Getting a Present

I met sourav just as I was alighting off the MRT yesterday. I was planning to go to get a present so I told him I was going to look around at some stationary.

So we went to popular bookstore and looked around at bendy rulers and markers. Then really not being able to make up my mind, I told sourav I was getting a present for joelle's birthday, and asked him what I should get.

He suggested photoframes, but nearly all of them were grey and metallic so that did not look very birthday-ey. Then he suggested we share cost for the present.

Sourav suggested we go to the pink section, which was totally appalling. We went there and left immediately.

Then we saw rectangular metal tablets which had words of kindness and friendship engraved on it. We considered them for a while, and picked out the not too cheesy ones from the overly cheesy ones which would seriously give people wrong ideas. However, after much consideration, we realised that most importantly, none of them said happy birthday, so buying those would not be too meaningful, or even seem wrong.

Once again we went back to the stationary section. It seems that stationary was the most suitable thing to buy in Popular@whitesands. I looked at the price of a set of coloured markers. Seemed too expensive for its worth. So we dropped it.

Next we looked at bendy rulers. Does not seem that useful. We were mentally trapped on what to buy. Then sourav digressed and told me about how his sister makes a list of everything in the store and crosses them off one by one when she goes shopping.

Then we saw some expensive branded pens in a glass cabinet, which gave him an idea. Sourav said that there was a shop with cheap(not cheap, just not expensive) branded pens which gives free engraving too, so we solved our present problem.

There is this shop along the walkway from the interchange to the mrt station, called "love and cherish" so we went into there and got a $22 red parker pen and engraved Joelle's name onto it.

We had finally bought a gift. I was left with no more money to solve my hunger problem though, but I am sure there would be food at home.

I reached home at around 7:30, did a little writing before doing up a birthday card. Just like last year, I drew an animal, because I was not too good at design. I could only rely on drawing. Last year, I drew an elephant, so this time I tried for a giraffe, but was unsuccessful due to incompetent skills. So I drew a whale and finished in 10 minutes.

The tough part was the message. What should I write? Thinking of something true, yet not too cliche and something meaningful was hard. Hearing the noise in my house of my brothers and mother made it even harder to think(and it was 10pm already, typical in my house). As I sat on the swivelling chair, I shut the lid of the laptop and rested with eyes struggling to keep open amongst the noise. Finally, my father told me to go to sleep so I went, hoping to think of something when my brain refreshes. Before I knew it, I fell asleep in probably less than 3 minutes.