more about gilda. like, much more.

save yourself now and read the shorter version!!! just kidding.

so, as you know, my name is gilda. all my life i’ve been asked, “is that your real name?” sometimes, i even get the racist treatment in america. like, “what’s this asian girl doing with a name like that?” kind of looks. just to clear it up, yeah it is my real name, the name my parents wrote on my birth certificate, not something fancy i came up with when i was 16. my siblings and i all have special names.

i think names are really important, don’t you? sometimes i feel that a name makes a person. and other times, the person makes the name. in my case, my parents chose this name based on this meaning: “servant of god”. whoah.

ever since i was little, i’ve had to deal with people who couldn’t pronounce nor spell my name right. in fact, i’ve gotten so used to it, i respond to all sorts of ways! my own parents confuse me sometimes heh heh. they call me gil-da or jil-da depending on… their mood or something. so i’m quite happy with either. i also get called gil, jill, or g. and sometimes, just plain old “oi“. my hockey coach is the only one who calls me by my chinese name (it started as a joke)!

i HATE, however, how my name sounds like in japanese. because the japanese language lacks the alphabets, or sounds, to produce my name correctly, i ended up with ギルダ (read: gi-ru-da). which is something that i basically have to repeat twice, to everyone whom i meet for the first time, or on the phone to the delivery guy.

i love my name though. my elder sister’s name, by the way, is bibiana, and my younger brother, jorim. aren’t we all just a bunch of special kids? heh heh. also, my dad is andrew and my mum is maggie. my dog is shadow and her sister was misty.

i turned 25 this last april 19th. this blog was started on my 24th birthday, in 2007.

i was borne and bred in sunny ol’ singapore, and lived at home for 20 years. when i was in high school (we call it junior college in singapore) i decided i wanted to do fashion, and was supposed to head over to new york. (since i could already speak english, i figured why learn japanese or french. and london seemed so cloudy and dreary so… hence new york.)

but the same year, september 11th happened, and my parents freaked out and said NO. so i got irritated, and decided to work instead. what a rebel eh? they were furious with me, and i, with them.

i worked for a year helping to manage a travel agency that my parents own. but after a year, i decided that i hated office work.

so i quit, looked through classifieds, and saw an ad for a nailist. for those of you who don’t know, i LOVE getting my nails done and i love nail art, and had always done it myself. so i called up, showed them my own nails, got hired on the spot, got the keys to the shop within a week, and actually did pretty well. i really loved my job and treated the shop like it were mine.

but i was getting pittance for a pay, and although i loved it, knew i couldn’t stay there long. i was destined for bigger things! heh heh. besides, my boss was a prick and after 3 months i decided this “fun stint” was enough. when i told one of my regular clients that i was leaving, she immediately offered me a job at her design agency. well, at that time, the company was basically designing things like pamphlets, p.o.p.s, catalogues and stuff like that, for some of the largest companies in the technology market. i bet you have something we did, in your home. i started as her personal assistant slash project coordinator, with zero knowledge. it was tough work and i had many screw ups, but i also had so much fun and learnt a lot. so rog and von, if you ever read this, thank you. for giving me a chance of a lifetime and teaching me a lot, and most of all for being great friends!!

in between all that, and since i was 17, i had fallen in love with japan. it started off with something so silly and trivial – i got addicted to some japanese dramas, and became pretty obsessed with this japanese group called smap. they were my light in a dark tunnel when i was going through tough times. they made me laugh when everything else was tumbling down around me.

i left for tokyo in october 2003 and started studying in a japanese school called inter-cultural institute. i loved it there, made so many friends, and my teachers were some of the loveliest people i have met in my life.

then i moved on to bunka fashion college. for those of you in the fashion circle, you might have heard of my school. it’s the only asian school listed in the top ten fashion design schools in the world, and alma mater to some of the best of japanese designers.

i took a 2 year course and it has taught me everything that i know now. i’ve also made friends who will last a lifetime and won’t ever forget. they are some of the most hilarious bunch of people whom i have ever met, and i love them for enriching my life the way they did.

well, rewinding back, my parents have always wanted me to graduate from university. so i tried applying to my school’s university program (i was in the 2 year intensive program, much more famous by world standards).

i got in, but when i met up with the professors, they suggested that i do not enter the university, because whatever i have already learnt, would be repeated and then it’ll just be a waste of my time.

so talks began with the parents, and i was thinking and going all excited about prospects of st martins in london. then guess what my dad says?

“how about new york?”

wow, you know i don’t regret any minute that i’ve spent in japan, but it does feel as if my life had gone by in a flash and i’m back to where i was 5 years ago.

well, new york was my next destination and school started in fall 2007. i ‘ve been through one crazy year, and in all honestly i have such mixed feelings about parsons. it’s way too expensive, and although some of the teachers are really amazing and so world-class, the rest of the school is just filled with little bitches who don’t care at all about the student population. having already been to another world-class school in tokyo, parsons pales so much in comparison and if i were the principal i would be quite ashamed of myself. don’t get me wrong, i am really learning a lot from some of my teachers. (i say some because the rest of them should just go away.) but the fashion department at parsons really tortures us students, and they do not allow us to have any sleep nor social life at all. it’s really not worth the money, and i really wonder if all this stress is worth it. how much do i want to let myself get critiqued by people who don’t believe that fashion should be an art, and anything a little extravagant is considered costume-y? i don’t want to become a boring designer.

i will finish up my course in parsons even though 45% of me is very very uninspired while in that school, and you have no idea how i have to push myself to go to classes each day. my friends inspire me in their design aesthetics, then our teachers shoot us down. woohoo. it remains to be seen if my teachers next semester would be more encouraging.

so there. that really sums up my life. for the moment, at least!