Here I am, a fine young lass, staying in on a Saturday, trying to convince my lazy brain to catch up on my readings. It is week 3 now and I haven't finished a single one.

Why, I am sure some of you are exploding indignantly, are you bothering with readings when you're just an exchange student who only needs to pass all her modules?

Well asked. I might well have held this view before embarking on this exchange trip.

The thing is...I have been trained, while at NTU, to always do my readings (or at least not have more than 2 weeks' worth of backlog) and keep up with the lectures. And it's hard not to fall into the same habits while I'm here. No matter how many times I tell myself that I don't HAVE to read these long and rambling essays/papers/studies, the nagging voice in my head won't let up.

"It's all fine and dandy that you don't have to study as hard here, but you must at least learn something," it echoes.

Which rings true, but then comes the counter-argument on whether not doing readings compromises one's learning to any great extent. And so it goes on.

Another thing is, you would think that since we have nothing much to do here but go for lessons, retire to the hostel and look for things to pass the time till our eyes grow heavy, but the fact is that we usually only return home from dinner after 9 pm. Sometimes we come back earlier, but then we'd be tempted to engage in some recreational activities to dilute our loser-ness. I also hate returning to the hostel early because then it gives me lots of time to think and miss home. Which makes me sad and unconstructive.

So there you have it, the prime excuses suspects: late nights and happening weekends. Why, we just went for KTV in the morning. 3 hours + 1 drink + lunch + free flow of salad and soup (3 kinds) in a big room with 4 microphones for a little less than S$10. It's a great deal, but how I wish I had you all to share it with...

Anyway, yes. Late nights and happening weekends = less time for readings. Oh, and Mr. Procrastination here doesn't help either. It tells me to explore the different levels of frustration by attempting to load youtube videos using the c r a w l i n g hostel connection at peak hours rather than do school-related stuff.

And now Mr. Procrastination has successfully "helped" me avoid my readings for 20 minutes. Cheers.