I was planning to do my Halloween blog today. But life plans always go awry, things never happen according to plan, wtf.

Life is too often a sad, cruel joke.

I’m posting this appeal, instead.

A friend of a leukemia patient is appealing for people to come forward to a Bone Marrow Donor Drive this Sunday.

I normally ignore such appeals because I’m afraid of pain and because I’m a cynical, cold-hearted, anti-life freak.

But this appeal comes from a friend.

It also comes to me at a time when I am re-evaluating myself, my life, my thoughts, my goals.

I have come to the conclusion that just because I’m anti-life, it doesn’t mean other people’s lives are not important to them.

I respect people’s wish to live and to live well. Shouldn’t I help if I can, no matter how small or insignificant that help may be?

So, I shall be going for the drive this Sunday. It’s only a little prick on the finger to test your blood for HLA type and to get on the database.

I hope to see you there.

Here’s the main thing you need to know:

Bone Marrow Donor Drive
Date: 5th November 2006 (Sunday)
Venue: Aramsa – The Garden Spa Function Room
Bishan Park II, 1382 Ang Mo Kio Ave 1
Time: 10am to 4pm

Background and details at Jaywalk’s blog.

Thank you for your kind attention.

Categories: Random Musings
6 Comments »

I will tell you why.

But, first, allow me to say a few words in my defence.

1. Stop hating my Cleopatra/Emily the Strange/China doll hairstyle. I can’t help my hair being this way.
2. Stop envying my naturally straight, silky, never-rebonded hair. Yes, it sounds like a shampoo ad dream but it’s really nothing but trouble.

Let me illustrate.

I was going for an audition the other day. It was for a young mother role, so I decided to gel my hair back in order to look older.

First, I tied it back in a low ponytail. Then, I brushed my Cleopatra fringe to the side with the help of hair wax. Once I’ve got it into satisfactory shape, I hairsprayed liberally all over to set it in place.

I was pleased that I was able to recreate my Kao Magiclean look.

All set, I left for my audition.

Walked to the MRT station and took the MRT to Chinatown where my audition was held.

When I reached Chinatown MRT station, I went to the ladies to freshen up and I saw that my hair had become thus:

Went for the audition, nevertheless.

Did the audition and went in search of another toilet to recover from post-audition nerves.

Alas, I saw that I was looking more and more dishevelled. Where did all the hair wax and hairspray go?

By now frustrated by my rubbish hair and also by the audition (I either get post-audition jitters or post-audition blues. This time, it was post-audition blues), I went straight home.

Another trip on the MRT and a short walk home.

By the time I reached home, my hair had gone back to almost square one.

SO YOU SEE! I HAVE TRIED BUT MY HAIR JUST AIN’T CO-OPERATING!!!

Compare again the first and last pictures. And this is like less than two hours apart. And this is also with tons of extra strength hair wax and hairspray to supposedly hold it in place.

In the past when I needed to keep my hair up, I would bring my hair wax and hairspray out with me. When that happens, you’ll see me going to the ladies every half an hour to spray my hair back to where I want it to be, because no matter how many times I spray, it just keeps falling down again.

By the end of the day, I am a walking can of hairspray and I still look like a China doll.

It was similarly frustrating when I had a long fringe.

It was forever covering my face, which was very, very annoying. And I realised one day that I had developed a very ugly head swing to shake the hair off my face.

I saw myself do it on TV too many times to count.

Cameramen hated my long fringe because they could never see my face when shooting profile angles. And they were always asking me to stick all the hair behind my ears, which just makes my whole hair look flat.

Yes, my long fringe looks really nice on photos. But those are still photos and my hair can be manipulated for split seconds, long enough to allow a nice picture to be taken.

But in real life and on TV, the long fringe is just too much trouble.

I have tried dyeing my entire head of hair. I thought if I damaged my hair, it wouldn’t fall so straight anymore.

Didn’t work. My hair got damaged but it was still as straight as ever.

I have tried perming it but the fringe still falls into the front of my face.

So, to beat all the frustration, I cut my fringe short.

Now, I can concentrate on acting without having to worry about my ugly head swing or stress about my hair covering my face.

In fact, I think my acting has improved since I cut my hair.

Unfortunately, I can’t do anything about the Cleopatra look. I have tried to wear it to the side as you can see, but it just keeps wanting to be straight.

What can I do?

Even if I look uglier with this hairstyle, I’m keeping it because it’s less frustrating and it makes me a better actress.

Seriously!

Categories: Acting Journal, Beauty
16 Comments »

Got a call yesterday asking me to act in a TV drama. One scene. Two hours’ shoot.

