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Our monthsary in July falls on a Saturday. When I was trying to plan for what to do on our monthsary early that month, I thought we could do something really different this time other than the usual cafe-hopping since I would have the whole day to spend with her. I happened to come across an email newsletter publicising a promotional event called “Despicable Me Breakout Party” the Universal Studios Singapore (USS) was currently having until August. I thought spending a full day at the theme park would be a good idea so I proposed this idea to Taenggu. Later on, on and off, I had been hearing voices mention the word “monthsary” so i assumed it was a sign that Taenggu was keen about my plan and was looking forward to our monthsary date. So about 2 weeks before our monthsary, I went ahead to purchase the USS promotional package online which included the entrance ticket, one $5 meal voucher, one $5 retail voucher and one minion game stall voucher.
Looking back, I think it wasn’t actually my first time trying to bring Taenggu to visit USS with me. I remembered back in 2015, when I was there with my friend, Yan Hao to take the new Puss In Boots ride, I pretended that she was with us too. I kept her in my mind back then, hoping she could enjoy the rides and have fun with us. Later on in the same year, when she came to Singapore on a secret visit with the other members of Taetiseo for a surprise event, she and Seohyun also went to USS during their free time. So technically speaking, it wasn’t her first time to USS too.
But this time, it was going to be special because I would be going to the theme park physically alone for the first time while taking her with me spiritually. I wasn’t sure how it would turn out and was concerned if I would be able to stay energetic throughout the day by myself. My body hadn’t been really good these 2 years. There were many times when I was on an outing for the whole day, my body would become really stiff and uncomfortable after long hours, making me feel like an old woman.
As if to make things worse, a few days before our monthsary date, I saw the news about SNSD going to film a variety show called “Happy Together” on the same day of our monthsary. I became worried even more about how our USS date was really going to work out under these circumstances. It seemed that there would be a even lower chance that Taenggu could be aware of what was going on in my reality when she was physically occupied with her work. It made me feel confused and wonder why she still sounded so excited about our date when she would be busy with her work on that day. It made me question, did she already know she was going to have a filming schedule on the day of our monthsary? Through the voices, I could tell that my Spirit was worried for me too. Afraid that I would sink into another depression again.
Taenggu seemed to feel sorry about it too. As if to express her sincerity and show that she really cared about our monthsary, on Friday morning, one day before our monthsary, while I was half awake in bed, I saw a vision of Taenggu putting a nicely wrapped rose onto my hands. Because I received this spiritual sign from her which warmed up my heart, I was able to balance myself emotionally and pushed my disappointment aside. Although I wasn’t confident if I could really do it, I decided to go ahead since I had already purchased the ticket online for 29th July.
On that day, I set off from my house to Harbourfront in the afternoon. While on the train, the first thing I noticed about myself was I was unusually in good spirits. Usually on long train rides, I would feel sleepy so I tend to close my eyes and take a nap. But this time, I felt really fresh and wide awake. Throughout the 50-minute train ride, I didn’t feel the urge to sleep a wink. I thought it was such a huge change in my physical body. “Thanks to the more regular exercises I have been doing lately“, I thought.
When I reached Harbourfront, I had lunch at a restaurant at VivoCity which sells the famous Sarawak’s kolo mee. I visited the same restaurant with my siblings late last year and we sat at a table whose table number was coincidentally the magic number ’39’ (related post: MAGIC NUMBER ‘39’). This time, when I entered the restaurant, my instincts led me straight to this same table again which also happened to be empty.
Right after lunch, I went to take the monorail at the top level of VivoCity to Sentosa and alighted at the first stop where the Universal Studios was located.
I was immediately greeted by so many minions everywhere the moment I entered into USS, which made me feel even more excited. Weren’t they really cute??
