Taxi Drivers

I find it interesting at times to hear what taxi drivers have to say. No doubt at times I would just want some peace and quiet in the cab, and at times some of them just blabber nonsense, but there are actually some of them who give rather interesting views and opinions on certain issues.

For one reason or another, 80% of them would always complain about the government. And I find it rather hard to relate to them, because my only view regarding this is that I am more than content with the stability and security of Singapore, period. Maybe because policy issues such as the CPF and taxes have not hit me yet, so I am not experiencing all that they are experiencing, yet.

But today's taxi driver raised an issue about the competetiveness of Singapore, and also the issue of opportunity and luck. I totally agree with him, that no matter how hard you study, how much you achieve, if at the end of it all lady luck deserts you, all still fails. Yes, you can work hard to achieve a certain something, but somehow or rather a portion of your sucess it still depends on your luck and the opportunity that comes your way. You can study for 20 over years and get a certain job. But you can chance upon saving a CEO from an imminent road danger in just a few seconds and maybe land that very same job (sorry for the stupid example but you get the point).

But then again, the taxi driver also said that in some ways the world is fair. You can work so hard to be a rich man, living in a big house with a front porch, a backyard and a good view. But because you are always working so hard, you only go back home for a good night's rest in preparation for work the next day, so what for have such a nice house? You do not even have the time to appreciate the view.

He also went on to describe how worried he was for his daughter, and somehow or rather, I felt very strange when he described his daughter, as I felt that almost everything he said about his daughther could be similarly applied to me. First he said she studied business it in poly, then I was like saying, me too! Then he went on to say how she can be so different at home as compared to her usual self at school, and then I was thinking, hey me too! And then miraculously, he said she can be so lazy, she can bring the drinking cups into the room and lazily leave them there, and it accumulates so much so that the kitchen run out of cups. Oh my goodness, that was also so me! What are the chances of that!

Funny thing was, when I reached my destination, he realised that he forgot to turn on the meter, and I was sure that the price he quoted in the end was much lesser than what it should have been. Maybe a discount for the chat and company I provided him.

A Bad Day

Only half of today has gone by, but I am already gonna label it as a bad day.

Firstly, my phone dropped while I was coming down from the shuttle bus, and it fell from such a great height it split into 3 parts. Thankfully, those are 3 detachable parts, the battery, the back cover, and the main phone body itself. Good news is no screen crack and the phone still functions, but the bad news is that the phone picked up quite a number of horrible scars and scratches, and somehow I got this funny feeling the drop also damaged something inside which I cannot see. Dang.

Secondly, I had wanted to finish up the beachfiesta site, something which I kinda dragged for a little too long. But, somehow or rather, the domain went down, and not only can I not update the site now, but all the club's events' publicity is gonna be hindered. Hope it gets back up soon.

Thirdly, suddenly feeling a little bit of the pressure of work piling up, I wanted to complete my newsletter assignment. But somehow or rather, the InDesign on my computer gives me a different measurement setting as compared to the one in the school lab. So I packed my stuff, and went off to the CNM lab, only to find it closing it 30 mins time because the lab technician had something on! Bah, so I went to the library to try to redo the newsletter to see if I made a mistake somewhere, but then the results turned out to be the same. Got so frustrated I made my way back to my room.

What a day! Still eagerly awaiting the reply for my interview.

Timbre

Celebrated Zhimin's birthday at this cool place called Timbre. I never really knew about its existence before today, but apparently I'm kinda sua ku and slow as quite a few people know about the place. The food was said to be costly, but it turned out to be reasonable. And taking into account that the food was really good, the price was actually even better than being reasonable. I had the most special fish and chips ever today. Once again, company was good, and the whole place was a nice place to chill.

About a year and a half ago, I stepped into arts club and mc with a xinyu, nick and lionel, all from arts camp 06 releka. And then when FOP come, zhimin joined us, and I am glad for both himself and the people around him that he made this decision to join us. The birthday celebration, the wonderful time, and the people who turned up today says it all. The wonders and beauty of that word called friendship :)

Well and just like that, half of the recess break is kind of over. And from the start of the semester to this point, I dare say that I have done probably only 10% of what I did at this point of time last semester, and the same applies to stress level. Having only one mid term doesn't help my cause to buck up, although I see a long line of assignments waiting to pounce on this 'freedom' I am currently experiencing.

