My Bucket List

You only have one life, live it! Treasure the people around you and remember that every moment you have with them is a gift. 

In the later half of 2012, because of the Korean drama Scent Of A Woman, I started thinking about creating a bucket list of my own. And the first thing I did was to google 'bucket list' and it lead me to Alice's Bucket List. This site belonged to a girl who had terminal cancer. The reason why I use the word 'had' is because she passed away on 12 January 2013. I had only just found out that she has met her maker today. 

Although I didn't know her at all, and I didn't read many of her entries, I can't help but get emotional about her death. Maybe it's because my grandmother on both my father and mother's side died of cancer and so did my great grandfather on my mother's side. And while I cannot make EVERYONE have a bucket list (getting everyone to have a bucket list was one of the things on her bucket list), I can help by doing one of my own.

In my entry about the film A Walk To Remember, I did briefly mention a few things I would put on my bucket list. And truth be told, although there are some things I know I'd want to do before I die, I never actually wrote it down or put it in a list. Is it important to put it in a list? Well, I think it is. When I was an Assistant Producer, I would have a list of things to do for my various projects. The checklist made it easier for me to not only remember the things I needed to do, but also made me actively think about having to check them off my list and when I had to finish them by. 

So! Here goes nothing. 

Monica's Bucket List

1) Win an Oscar or Emmy for my work

2) Visit the ruins of Atlantis

3) Live in space

4) Live in an underwater colony

5) Represent my country in the Olympics

6) Watch all the Cirque du Soleil shows - So far I've watched 3; O, KÀ, and Mystère.

7) Be a writer - Done!

8) Travel the world - Go to my travel blog to check out the list of places I want to go to

9) Live a full life with a man I love, respect, and can communicate well with

10) Play a role, no matter how big or small, in helping to find a cure for cancer - Done? I may not have the medical know-how, but I hope the money I regularly donate to the Singapore Cancer Society can help in some small way. You can donate too, click here to find out more.

11) Own a house with a library 

12) Get a tattoo

13) Swim with the dolphins

14) Live in a new city for 2 to 3 years everyone once in a while - New York City is on the top of this list, Santorini is next.

15) Learn how to figure skate

16) Speak 5 languages fluently - Currently it's just English and Mandarin (although my friends would insist that I don't speak it fluently)

17) Handpick and train a Miss Singapore Universe delegate to successfully become the first Singaporean to win take home the Miss Universe crown

18) Watch a live Stanley Cup match

19) Learn how to fence

20) Be a show runner for a hit American television series

21) Write for a film magazine

22) Publish my own novel

23) Write a box office hit

24) To nurture the next generation of directors, screenwriters, and producers

25) Invent something that benefits others

26) To be a world famous photographer

27) Fly first class (again!)

28) Be famous

29) Be a detective and solve a crime

30) To make an important discovery
31) Write a song
32) Learn how to play ice hockey

For now it's just these 32 items on my bucket list. And I've only done 2 items on this list, but hopefully, one day, I'll get everything done. Although, that might be quite tough, because I'm pretty sure this list will grow. 

Now that I've finally written my bucket list, all that's left is to start checking them off the list. Wish me luck! 

Finding Atlantis (2011)

Network: Discovery

Synopsis: Finding Atlantis follows a team of Spanish, American and Canadian scientists as they employ satellite space photography, ground penetrating radar, underwater archaeology, and historical sleuthing in an effort to find the lost civilization of Atlantis.

In the news recently:

A private foundation is working to send a pair of non-NASA astronauts, possibly a married couple, on a slingshot journey to Mars, with blastoff slated for January 2018.

The nonprofit Inspiration Mars Foundation is starting work on life-support systems and other technologies that will be needed to keep two people alive and healthy for the 501-day mission. The flight path would put the spacecraft to within 150 miles of the Martian surface before automatically returning it on a direct approach to Earth.

-  An excerpt from Discovery News

Wow! Would you volunteer for this particular road trip to Mars? My first reaction was, "Hell yeah!". Then when I read on, I realised that the spacecraft that would be carrying me into space and back would be really cramped. While I can deal with being cooped up in a room with nothing but my Mac, Blu Rays, music, books, and basic necessities, I don't think I can deal with the size of it and the fact that it'll be for more than a year!  

That being said, I would love to one day live in a spaceship (I'm thinking of Star Trek Voyager right now) and I'm definitely going to put it in my bucket list. But, there is something I want more than going into space - I want to visit the ruins of Atlantis!

The island of Atlantis has always fascinated me. I don't remember how old I was when I first heard about the island or how I learned of it. But I remember watching an episode of seaQuest DSV called Lostland in 1995, and in that episode, the crew stumbles across the remains of a warrior from the island of Atlantis. I also watched a film titled Sing (1989) which is about a dying neighbourhood in the US that results in the only school left in the neighbourhood to be shut down. The students annually perform in a Sing! production and in the film, the seniors put up an item based on the last days of the people of Atlantis. I also watched the Disney animation, Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001). 

In fact, my fascination with Atlantis is the reason why I watched this documentary. Although we are no closer to knowing for sure the exact location of the island of Atlantis, visiting the ruins of the city of Atlantis is high on my bucket list. Yes. This sounds a bit far fletched isn't it. But if Mandy Moore's Jamie Sullivan (from the film A Walk To Remember) can put "Be in 2 places at once" on her bucket list, then I believe that me putting "visit the ruins of Atlantis" in my list is not a ridiculous notion at all. 

There are many theories and speculation as to the location of Atlantis, but they will all remain just that until there is concrete evidence that tells us otherwise. In fact, until we find proof of its existence, we will never know if Atlantis is even real or just a work of fiction in Plato's writing. And of course, finding Atlantis will be the ultimate proof.

In Finding Atlantis, there is a generous use of 3D animation to help the viewers understand the scientists' theories as to why they believe the location they are at is where Atlantis can be found. The documentary also makes it easy for the audience to digest the information proving and disproving their theories through the use of a checklist. A checklist made by the careful reading and understanding of Plato's description of Atlantis. 

In fact, I enjoyed Finding Atlantis so much, that I have gone on a hunt of my own, for other documentaries about Atlantis that is. And to all the scientists out there who are searching for Atlantis, please keep going even when the going gets tough. Then maybe in the near future, I will be able to strike off number 2 on my list - "Visit the ruins of Atlantis".


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