Count Down to 2007

Being an early sleeper, I hardly stay awake at the stroke of 12 for counting down to the new year for the past 26 years.

When Dear asked me to join some of our JC mates for counting down, my first concern was whether I could stay awake till then. Moreover, I have not seen some of them for ages, I was also worried that there would be many awkward moments when we run out of things to say to each other. With Dear’s strong assurances and reassurances that it would be a fun evening, I have decided to attend as it was rare that so many of us could make it that night.

We gathered at Lik’s house mid afternoon. From the afternoon to counting down, we were supposed to be engaged in board games. If you think of board games in terms of monopoly, scrabble or Uno, you will be appalled by the narrow range of games you have been exposed to so far. All the games that I have played (mostly touted to be rather brainless, but still proved to be complex to me) were previously unheard of. Although one game might not take long to complete, we often spent more time understanding the instructions and even asking questions along the game. After all, the fastest way to understand the game is to play the game itself.

Among the 3 games which I have played, I liked the Chess Game (I wonder if I have gotten the name correct) best. Chess Game is not a game about chess. It is a card game about slackers. At the start of each game, everyone was supposed to pick an occupation which would determine the number of slack activities you could engage in and the income you have to engage in such activities. Each occupation would also have a designated number of slack points to fulfill. Whoever gained the required number of slack points first would win. In addition, there were some sabotage cards for another player to sabotage the player who was on a winning streak, such as getting the potential winner to lose their jobs or to lose their slack points.

Needless to say, for someone who has not engaged in such intellectually stimulating activities (outside of accounting related) for a long time, I was forever on the losing end. Moreover, my opponents were all having higher IQ than me (I was not exactly one of the smartest in class previously). Fortunately, they were all patient and encouraging with my “anyhow” playing which were often based on guts feel rather than strategies.

We have also decided to emulate the practices of different cultures in their new year celebration, such as the Spanish’s eating 12 grapes or the Japanese eating mochi ice cream at the stroke of 12. We have decided that it would be rather difficult to do both at the same time. Eventually, we have decided to just eat the mochi ice cream and ditch the grapes instead at 12 midnight.

Then we proceeded to the rooftop garden at the neighbouring multi-storey carpark building to light our sparklers and create our own fireworks. We nearly went crazy trying to throw the sparklers into the air to create our own “fireworks in the sky”. Champagnes was popped and we toasted to the new year. I just did the toasting and passed the drinking part to Dear’s boyfriend since I was allergic to alcohol.

Welcome, 2007. Goodbye, 2006.



P.S. I have not been sleeping so ‘early’ for a long time that for the whole of 1 Jan 2007, I felt like I have not woken up despite downing 1.5 cups of coffee. :-(