Oh, and interview was, I would say shorter than I expected. I think I did ok, but it kinda all ended much faster than I expected, so much so that I felt that there was so much more that I could have said. But oh well, I was honest in my answers and opinions, and if I don't get it, I will just have to accept the fact that the rest beat me to it. I don't know why, but after coming out of the interview, I felt an even greater urge to want to get this internship. Crossing my fingers, hoping a positive reply will come from them soon. Hopefully friends like Shuping and Bingde will get theirs too.

Thanks to hock, we managed to have a dota session. It was fun, although I felt kinda tired and saturated towards the end. Starting to wonder how I used to survive 13 hours of straight lan gaming back in my secondary school days. Despite the fun and laughter from all the killing, there was a flip side though. To be honest, I think we had more fun playing as a team against the computers, than against each other. It was definitely more challenging, but in my honest opinion, not very healthy. To put it simply but crudely, its like 'having fun at the expense of the other'. Winning and losing is part and parcel of gaming, but so are the joys and frustrations brought about by winning and losing. I have personally seen tempers lost due to gaming, and how small gestures like jokes or taunts have been interpreted wrongly. I have also seen how one can be a totally different person just because of a game, and be totally disinhibited from his real self. Ugly, unnecessarily ugly. All these for what? Nothing really. The toxic power of games can be real powerful.

Singapore, First Youth Olympics Games Host

Before I write about the happier stuff, lemme first talk about the not so happy stuff first. The crisis management assignments is kinda taking up alot of my time and energy. No doubt I will admit that the lecturers did a great job coming up with this concept, and coming up with the narration. However, 3 assignments in 4 days is no joke. And assuming that my guess is right and that there will be a final one tomorrow, it will be 4 assignments in 5 days. Some people may say the percentage of each of the assignment is small, so its not much of a problem. But that's not the case for me. You see for any assignments, I do not really care what the percentage is. It can be 1%, 10% or more, I will still want to give it my best. Even if its leaving it to the very last minute (which I always do), I will still want to ensure that I make use of every single of the last few minutes to come up with something good. I guess thats just me, so it inevitably causes me much headache in this crisis communication assignment. In fact, I am left a little scared now whenever I hear the word 'crisis'.

Ok on to the happier stuff. Yes! Singapore has won the bid for hosting the first ever Youth Olympics Games! I was waiting for the results for quite a while already, and was keeping my fingers crossed, as I felt that Moscow was definitely the favourite. But deep down, I still had high hopes for Singapore, as I think a good point was made regarding how Moscow already has the ability to host a bigger scale main olympics, so Singapore should actually be given the chance to host the smaller scale youth olympics. Furthermore, I am sure a young and vibrant country like ours would suit the youth olympics better. And yes, the IOC chose Singapore!

Thanks to Bing De, I managed to view some videos, together with the one on channelnewsasia. I share much of my sentiments already been pinned down by Bing De on his blog. It is through these kinda situations whereby you feel so proud to be a Singaporean again, where you feel the patriotism usually lacking in the very shy and reserved Singaporeans, and where you feel the joy and warmth of home. It's such a good feeling, but sadly I only manage to get this warm feeling during National Day parades, the SEA Games and the Tiger Cup. Oh and one other thing that I am happy about, I am sure winning this bid will see a major facelift in sports facilities in Singapore, something which we so dearly need. I hope to see more upgrades in stadiums and swimming pools, and other sports facilities around Singapore. I am no sport fanatic, but it is always nice and exciting to see such changes around the country. Watching the videos was some what euphoric yet emotional. Can't wait to read the papers tomorrow.