The first thing I did there was to play at one of the minion game stalls using my game voucher. It was a aiming-the-balls-and-throw-them into-the-holes kind of game. I was given 5 balls and I missed all of them. I guess I sucked at throwing games. 😛
The Transformers ride was the first ride that I queued for. There was a crazy long queue that lined up for this ride. I had to wait for more than an hour before it was finally my turn to enjoy the ride and I quickly regretted it after that. Not only did I feel really dizzy, there weren’t actually any elements of surprise to me anymore (it was already my 5th or 6th time to USS taking this ride). Definitely wasn’t worth my long wait.
I wanted to take the Battlestar Galactica: HUMAN vs. CYLON rides next. They are known as the world’s tallest dueling roller coasters. You could say they are the most exciting and terrifying rides out of the whole USS. I only ever tried them once before during my very first visit to the USS many years ago and thereafter they had been closed down during my subsequent visits because of some technical issues. So this time, when I knew they were finally reopened, I was looking forward to taking them again. But the estimated waiting time shown at the entrances of these rides shocked me. FREAKING 105 MINUTES. Furthermore, we had to put all our belongings into the lockers before taking these rides so I wouldn’t have anything like my phone with me to distract me from the agony of waiting. After waiting in the line that was barely moving for 30 minutes, I gave up. I had wasted enough time waiting for the previous Transformer ride. To make full use of the limited time I had left before the 8pm closing time, I decided that I should enjoy the many other small little rides that required only much shorter waiting time.
So I went to take the other rides like The Revenge of The Mummy ride, spinning tea cup kind of Accelerator ride, treasure hunt jeep ride etc. The jeep ride was relaxing but a little more towards the boring side. At least I was much happier not having to queue for too long to take this ride!
Finally at around 6pm, I was hungry and decided it was time for dinner. I grabbed a chilli crab sauce hot dog bun set meal at an eatery in the Jurassic Park area using my $5 meal voucher.
After the meal, I hurried off to take the Puss In Boots ride. As I approached the entrance, the staff saw I was alone and immediately gave me an express single rider pass! So I went into the express queue which had nobody at all and in less than a minute, I was already on board the ride! Everything took place unexpectedly fast. I guess there was a perk of going to theme parks alone after all!
After Puss In Boots, I wanted to queue for the Human ride again whose waiting time became 65 minutes now. But I gave up again after 15 minutes in the queue. My priority on that day was to make myself comfortable as much as possible and prevent myself from getting into negative situations. If I didn’t enjoy the process of waiting, then I shouldn’t continue to wait or else I would subject myself to more negativity and unhappiness.
The Madagascar boat ride was the last ride I took before I started to subconsciously call out for Bobo. I guessed it was a sign that it was time for me to go home. Before I left for good, I shopped at the Minion Mart to spend my $5 retail voucher. I bought a King Bob figurine and a mystery minion lego for Taenggu and a minion backpack for myself.
At the end of the day, I was surprised that I managed to maintain a generally good mood throughout my day at USS. I felt I had been emotionally well taken care of. I guess the major reason was because I already knew for sure what Taenggu was doing and where she was on that day. And I could see photos of her on that day too! Unlike our previous dates, I didn’t have that uneasy feeling of uncertainty this time because I knew she was busy filming. I was more focused on what I was doing, not having to think too much and spend the unnecessary effort to keep guessing what she was up to. Voices that I heard had been generally positive too. They commented that my energy level was high, which was true. I didn’t expect myself to be able to sustain that level of energy throughout the day under these circumstances too. They also said Taenggu had been really professional, probably referring to her being focused at her own filming as well. The only unpleasant experience I had was there were simply too many people everywhere and the waiting time for each ride was too long. I kept ranting to Taenggu that I would never visit USS on a weekend ever again. If we were to go USS again, we should go on a weekday next time when there are less crowd and shorter queues.
When I was on the uber car back home that night, I was scrolling through my instagram feed and there was something that one of the instagram users whom I follow wrote that I could identify with and perfectly summed up my attitude for the day. She wrote, “別看別想別失望。(Don’t see, don’t think, don’t be disappointed.)”
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