Co..Co..Cold

Before I went to sleep last night, I decided to leave the window slightly ajar so as to sleep comfortably with a nice cool breeze, ensuring that the room doesn't turn too stuffy. Well it backfired, as temperatures dipped to around 11 degrees in the early hours, and I was so cold that I couldnt sleep anymore.

And as of tonight, temperatures at new territories is ranging around 8 degrees. I thought there was maybe some kind of misprint on the observatory website, so I went out with my shorts and slippers to test water. I shouldn't have. Water turned to ice.

I kinda under-estimated the weather in HK. You see the last time I came to HK it was during winter, and temperatures averaged around 17 degrees. But it's only autumn here now, and it's hitting below 10 degrees. My wardrobe doesn't seem to be able to withstand this temperature, yet with less than 3 weeks to departure I'm a little reluctant to buy some warmer clothes. I guess in some sense I will probably be staying indoors much for the next couple of weeks rushing to meet my deadlines, but the problem is my open-sea facing room is freezing as well, despite all windows and doors shut.

It's times like this where I miss sunny Singapore. Then again, the grass is always greener on the other side, and when I'm back home, I'm sure to complain its too hot.

Autumn Cleaning

It was my free day today, but just as per every semester back at home, I always seem to have this uncanny ability to waste the entire day away without doing any work, despite plenty of deadlines looming. Then again, I did manage to do some spring cleaning, in autumn, and it's only until today I realised how much rubbish I had at my small corner of the room. Unused logistics from filming, loads of paper bags from all my previous shopping, maps and papers which I took when I first arrived ..... and loads more. In some way this autumn cleaning session allows me to get more organized for the deadlines ahead, and preps me better for departure in a few weeks time.

Speaking about autumn, weather in HK is really cool now. It has been constantly around 18 degrees today, and it will reach new lows of 13 degrees in a couple of days. With the university located on top of a mountain at new territories, winds are always ensuring that temperatures are a couple of degrees lower than forecasted. I'm getting more used to this cold weather, eventhough my skin and lips still dries up.

Tomorrow marks the last day of school, and I will be having my last official lesson at CUHK. Was reading some of my previous entries, and it was just not too long ago that I mentioned how eager I was to see what lectures were like here. And now, it's all coming to an end. I guess in some way I prefer lectures back at home, perhaps because I'm more used to it, but one thing I really enjoy here is both the film lectures I have.

Film production lectures are like mini board room meetings every week, informal and relaxed. Film genre class is just watching movies every week, and analyzing them. It's like going to the cinemas every week. I have mentioned much about what I've gained in terms of film production, but in many ways film genre class is much as beneficial and enjoyable, as I've watched films I've never dreamed of watching ever before. From old western cowboy films, to film noirs, to last week's 'Singing In The Rain', which was damn good.

Return flight has been rescheduled and confirmed, and the timeline above reflects the time left here in HK. Met a friend at the bank today, and she asked if I would be traveling, and I said 'no'. It was always part of the plan to travel when here on SEP, but I guess this again shows that not every thing goes to plan. I never did thought that I would miss home that much (eventhough HK has been great), and although I know the one big thing I would regret from this whole experience was that I didn't get to travel, I'm sure there will be opportunities ahead.

Three

The days which I have waited almost three months for has come ... and gone just like that. Time passed by so quickly in the last three days, and now I'm hoping time continues to travel as quickly for the next three weeks.

For now, after three days of total absence from the books, I must reluctantly shift my attention back to assignments and deadlines. I just want to get them over and done with, and as much as how I know I should cherish whatever is left of my exchange experience, there's this part in me that just really wants to go home. There's no denying, and I will be very honest in saying that there's just too much I miss at home.

Well, I would be calling up the airlines company soon to re-schedule my flight as planned, but now maybe even earlier than I first wanted. I was hoping to spend the time after the exams covering places I've not gone to yet, but within the last three days, I've covered almost the whole TST, the wax musuem, restaurants at corners of HK I would never have known of, and yes the long overdue, Ocean Park! So I guess I've already done quite a fair bit of what I've wanted to do after exams.

Oh, and I only just realised that this coming week is the last week of school. School term seems really short here without week 0, mid term break and reading week.

The Other End of The Gun

Filming is finally completed. What started out as a mediocre student film assignment had exploded into what I would call a semi-pro film project. It was a huge jump for me, someone with literally zero filming experience, and I would say I have gained much from this entire experience. I had to adapt fast, and not everything went smoothly, but it was definitely something no other exchange experience (to any other university or country) can match.

"The Other End of The Gun" is our film's title. So basically the title reflects the story of our film; a female contract killer who is torn between her 'bad' lifestyle, and the 'good' lifestyle which she really hopes to have. So on the muzzle end of the gun, it's her dark killing lifestyle, while on the other end of the gun, she's actually hoping for a normal lifestyle with kids and a family.