The second happy thing to mention, is of course Dota. Had quite a few nice games of Dota with the guys today, and I enjoyed myself. Despite still being noobish, I managed to up my level abit to join in the fun of killing. As mentioned in a previous post, the feeling was so much like poly. Fun and games in school, instead of assignments and grades. Of course, it is important to know where and when to stop. It was real fun. Hock did mention today that maybe I am not feeling all so stressed because I am enjoying myself more this semester with Dota and such. Well maybe it did help a little, but I guess the main reason is really still the sudden decrease in the amount of assignments this semester, for now at least.

First Blood .... Monster Kill .... Ownage!

School Started?

It's a strange feeling. It feels as if school hasn't even really started yet. First, the initial 2 weeks of school was as usual, very slack. And then on the third week, things picked up a little but my mind was more geared towards my gf's 21st chalet. Then fourth week was practically nothing because of chinese new year. The fifth week then became something like first week of school after a long and good cny break. And now in the sixth week, its e-learning week for my department. And guess what, its the recess break next week already.

Apart from all the breaks and holidays, assignments have been coming in much slower this time round. It's just hard to believe that after this week, I would have kinda gone through half of the semester already.

E-learning week this week has been, well not as ideal as it may seem to be. We are still getting assignments to do, especially the crisis communication one. Apparently for each day of the week, we will be updated on a fictional story line on a crisis in a company, and we have to submit assignments as and when needed to address the crisis issue. It seems quite fun, but I would say it takes quite abit of our time too.

I am wondering now if things have really changed, as in my approach and mentality towards studying now. I have really taken a step back over the last few days, and have even left my crisis management assignments to the very last minute. Yes, the last minute-ness is nothing new, but the pressure I am feeling from each assignment is not as great as before. Well, I still ensure that I meet all deadlines and do my work to the best of my ability, but something just feels so different now.

Oh, and I finally got a call for my internship. There is an interview, and I am kind of nervous about it. Don't really know what to expect, and it has been quite a while since my last interview session. Gonna do some preparation over the weekend. I so want this internship, because I really want the working experience, something which I so dearly lack.

A Different Perspective

First of all, a big thanks to those who have shown concern about the condition of my eyes. Apparently, the first check up showed that my eye sight is still good, and the optometrist kinda suggested that it may be a problem due to just tiredness or glare. So I decided to wait a few more days as I didn't think it was worth spending so much just to make a pair of glasses to prevent glare. After a couple of days, and lots of rest over the weekend, things were initially better but I soon realised it was not much of a difference, so I went to seek a second opinion. This optometrist gave a more thorough check up, and I felt more assured as again my eye sight proved to be ok. But what he said next kinda scared me. He said apparently after the check up, it goes to show no lenses or anything they have at the shop can help me, and I should seek to consult someone of a higher 'level', like the doctor to see how he can help. *Gulp* Oh well, eventhough I know I shouldn't really delay this, but may be I shall just wait for the one week break to see what I will do about it.

Well, you know I am glad I am someone who study social sciences, as it is always interesting how everything in life can be linked, and how there can be a reason for every behaviour and action. You can infer this from that, and that from this, and it goes on and on. Reason why I brought this up? Because I am going to draw a link to two very different things in my life; my frequency of blogging, and studies.

If you guys noticed, my frequency of blogging has decreased, and I am going to link it to the reason that I am not so stressed up about studying this semester. By now many should know, most of my blog entries last semester were all about being stressed up and studies. But this semester, I seem to have taken a step back from studies, and that explains for the decrease in 'stressed up' entries. I am enjoying more of my lessons now, as all 3219, 3217 and 2102 are teaching me essential skills which I see myself needing in my ideal job to be. As such, I am seeing it more as a 'learning experience' rather than a 'I really need to score well' thingy. Last friday, I got back my first assignment, and I myself was quite surprised at how I wasn't all that anxious about getting back my grades, as how I would usually be. I seemed to allow nature to take its course for once, and accept whatever was to come my way. Thank goodness I did well though.

Also, 3217 requires me to work with an organization to create a website, and I have chosen BizLink, an organization which helps to allocate and find jobs for the disabled. As much as I want to do well in the assignment for this module, something else in me made me volunteer to create and maintain the website for BizLink on a long term basis. And I'm glad they have agreed to speak to me, as I have seen the disabled people at BizLink, and I have seen how they could do with whatever help one can offer.

