2007

2007 = Horrible year in terms of work and stress and crap. Memorable year in terms of trips, band and non-work related stuff.

Before entering ACJC this year, I swear life was 1 million times better. During the Barker days, there was time to while away the afternoons and watch anime/play dota everyday. Saturdays and Sundays were lazy days to stone and sleep and enjoy life until "O" Levels came. Compare that kind of life to now: full of band practices, tutorials, projects, research, fill up retarded and long scholarship forms but never got any, long school hours (waste a hell lot of time)... you know that I wouldn't prefer the latter. Never in my life have I felt so stressed until I faced 2007. It was such a horrible year. So horrible that I shall not continue to elaborate further.

In the midst of the negative atmosphere of work, there was surely something to motivate me. Ironically, it's band. Band provided me with something to look forward to at the end of each tiring week. I know it was tiring, but at least I enjoyed band. Every band practice, it's nice to see the clarinet section people and other band friends. I'm not that close to that many people, but I always feel good when I see the band. Though the soon-to-be J2s in band may not be bonded as a batch, I hope that next year, after the overseas trip, we will be.

Thank God, that in the midst of the piling work, I always managed to keep myself within the top 10% of the school. SA1-ers, thanks for being there to pressure me to study. Thanks for the wonderful memories in the void deck, the canteen, the lecture theatres, the classrooms and the places we go for PE. Thanks for my project work group, who made our event such a special one. Thanks for my circle of good guy friends in the class... rmd, darren, shaun, kok, david, tim, allan, zaneth. It is my only hope that as a class, we bond together and organise class outings with better attendance.

Vietnam OCIP people. Thanks for all the memories. We really bonded as one huge family. You guys were great. Those were the best 10 days of the year.

ACJC Band.. Gold With... cheers, tears of joy, delirium. Memories of the 10 second glorious B-flat, D (a bit flat), F chord in SCH still linger. I remember the enjoyment we had playing Feste Romane. This was the SYF which I never felt nervous at all. This was another great moment of 2007.

Thanks goes to the staff at NTU, who willingly helped to make my NRP project possible. Special thanks goes to Professor Law and Hongtao. They were the ones who made countless sacrifices.

Thanks goes to the physics teachers at ACJC, who taught me to tackle physics olympiad which no one got to the second round. They were the people who stayed on till late to teach us the difficult concepts.

Give all thanks for this year to God. This year was truly a challenge. It was a year which made my faith in God become such a roller-coaster ride.

Of course, I need to make some new year resolutions.
In 2008, I shall:
1. Continue my faith in God
2. Be disciplined in my studies
3. Save more money
4. Pack my stuff properly everyday
5. Be optimistic and be a true friend to others

Let me tell you the plain truth. 2008 will surely be worse than 2007. That is why I don't want 2008 to ever come.

solving the cube for the first time

After what seemed like hours of frustration and getting used to. I finally solved a Rubik's cube. So proud of myself. But sadly, I wasted an obscene number of hours.

Here goes:

The scrambled cube

The white cross

Completed 1 side and the 1st layer

Completed inserting in the edges of the 2nd layer

The yellow cross on the last layer

About to complete...

YAY! COMPLETED! :D

the saturday without band

To start off, this was a freaking huge white rabbit I saw at a pet shop in Great World City. 10000 times bigger than my 2 rabbits.

SSEF sucks. My teammates and I are dying under our own self-torture. The freaking computer takes 1 year to take 100 received signal strength samples from 5 access points. Every time, the 2 computers we're using goes wonky and hang a bit when we run the perl programming script.

The computer got stuck...

Edmund tries to solve the problem, but to no avail ):

Imagine the pain when you realise that you have to repeat this process for 324 times. (It could have been be more!) Estimated time needed to spend at NTU: at least 24 hours. And we have to hand this project up by January 9 2008. gg guys. I shall have to pon school on 1 or 2 days when it reopens. CRAP.

Guess what? I swear it's rubik's cube season! I'm not the only one trying to solve this colourful block of frustration which you can only observe RI/RJC or NJC or any nerdy/chao mugger secondary school guys fiddling in any science competition. Cos today I saw a man in the MRT trying to solve a 4x4x4 rubik's cube. To think I'm having trouble solving the original 3x3x3 at present... D: Oh, and Sheree saw another person doing it in public 2 days ago.