Got an offer today for a role in a telemovie. It sounded like a great role at first. And then, five minutes later, it was revealed that it’s only one scene and NO LINES.

Not that I despise small roles, but if I accepted them, wouldn’t it be like someone who quits a job to accept a lower paying job in the same industry?

It’s regression.

I have paid more than my fair share of dues since I was 17. But it seems every time I take a step forward, someone tries to push me back two steps. Three. Four. Ten steps.

Fed up.

I can’t even take a break in peace.

Counting my teenage years, I have worked as a model/actress for eight years in all. I have paid more than my fair share of dues. My resume lists mostly leading and major supporting roles. So why do I keep getting stupid offers? I mean, I still don’t believe I got invited to audition for the role of an extra. That surely takes the cake.

I don’t think I’m being too prideful.

Imagine a manager of a whole department in a company getting a call one day asking if he would be interested to join another company as a junior clerk.

Where got such thing one??

It’s just not right. So stop calling me!

GAaah.

Categories: Acting Journal
9 Comments »

Tonight is no-WoW night but I’m not in the mood to blog like I was planning to, so I’m just going to do a quick show-and-tell for non-WoW players.

The other day in WoW, someone was selling this ring.

It’s called The 1 Ring.

I thought that was really cute.

So I examined it to see what powerful stats it would have, and this was it:

I so love the sense of humour in WoW.

There’s also this item called Moist Towelette.

And the description:

There’re a lot more funny things in WoW, but I haven’t really thought about starting a funny collection, so that’s all for tonight.

WoW players, feel free to share all the humorous, witty things you’ve come across.

Thank you for reading!

Categories: Gaming
2 Comments »

I finally did it. I disabled my profile on the online actors’ database so that people will stop calling me for auditions.

It’s kinda dumb because I paid $150 for that service (one year of listing + another free year cos I signed up during the promotion). But it has brought me only heartache.

Now, I need a break because this year has been a bad year. I’ve gone for a zillion auditions and only gotten a few lousy jobs.

But, worse than that…

1. I get offered extra roles.
2. I get invited to audition for extra roles.
3. I get invited to audition for the role of a 40+ year old woman.
4. I get offered non-paying or very low-paying jobs.
5. I keep getting crummy, forgettable roles.
6. I keep losing jobs because I have the wrong chemisty with the male lead.
7. I totally suck at auditions

The winds are against my favour this year, so I shall stop fighting it. It’s freaking October already; I’m tired.

In fact, about three months ago, I made the decision to “take a break” before I lose my sanity. But I decided to leave my profile online on the off-chance that I would be “spotted” by someone willing to give me an exciting project to work on.

And I busied myself with other things such as acting classes, acting books and generally trying to improve myself first, instead of actively trying to find jobs.

But when I stopped trying to get jobs, people started calling me nonstop. Except that they were all the wrong people, either calling me to audition for yet another job I wouldn’t be getting, or giving me stupid jobs that insulted my pride.

That’s gone on for three months. After last weekend, I kinda lost it.

I have been so depressed all week I have been overeating and suffering indigestion. I don’t think I’ve put on weight, though. Even if I have, it all goes to the wrong places, anyway, so I’ll still look too skinny.

I’ve been so depressed I can’t even play WoW. It’s that bad. Playing games usually take my mind off my depressions, but now it seems to make it worse.

Anyway, so, I have taken my profile offline and am going to stop reading casting notices and just… stay home and mope.

I DESERVE SOME TIME TO MOPE AFTER TRYING SO HARD FOR THREE YEARS AND HAVING NOTHING TO SHOW FOR IT!

By the way, I have disabled comments for this post because I don’t want people to feel sorry for me or give me encouraging pats on the back.

I wrote this not to garner sympathy but just to rant.

I don’t think anyone should sympathise with me or feel sorry for me because I chose this path and I accept full responsibility of the consequences.

I have no regrets. If I’d known the results beforehand, I would still have chosen this path.

So, you can say that I’m in perfect control of my misery.

Categories: Acting Journal
No Comments »

Mood meter: Low.

Went for a TVC audition today and I was terrible like a camera-shy newbie.

It was a young housewife role.

I know I’m supposed to shed my auntie image but I’m not going to argue with money. TVCs are great money and I would act as a grandmother if they paid me.

Anyway, they wanted me to say the lines very auntie, very ah soh, like a gossipy housewife hanging out at the wet market. You know the kind?

I performed take after take after take. Somehow, I just couldn’t do it properly. Every inch of auntie-ness I ever possessed fled me instantly. It was like I simply couldn’t act like an ah soh if my life depended on it. 