To sum it up, I am approaching studies from an all new perspective this semester. Maybe it should have been like that right from the start, but sadly it wasn't. How long this new perspective will stay I really do not know, but I hope it is for a long. I have had enough of all the worries, and all the stress. No doubt when cruch time comes, I will still feel the heat from all those assignments and exams, but well, maybe not as much as before.

Worrying

What a day of worries.

Firstly, my eye problem is not getting any better, and my gf was saying it could be astigmatism. I went surfing some sites to check up on the condition, and it really looks to be so. Then today, I wanted to double check that it was not the problem of my laptop screen being blur, so I glanced at hock's lappy and the words were blur too. Oh dear. Im gonna get an eye checkup soon. Damn, 24 years of a pair of perfectly fine eyes is gonna give way soon. Tomorrow a loaded day, so is friday, so I'll probably go during the weekends. This problem is making it hard for me to read too, and its discouraging me from doing any work. Good excuse huh.

Second worry? My daily routine now. Apparently, the long break from both the cny holidays and my gf's chalet, I haven really picked up the mood nor momentum to start studying. To put it simply, I am not at all motivated to study at all. I don't really know if thats a worry, or a blessing. Because for the last 3 days, I have been spending more time talking on the phone with my girlfriend, I have been sleeping early and catching some good rest, and I have been playing dota.

Its a totally changed lifestyle from what it used to be, assignments, studies, and more assignments. For projects so far, I am even guilty of taking a step back to just watch and follow suit, something which is so not me. I even skipped a lecture today, eventhough it was kinda because I was still settling my SEP stuff. What has come over me I really do not know, but I guess part of the reason for my slackness is that I do not really have any deadlines or work to be completed this week, so the last minute-ness in me is not prepared to start doing assignments which are due next week.

I also think that I'm suffering from some cognitive dissonance, finding more and more reasons to justify why I am really starting to find studying a chore, and am looking forward to other things like working or going abroad. Sancia just told me about her interview, and apparently a very familiar remark surfaced. The interviewer said 'Apart from all your certs and grades, what else can you offer?' When I heard that, the more I suddenly lost the motivation to study.

Ok, maybe I just need a rest to 'reset' my currently messed up brain. And my eyes are really starting to hurt and strain, so I'd better stop typing now.

Back to School, Back to Reality

Its a very lethargic return to school for me and many of the rest, probably all still in the chinese new year holiday mood. Nothing much really happened, but just some random thoughts.

A singaporean icon passed away. Ah Meng, and its amazing how she lived till 48. I guess her keeper of 38 years should be feeling the most about her passing. Quite sad to hear about it, but what amazes me is that almost 4000 people turned up for her funeral. Wow! Rest in peace Ah Meng.

The Singapore Flyer is up and spinning. Fully booked for the first few months already, but once the hype is over, I so want to go and catch a ride on it with my gf. Clips from the news shows that the view is real nice.

My legendary handphone just failed on me again, and this time I have decided to give up on it. Saturday was the last straw when the phone blanked out on me again. It also cannot be charged properly, and the joy stick seems to have problems moving up and down. Real frustrating. Managed to get a spare phone from dad, but my old sim card has very little memory and its a pain transfering all the numbers manually. So if any of you call me and I go like 'who is this?', pardon me as my phonebook is in a mess now.

One last thing, I am feeling a little worried. As I type this, the words are looking real blur. Most of you probably know I have this habit of blinking my eyes alot when I am very tired. Because when I am tired, my eyes get real dry, and blinking kinda makes it feel better. Gotta stop this habit though, because Im not sure because of blinking, or some other reason, my vision is starting to blur. I certainly hope its due to fatigue, and all will be better tomorrow. I still want my perfect eyesight, eventhough its not that perfect now.

If only, if only, if only ... Powerful but hateful pair of words. I have to remember that I am living in reality, and reality moves in only one direction, forward.

Gong Xi Fa Cai

Happy Lunar New Year everybody! Was kind of lazy to come online for the past few days, and that explains for my absence of entries for quite a while. So am gonna make up for it, by having this rather long post about all the random stuff in my head since I last blogged.