Yeah man! Doing a 4x4x4 in the MRT.

After the ride from Boon Lay, I met the clarinets at the Hong Kong Cafe at Marina Square. It serves good food such as milk tea and some mango ice kachang. The cheese baked rice never tasted so good.

Samantha, me and yel at HK Cafe.

We then went for the SparkWinds concert at VCH. Dorance and Cynthia were playing for the band (made up of RV alumni, Yuhua alumni, PJC). All the clarinets were there to support our fellow clarinetists. :D And some of the J2s. We kept shouting nonsense like: "Nice solo, Dorance!" when she was obviously in 3rd Clarinets. We refrained from "Woo, Peck Suan!", otherwise we would have been flamed by the crowd haha. (That's the conductor!)

Dorance, the "soloist".

We were damn bad to leave the concert just before the encore. lol. And went to walk around and blah.. boring... went to Ben and Jerry's at Raffles City and sat at their tables and drank up their water but never bought anything. Damn retarded.

Soon-to-be J2 Clarinet guys with an exception to Melvin. yel suddenly realises he's gonna be in J2. Better late than never.

We wondered why this water fountain at B&J's is so constant in its flow. Even my supposedly pro-ed physics couldn't explain it.

I went home and then watched football from 11pm, only to see Man Utd losing to West Ham 2-1. D: If only Ronaldo scored the penalty, perhaps the result would have been very different. Oh well, a sad ending to a sad day.

i am legend

I just only watched this. It's still fresh.

In this kind of 1 man movie, you need a kind of charisma to keep the audience interested. I thought Will Smith's acting was awesome. He did capture the emotions. I must say that he was damn emo in some parts. I could feel that he was damn scared. But there was still a tinge of his usual humour.

The director freaking used a lot of loud noise and sudden movements as shock tactics. Suddenly, this weird zombie person come out from nowhere accompanied with lots of noise. I was half expecting this kind of thing, so I didn't jump in shock like I do if anyone poked me. :D

Damn sad that lots of things die in the story. After a damn long character development, then suddenly this character dies, it feels very "wah lao, just die like that". Yup, that's the bitch called Samantha. Nice dog leh. She adds a lot of interest to the story. But without her death, the story would not have developed.

Smith's character, Robert, had a final act which was like what justified the name for this movie. Yeah, good man.

I would give 4 stars out 5 stars for this. Because I thought that Robert was acting too insane for his own good haha.

That's my 2 cents worth and no more spoilers already!

let me share some stuff

I found a damn funny photo album of animals and anime characters. The thing is, it's damn vulgar.
Here's the link:
http://http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a55/pagyu/

vietnam reflections

WARNING: BORING POST

I have to hand up my official Vietnam trip reflections for the school today and I think I shall show it here, starting from question 5.

5. Responsibility / Contribution:
(a) Photographer for workshop and competition
(b) Danced and modelled for concert items/ Led a group for the SOS Orphanage
(c) Contributed the chemistry practical used in the workshop

6. What did I expect of the trip/programme?

I expected the trip to be arduous and tiring but fulfilling at the end. This was because of the large number of activities that I heard that we were doing for the trip within a short span of 10 days. As a result, I did not expect the trip to be generally fun, but instead, I thought of it as serious hard work. I had expected a country which was very backward in development, not expecting the accommodation and food to be of a high standard. As personal development, I expected my leadership qualities, interpersonal skills, intrapersonal skills and photography skills to develop to some extent as a result of practice throughout the duration of the trip. As I thought that the preparation for the trip was a rather precipitate as many tasks were done at the last minute, I had expected a workshop and concert of just only an acceptable standard. In general, I anticipated the programme in Vietnam to be fairly successful.

7(a) What did I actually experience/see?

I actually experienced a trip which was truly more than once-in-a-lifetime. Although during the trip I was physically tired, I was never mentally tired because I enjoyed what I did in Vietnam. As such, the trip never felt as if it was hard work. In fact, I felt that everyone in the trip had put in effort in some or another way in making the trip a success.