I felt awkard and unnatural in front of the camera and my body gave out self-conscious tics each time a scene ended and I waited for the casting director to say “cut”. I giggled like a self-conscious teenager each time the “cut” came.

WTF WAS WRONG WITH ME?!

OMFG, I WAS SO BAD I OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN SHOT.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

Yesterday, I went for a short film audition.

It was a callback (meaning second round of auditions).

We were given two scenes to prepare a week before the callback and, I tell you, I have never put in so much effort into an audition script, ever.

Reason being I love the script, it’s a good story and it’s the most challenging script I’ve ever worked on (has lots of subtext, role within role kinda thing, and very emotional).

So, I worked and worked and worked on it.

Because I was filming Incredible Tales last week, I didn’t have a lot of time, but I worked on the script every free moment I had. I memorised the lines to death, analysed and rehearsed each line individually, and tried out all the different ways I could play each line and feel each emotion.

I worked on the two scenes (four pages) for five consecutive days, which is rather extreme.

I had two competitors and I didn’t think I had a high chance of getting the role because I’m the wrong race. The script says ”preferably caucasian” and I’m the least caucasian-looking one. 

But I worked on it, anyway, because I owe it to my reputation as a serious actress to do a good job at every audition. And because this was a tough role, I worked doubly, triply hard on it. I wanted to give a good performance not strictly to get the job, but for the sake of giving a good performance.

And then, besides filming Incredible Tales and preparing for this audition, I also had another emotional audition (TV drama) to prepare for. It was to be on the same day as the short film audition. So you can imagine my stress level last week.

Saturday was the last day of the Incredible Tales shoot, and then Sunday came. I did some final rehearsing on Sunday morning and was finally satisfied that I was well-prepared for both auditions.

The first one (TV drama) didn’t go as well as I hoped because they changed the script last minute. I had to unlearn and relearn the lines on the spot, and the emotional buildup that I had planned for didn’t work on the new, shortened script.

The second one (short film) went ok. Not as spectacular as I’d hoped, but I didn’t think I was too far off.

After both auditions, I was relieved.

Incredible Tales – DONE

Two back-to-back challenging auditions – DONE

Dieting – DONE

I celebrated the end of stress week by playing WoW and eating McWings, cheesecake and bak kwa for dinner.

Halfway through playing WoW in the night, I got a call from the short film director to tell me that I wasn’t selected. He was very nice about it, saying that all of us acted very well, but he decided to go with a particular actress because she paired better with the male lead to give the film the flavour he wanted.

Which is reasonable. Purely on looks alone, I don’t think I’m very compatible with the male lead because he’s ang moh and I look too oriental.

But I was sad.

I felt a heart-sinking emptiness. Like, after five days of hard work, it’s over. I think it’s the kind of feeling someone would get after being dumped, only milder.

I felt a bit of relief because the role is honestly very hard and I’m not sure I can pull off the entire film. But the disappointment affected me more.

So, after that and today’s embarrassing TVC audition, I wanted to call it quits and run off to Australia to live with emus.

But that was the child in me. The adult in me knew that that’s impossible and I’d just plod on like I always do.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

Today, the short film director requested a re-audition because a previously short-listed actor who had dropped out due to time constraints now doesn’t have the time constraints anymore. And the three actresses have been invited back to audition with this other actor because the director wants to find the best possible combination of couple for the film.

So, now, I have another chance. But I don’t think it’s going to make a difference. I think I have the wrong look for this film, anyway.

Yet, I have to try because it’s the right thing to do.

That means stress week isn’t over yet.

Four auditions scheduled for this week so far, including the one today. And I expect more to come.

I hate auditions.

Just give me the freaking job.

=(

Categories: Acting Journal
13 Comments »

I am seized by a sudden urge to reactivate my Star Wars Galaxies account. I miss my pet droid.

You know the droid that looks like a little toaster and makes cute sounds?

In SWG, it’s the cheapest droid and it was my first pet. Later, I got an R2-D2, but I still kept my toaster droid because it always made me smile for being so very cute.

(I don’t remember what it’s really called. I call it toaster droid cos that’s what it looks like.)

Anyway, I suddenly cannot remember the sound that it makes and it’s driving me crazy. I asked the Goonfather because he’s a Star Wars fan, but his reply was, “Like a normal droid sound lor.”

But it’s not lah!

The toaster droid makes a very distinctly cute sound BUT I CAN’T REMEMBER IT all of a sudden.

Any help?

Categories: Gaming
9 Comments »