This new year was well, here and there in some ways. It started off with the new year eve, whereby I joined the guys in clubroom for dota. Yes, I actually don't know how to play dota, but seeing them having so much fun, I couldn't resist the temptation and joined in the fun, making a noobish learning start of course. It was kinda funny though how some of them were already late for their reunion dinners, but they still wanted to finish off the last game. You know, the scene at the clubroom that day reminded me of my poly days, where school was a hell load of fun. You could play yahoo games during lab lessons, could go for billiards and lan in between and after classes, and you could even go to play lan in between exam papers! That was what poly was all about. Some people have this perception that you have to do very well from poly to get into university, but it wasn't the case for me. I kinda played and enjoyed most of my time at poly, with some hardwork and studying in between, but not much really. Although in saying this, I'm not saying its real easy to enter university from poly, just that it may not be as tough and you may not have to be as muggerfied as some people think. Whatever it is, my poly days will always be the best time of my studying years.

As for visiting on the first two days, an unexpected death of a not so close elder relative made my already short visiting rounds even shorter, and this again erased off some lines in my family tree. I visited only 3 places on the first day, and it took about 2-3 hours only, and just 1 place on the second day. It was kinda sad, and I really see myself and my family spending just 1-2 hours visiting in the years to come. It's a sad reality, as chinese new year seems to lose its meaning as you start growing older. It used to be the case where 1 day was not even enough for visiting, where visiting was fun and red packets aplenty, but now that has all changed.

The third day was better. Spent the morning at my gf's place before going to our friend's house, and then going to camy's house. It was a day of catching up with old friends, fun with university friends, and also lots of gambling. My blackjack luck was good at our friend's house, but kinda lost back some earnings at camy's house. Haha, played mahjong with her mum and aunt, and the stakes were double those I usually play. But well, it was good, and I did ok, until hock came and swipped my winnings, so much so that they become losings, haha. After camy's house, went out again with my gf and our friends and we played some simple games at this 24 hour hong kong cafe, and it was amazing how we could have so much fun and laughter just playing those simple round-the-table games.

Well just like that, I am already in the final day of the long chinese new year holiday, and its really upsetting to know that school resumes again tomorrow. I have totally slacked off for the past 3-4 days, and its gonna take time to start back the engine.

Many thoughts have been running through my head the past week, and its kinda disturbing. Since the end of last semester, I have always been complaining about school. I said before that I was seriously considering not going for honours, just simply for the fact that I was starting to get real tired of studying. That fact has not changed, and the reality of it surfaced in my thoughts again last week. To be real honest, I am feeling really saturated from all the studying. During visiting, one of my younger uncles was asking how long more before I graduate, and I said about 1 year plus because I am going for honours. His reply was, "good, studying is fun so study while you can". The reply was so similar to that of the IAC panel I mentioned before. But it dawned upon me that, studying is not at all fun for me now. The only fun I had studying was during poly. The activities and friends at university is fun, but studying? I know when I go out to work in the future, I may look back to say I prefer to study than work, but thats for the future. As for now, studying is well, to say the least, not something I am enjoying at all.

Apart from the saturation from all the work and assignments, there is another reason why I am so sick of studying. I must admit many a times I am too overly concerned about my grades, about my CAP score, about dean's list, about assignment weightages. But sometimes I just sit down to ask myself, why worry so much? These stuff are getting to me, and making me all stressed up and worried. In fact, too stressed up and worried for my own good. It is really frustrating. Suddenly, I just want to graduate, and go out to work.

I am so looking forward to internship and SEP now, rather than the workload and assignments ahead in this semester. I am now just focusing of doing fairly well for this semester, hoping to cement my cap at second upper region. I am now just looking forward to the experiences I can get from my internship and overseas exchange, which I am sure would do me more good than just good grades. I know some may say all these frustrations and pressure are brought upon to me by myself, but well, that IS just me, setting all those stupid and unnecessary expectations for myself. And you know what, all these happened only because I started doing well 2 semesters ago. All these added pressure for nothing. Sigh.