It was fun to interact with Vietnamese students and they often surprised me with their mannerisms and culture. With my interaction with the students, I saw a side of Vietnam that not many foreigners would experience – that is, the mutual relationships that form the tight community. I also saw the inquisitive nature of the Vietnamese that may one day bear fruit for the already booming economy. The students were hospitable and tried their best to communicate with me in English, but it was still difficult to break down the language barrier.
I experienced Vietnam to be a place brimming with history and culture from the visits to places which were related to Ho Chi Minh and other places such as the Temple of Literature. These visits have made me understand more about the beliefs and ideology of the Vietnamese.

Food and accommodation were better than expected, but accommodation could be considered as far below par in luxury standards. Vietnamese food was generally appetizing, but the daily cuisine could get repetitious after a few days. Perhaps our group missed out on what the typical Vietnamese ate for his or her meals.

7(b) What did I see/learn that is new?

As this was one of the few times that I worked with people as a team to work out something practical to apply in real-life, I gained a more realistic approach to working as a team. For example, when I voluntarily joined the English conversation programme team on the night of discussion before the workshop, I had to keep in mind the limitations of their resources to come up with ideas to help the team.

From a viewpoint of a photographer, I learnt several methods that photographers use to capture a defining moment. The trip gave me an opportunity to experiment with taking pictures of people as the main subjects and this allowed me to learn different approaches to making shots more interesting.

(For more, refer to question 10)

8. What could I have done to make the trip/programme better?

(a) Before the trip

I could have signed up for more responsibilities before the trip to fulfil my potential. This could have possibly reduced the workload of others. Perhaps I could have proposed a new responsibility such as welfare to take care of everyone involved in the trip and keep them in good spirits. I could also have learnt more of the Vietnamese language so that I could hold a simple conversation in Vietnamese. Furthermore, I could have contributed more by volunteering to help others who needed help in their jobs to reduce their workload because I was not part of any workshop programme. With my help, it could be possible for certain parts of the programme to run better. Moreover, I could have done my job of interviewing Mrs Chan earlier to make the first video presentation more interesting.

(b) During the trip

I could have brought my laptop to save all the photographs that I had taken before giving them to my partner and for more efficient distribution to the others in the group. Furthermore, I could be more resolute in my ideas for the video presentation so that the other parties are more agreeable to my ideas.
I could have been more intrepid and proactive in helping others to solve problems in some areas of the programme which required ideas and help due to the almost completely new situations that some workshop programmes have been put into.

9. What could I/we do better if there is another trip/programme (or if somebody asked me/us for advice)?

Rigorous planning with multiple back-up plans is required for a successful trip. Try to find a balance between planning and spontaneity in conducting activities for the trip to keep yourselves open to new ideas that may improve your activities. Always be prepared to think on your feet. Look out for each other and never leave anyone behind, especially in a foreign country. Do not strive for perfection, but strive for passion to achieve perfection. Be wary of the working style of your group members to avoid or mitigate internal conflicts. Employ a passionate photographer who is willing to do photography for the sake of the people and photography for the sake of his/her job as a photographer. At the end of everyday, gather everyone to take 20 minutes to write their reflections of the day in point form to aid in the process of writing the post-trip reflections. Know how to speak the native language of the place that you are in to prevent communication breakdowns with the locals. Organise some bonding sessions with the group members prior to the trip regardless of the time left for preparation for the trip.

10. How can I apply what I experienced/learnt in the future?

I learnt that it is difficult to get things the way you want things to be due to certain limitations and it is always best to arrive at a compromise which results in a win-win situation for all parties. I can apply the skill of coming to a compromise in the future by asserting my views but also considering the other party’s view and this can avoid or mitigate any major conflict . I also learnt that I should be lavish in praising people because this breeds motivation and everyone can do their job much better and I can be in a better position to influence people. In the future, I can apply this learning point so that I can work better with people and keep people more positive in their attitude. After doing the photography for the more important events during the trip, I gained invaluable photography skills that I apply in the future. I learnt that hard work is an important component of success, and I can definitely use this learning point in my academic pursuits. When working in a team in the future, I learnt from the trip that it is important that we form a strong bond with one another and avoid conflicts so that we can be successful in our main jobs. It is the interdependency between the team members which contributes to success.

merry christmas

Merry Christmas to all of you out there! It is a time to remember about the birth of Jesus Christ, not just about giving and receiving and basking in the Christmas festive mood.