Ironically, as the days of filming went by, the title portrayed a true reflection of the entire production and filming process. On the filming end, things worked out really well, Our friend who directed the film, seriously worked wonders. Weeks back when he spoke about having auditions with professional actors, I was thinking like 'oh right can we even engage any actors to help us, not to mention professional ones'. And then he talked about having scenes with a smoky bar with singers and a killing scene taking place, I went like 'how is that ever going to happen'. But guess what, those two things plus many other amazing things, did in fact happen. We roped in professional actors and actresses, a director of photography and camera assistant, set designers, make-up artist, extras and many others. I've seen most of the shots that I've transfered to the editing room, and they look really amazing.

However on the other end of the gun though, I would say things turned out really bad. I've honestly never worked in such disorganized circumstances, and never felt so frustrated over working with someone before. You see our friend was so focused on the filming end of the 'gun', so much so that he often overlooked the other end, which is the filming preparation and people management aspects. No doubt, what the audience sees is the final edited film itself, but a good film will never happen without all the background support. It's like expecting Arts Camp to happen without the help of the often neglected logistics team.

To cut the story short, he was so engrossed in his actors and how the shots would turn out, so much so that he neglected issues of logistics, food, communication, budget, scheduling and most importantly, team morale. At one point in time he also kinda lost touch with his own sense of humanity, just so as to ensure he gets the shots he wants. This resulted in much unhappiness, and to be honest, the rest of the team simply got frustated having to clear up the negligent mess he made time and time again. Which brings up the same phrase we hear so often in arts club, 'Can a project be considered successful even if it turns out really well, but the process was an unhappy one?'

All this may sound really crude, but that's how bad things really got. And yes I may be someone who can be vocal at times, but this time I went to the extreme as I confronted him many times to highlight these issues. It's one thing that we're both cool with honesty, but it's another that despite my honesty, I can't seem to drill the fact into him that he has to do something about it, apart from just saying 'no way did that really happen?' or 'no way did I really do that?'

Nonetheless, there's always a positive to the negative. I've learnt alot from all this. This experience re-emphasised the importance of proper planning and management, of how important a leader needs to see the 'whole picture' of a project, and not be over-engrossed on one aspect, and I've again seen how good communication is the key to everything. I've also grown to appreciate films more, and all the hard work behind it.

I am also grateful for the new friends and contacts I've gained, and how these wonderful people from all over the world have provided me great insights into what the filming world is like. I now kinda know the entire film production process, the different kinds of filming equipments, and of course, the basic techniques of sound recording, which I was doing for most of the film. I've also seen how the world can be less practical than what I've often observed at home, and people are actually willing to help and do stuff, just simply because they're professional, nice and want to help. No other agenda, full stop.

We were asked not too long ago if we were planning to go into the filming industry, and to be honest for me it's quite a definite no. But whatever experiences gained over the past week or so will definitely aid me in one way or another, directly or indirectly.

It's now time for a good rest. Tomorrow's the day I've been waiting for. My gf is coming to HK! Great timing considering I really needed something to look forward to after that long ardous journey :)

Flustering Few Days

When I was still sound asleep this morning, one of my room mates received a call asking where he was. Apparently he was already 20 minutes late for some excursion, and the bus was leaving soon. His franctic actions kinda woke smeagol and myself up, and it was not long before smeagol was clear headed enough to realise that he too was late for his class. So the whole room was like in fast forward motion for the next 3-4 minutes before they both ran out of the room, and then sudden silence set in. As I lay on my bed, I thought that what happened in that 4 minutes was a good reflection of my last 4 days.

I was running around alot the past few days for filming pre-production, and I think I practically emptied at least 1/2 of the equipments at the studio into my room. So you can imagine what a mess my room is in now. Thursday came and the whole day was spent on filming, and it kinda zoomed past. And despite having a break in between before we continue filming on Sunday, there's just so much to prepare again for the shoot. I have two soci assignments in between, and I really don't know where I'm gonna find the time to finish them by Tuesday. You see with one foot into the film already, I just want to fully concentrate on it and get a good one out of it. But with that, I really don't know how I'm going to balance it with the other modules. Yup so to sum it up, everything's in a little bit of a mess and fluster now :p

Had dimsum lunch with TK and Josh yesterday, and it was really nice to see TK again after a few months. Just feels different meeting up with a friend in a foreign land, and it was a pity I couldnt spend more time with her as I had something to settle. Nonetheless, I enjoyed the dimsum session!

Oh, and internship has been confirmed! My path towards graduation is now much clearer, and I think the next 6 months is going to be a fruitful and enjoyable one!

Way Too Cool

The weather is really crazy here. Today's low hit 17 degrees, which means temperatures dipped by more than 10 degrees in the last 2 days. No doubt its cool, but I guess I'm not exactly ready for it, and it came a little too drastically. My skin is drying up, and so are my lips, and I don't even have a single long sleeve top. So maybe it's time to do some shopping tomorrow (after a long while), to get some long sleeves and a lip balm or something.