A Short Week

It is gonna be a real short week, eventhough I have 3 small assignments to hand in. After today's 3217 lecture, I am left with a JS tutorial tomorrow and the week's finished. Somehow or rather, I am not at all excited about the chinese new year. Well, actually I have not been excited about it since I kinda stepped out of my childhood years. I am looking at a Chinese New Year with a decrease in the number of visits, decrease in the number of red packets, and the increase in the number of assignments!

Somehow or rather after the chalet over the weekend, I am getting a strange slacky feeling. Maybe it was so nice to just spend the weekend relaxing at the chalet, so much so that I felt so tired about having to come back for lessons again.

Don't know why, but thoughts about what was said at the IAC comes into my mind again. "Grades don't really matter" was strongly emphasised by the panel. Suddenly, I am feeling all so sick about school and studying again. I am worrying myself about this stupid word got 'grades' again and again, but school life should be so much more than that.

Grades, honours, dean's list, assignments, exams, how much of all these will really matter in 5 or 10 years time? As compared to the leadership experiences, friendship and public speaking experiences I gotten from all my cca experiences, which one have benefited me more, and will benefit me more in the years to come? Answer is quite obvious, yet I am constantly bugging myself down with the former.

Greed by Human Nature

Spent the entire weekend at my gf's 21st bdae chalet. I didn't really get to sleep much, so am feeling kinda sleepy and tired now. Well, am real glad she enjoyed herself, and glad that so many people turned up. The 21st bdae is always a significant one, and I keep telling my gf how lucky she is to be able to have a big party. I spent my 21st climbing moutains and navigating through jungles in taiwan. How nice.

On to something else, I wanted to blog about this before going to the chalet, but lessons ended so late on friday and as I had to rush to get some stuff ready for the chalet, I didn't really have the time. So I shall do it now.

A topic surfaced on friday, yup the dean's list. About a month or so ago, I saw this day coming, and so it came. I decided against S/Uing one of my modules, as it was a fairly decent grade. But with that decision, my grades were dangerously on the border line to get into the dean's list's. And as expected, I merely missed it by that very bit. Yes, kinda feeling a little bit of the pinch, and a little disappointed. But the thing is, isn't it just amazing how greedy one can get. Right from the start, I was praying to just have decent enough grades which fall nicely in between sem 1 and 2, but I got something much better than that. And just because it fell a little short of the dean's list, I am complaining that I should have scored better. Someone should really just smack the fact into me that I should be grateful for grades which I was so lucky to have gotten.

Well, just because I made it into the dean's list once, and just because I did fairly well again last semester, somehow allowed some to forget, or just not realise how I actually fared for semester 1. I am actually happy and honoured by how a few of my friends can 'place' me up there, together with some of those super scorers. But sad to say, I honestly do not see myself there at all. As I mentioned before, last semester's grades were extremely lucky. Every single one of my modules got me grades higher than I could expect or calculate, and of those modules, there were only 2 grades which I felt I so dearly deserved. The other 3 were just plain lucky, and yes real lucky.

My initial goal in university was to just get a degree, something which was so dear considering the fact that I miraculously made it in from poly. And when things started turning for the better, I started aiming for higher. But as high as I can go, I have still capped myself at second upper. So the question really is, would anyone with my expections, have S/Ued a B+, a grade which nicely satisfies my second upper requirements?

Inclusive of IT1001 this semester, I have 4 more modules which can be taken out of faculty, and with 2 more S/Us, I feel safer. Some may see it as an unnecessary move to play it too safe, and that I should perhaps have just taken the chance to use that S/U, and leave myself with 1 S/U for the remaining 4 modules. But I guess I'm just someone who wants to play it safe. That's just the way I try to overcome the 'system'. Too safe? Maybe, if my grades continue rising. Maybe not, if my grades start dropping.

Yes, I seriously should be more confident and assured of my decision, but its true that words and opinion around you always affects your way of thinking. I guess I'm blogging all these because I am just trying to rant what I feel, and maybe also to assure myself of my actions. Bleah, and I should be more content, and stop being greedy.