekend), and I hope I won't be disappointed and have to film yet another subpar final year film for school. Up till now, I've never really produced anything I really am proud of, and after being exposed to film/movies/cinematography for so many years, I don't think I'm that great of a filmmaker yet. Tons to improve on, still lack experience in gaffing/lighting, but at least I'll be exposing myself more to all this in this coming month. Really want to bring it back to Singapore.
The rest of the week was spent working and cycling a lot, which in turn made me earn quite a bit of money despite juggling school in between. It sucks to miss out on two shoots but the honest truth is that I need that $160 worth of money for those two full work days that I can't quite give up just to attend to shoot, but I will have my fair share of time spent on the working on that project during the post-production phase. This week though I definitely have to give more shifts out as I'll be the DoP for the shoot. It's the more important one.
I have to say, UberEats in my area have expanded and I am now getting much more orders whilst working in my Deliveroo shifts. That ramped up my earnings by a fair bit now to be honest - Earning $145 in 5 hours is definitely something new which is a good thing, will be keen to see how much I can earn during the holidays if I were to just work all week and maybe hit $1k/week. I also hit my first 20 orders in UberEats which I got the $200 bonus. It's definitely one thing positive amidst all the negativity I've been feeling recently - then again, I have to put aside so much money to pay up for my clumsiness. And fucking Australia's labour fees.
I am coming up with possible ideas of video I'll be making when I head back to Singapore. I have a lot of motivation as my brain's always thinking about movement-related stuff, however I can't quite translate it in Melbourne due to the lack of time and also the current form that I'm in. I hope things pick up and I get back into full form again - and stay motivated to complete the ideas I have in mind now when I actually get back home. So I guess I should pen down those video ideas:
1) I plan to start training everyday again hopefully. And I want to make a month's compilation of footage of something new or challenge I did each day - probably in a form of a run, but can throw in a different mix of movement for the 30 different shot for the 30 days in a month. What I'd like to do is to train at different spots, trying to seek out interesting/creative runs in random areas. Stoked for this for sure.
2) Revisiting my old video. I would like to replicate an old video of mine, movement by movement, the only difference is that I will only have one attempt for each move. So everything in that video will be my first attempt. This one will definitely be interesting to watch in terms of progress - also a challenge with the added pressure of doing it in my first try - which is 100% something I want to work on.
3) POV styled parkour in Singapore. Remember the shots of Samuel Gvdn at Clementi and Bishan? I think there's so much to explore as Singapore hasn't really have a well-shot POV video yet. Surely viral potential, surely something I want to think of and explore.
4) Roof Culture Singapore. Not sure about this. But finding carpark gaps, risky high elements stuff is something that I might have to work on. Ascents and descents as well. Will be interesting to bring this one up in SG.
5) That SG video that I want to make with Zack/Wx. Going to replan it thoroughly and go all out in this one.
6) AOM submission for sure. Probably keep some of the clips that I will be filming in the above ideas, saving the best for last.
7) Probably do short trips to Msia/Indonesia if possible, make a weekend trip video.
8) Jump Club. This is a short film idea Stan and I have for such a long time now, probably time to put it into work.
9) Art-styled Parkour video with cool transitions/video effects/composition/surrealist ideas. Basically making a parkour video different from the normal hardcore parkour showreely kind of stuff - but more of creative camera angles and unexpected twists with a lot more thought going into both filming and editing process.
10) Probably try to direct/shoot my first short film if I can come up with an awesome script idea - fully going all out with cinematography and style... May or may not be parkour-related. Want to include visual effects stuff in this. Probably work with Samuel on this.
I might get into the talking to camera vlog styled videos if I do get a kickstart in my Youtube creator career. That's why I'm always thinking of videos now. I think this will also motivate me to train a lot more, but that would also mean I have to be a lot more careful and get injured less frequently as it will affect what I want to do a lot.
I might also invest in a gimbal/steadicam or maybe even a drone at some point. Guess it's something I have to think of if I want to up my videomaking standards.
Other than that, I still have a couple of videos that needs to be done in Melbourne before heading back to SG... But before that, I have to get back into the sync of things. Hope when the end of October comes, when Sam Carter's back, and it's summer and when school is finally done, probably I will get my life back on track and do what I love doing again.