It's also interesting to observe how the people here are suddenly all dressed differently. Boots, scarf, pull overs, all sorts of sweaters and head dresses. It feels like within one weekend, I'm suddenly in an all new country.

And yes, yet again because of the cold weather, I'm eating just for the sake of keeping myself warm. And that's not good, because it means that I'm eating eventhough I am not hungry. The consequences of this bad habit would of course be dire.

Ouch!

I was out at IKEA today looking for some stuff for filming, when someone kicked my left feet and resulted in one of my toe nail splitting into half. It hurt so badly, and it bled so much that I seriously thought of just taking the red towel on a rack near me to just wipe the blood. In the end, I just dragged my bloodied feet all the way to the IKEA restaurant to take a huge stack of the free tissues. I'll give the guy the benefit of the doubt that he was carrying his kid, and probably couldnt really see where he was walking. Although I was quite surprised at how he didnt realise he actually kicked someone (so hard), and just continued walking on.

Thats the left feet. The right leg is injured too. Kinda balances it up huh. An old injury which I sustained back in OCS is back to haunt me. The external right knee ligament is starting to hurt again, and now I'm even having problems walking down the stairs. And it didn't help that I still played soccer despite my injury. Probably insensible and not so smart on my part. But oh well, it's just the love for the game.

The temperature totally dipped today, and it averaged around 20 degrees. It's going to stay like this for the next few days at least, before it would get back to the mid 20s again somewhere next week. Well that's what the weather forecast says, and the forecast hasn't been accurate for the past 1 month. The problem now would be that with an injured toe, I can't wear shoes, and putting it together with the cold weather, my toes would freeze! I already felt my toes going numb outside just now.

Filming starts this week, and it's going to be tough, but an exciting journey I'm sure. If there's one thing Josh and I can proudly claim, its that this filming opportunity is one that no other exchange student may get, ever!

It's Getting Hot

Weather's getting cooler here, but I'm starting to feel the heat ... from school that is. Yes it's still comparatively slacker than usual, but this time there's no denying that stress has started to creep in. I'm starting to think it's not slacker because of lesser workload here, but more because of my mentality towards work as an exchange student. I remember hearing from somewhere that you get like double the marks for half the effort on exchange. That to me now appears to be just a myth.

This week was very packed, assignment on Monday and Tuesday, presentation on Wednesday, pre-production preparations for filming on Thursday, and a major exam today. So, it's pretty obvious I didn't have time to study for the exam. And I probably messed it up big time. Went totally blank after doing 1 out of 6 questions, and now I really have to depend on the final essay paper. Concern now is I may not even have time to come up with a decent paper. About one month from exams, and I just realised the number of assignments in between. Oh dear ...

Filming for our project starts next week, and all of a sudden many people were roped in, and it's turning out to be something big. I started feeling a little tired after the hiccups and workload at the start of the week, but now I'm really excited. Once in a life time ...

Hallo-What?

It is halloween weekend, and I have sinned. No not because I've been out partying, nor was it because I have been naughty, nor was it because I ate too much. It is simply because I missed out on too much fun. I missed out on halloween parties at LKF on Thursday, I missed out on halloween night at Ocean Park on Friday, and I missed out on a boat trip with the Koreans on Saturday. Instead, I stoned and stoned and stoned the weekend away.

Of course, I can simply say I'm not exactly the party animal to want to go to LKF, and that the gang wasn't available to go to Ocean Park with me, and that I wasn't exactly comfortable with being the only Singaporean on a Korean boat trip, and that I had some tight deadlines to meet next week. But the point is, I totally went against the 'I am supposed to be on exchange and out enjoying' principle. Shucks!

On to other random stuff ...

I'm not someone who really follows the economic downturn, although on the surface I roughly know what's going on. But today I felt the hardest pinch from the crisis, when I drew money from the ATM. The exchange rate was very much lower than what it usually is.

See the timeline at the top of my blog? Apparently week 17 and 18 may not exist now, as exams are ending much earlier at the start of week 16. So I'm kinda left with like 5 weeks here? And with many deadlines in between, it's going to go past much faster. Time flies.

I brought two phones to HK, but for one reason or another both has battery problems. One has problems charging, and the other charges only to a small portion of its capacity. So I actually bought a S$30+ old school phone which looks more like a remote control. Now at least I get the proper reception, my calls home wont get cut off, and I wouldn't have to worry about missing calls.

Don't know why, but as the weeks go by, I'm starting to miss home more and more. I know there'll be much I'll miss about HK when I leave, but for now ...

Week ahead seems hectic. 2 assignments, 1 presentation, and 1 exam, but that very slack exchange mentality won't go away.