I'm not going to blog much because I have already killed off my fingers by playing the piano for so many hours today and have already drained my "musical energy" by doing endless sightreading of SATB parts of Christmas songs. I have to say that today's 8am Christmas Service at St Andrew's Cathedral wasn't so special because I felt that something was missing. Now I have figured that out already: I didn't perform with Barker Band this year at Barker Road Methodist Church, and I don't think there's even a Christmas performance this year since there's the One ACS Esplanade performance tomorrow.

Christmas is also a time for my extended family to visit the colombarium in Hougang. And yeah, I know it's one place that one wouldn't normally visit in this season but I can't help it because it is family tradition.

Yes, I can't wait for tomorrow, the ACS Bands are going to rock Esplanade down with Christmas songs and other songs. Then, after that it's section supper! Yay!

christmas shopping

Went Christmas shopping after church today in Takashimaya. Met Timothy and met Emily. Timothy dunno how come he was in Orchard and he called me when I happened to be around the same area. Either coincidence or something I don't know. So we met and I did him some favour. I met Emily in the department store but I swear she never even noticed me even though she was looking around my direction until I tapped her. lol, what's wrong with her?

Christmas shopping was not good because of the big big big crowd throughout Takashimaya. I was carrying some big bags of things and people just keep on coming and I found it hard to move about. If not for the big crowd everywhere, shopping would have been more enjoyable.

The next post will probably be on something on Vietnam. Perhaps I shall talk about the home visit, the orphanage and the visit to Dang Tham Mai Secondary School. Stay tuned.

the last christmas band practice

It was bad... at least for me. Every one of the conductors had to pick on me! Mr Tan, Ms Tan and Mr Wong. Damn retarded. So I walked out. And so my msn nick reads "ian felt that he was hated by all the conductors and so he left band practice early to prevent further upset".

So you think I'm so easily pissed off? Well, this is only half true. I left early to attend my neighbour's wedding (Huan Xin got married). The ceremony started at 6pm and dinner was at 8pm. So draggy... that's why I wouldn't like to attend weddings of people I don't really know.

I shall go back to the picking on me crap. Dr Lee didn't pick on me today, which is good. But on the previous day, he had to over tuning in the last part of Les Miserables and the starting of the first note of the "let us hear the people sing" part of the piece. Stupid lah. My B-flat clarinet playing has turned damn loud and tone improved a lot after changing to using the 56 rue lepic reeds that I bought. Every time I play loud sure damn loud. And my fortissimo can overpower everyone. Since the resistance is quite high, it is also quite hard to control the clarinet to play soft now. This is probably the reason why Dr Lee keeps picking on me when I play the B-flat clarinet. For my E-flat clarinet playing, Dr Lee is always full of things to say. He keep praising me for my ability to play damn loud in Armenian Dances and running notes in Charming Asia. Which is good haha. All I got to say that the E-flat clarinet is damn easy to play damn loud and overpower almost the whole band.

So second came Ms Tan. She was ok, with a little bit of picking on me. But I can't remember haha. So I shall skip this part.

Mr Wong started the main part of the picking on me for today. In particular, the first note of Christmas Festival. First, he said that I was playing the wrong note on the first note. Then he said that he did not have my E-flat Clarinet part on his score and he came over to my stand and looked at my score. He saw the high D and asked me use the tuner to tune my D. I tell you, it was perfectly alright since it was at the green light. Since the key was transposed on mine to B-flat major, D should be flat but that doesn't matter because I was pressing the right key anyway. Anyway, when he heard the high woodwinds every time on the first bar, he acted damn weird and asked the band repeat again and again. But somehow, he did say most of his comments on this in my direction although I was certain it was me as I was playing the D (or concert F). Furthermore, the starting section he commented so much on the loudness and roughness of the woodwinds leading the melody. I dunno whether it was me because I was only clarinet playing the actual melody. Crap lah, feel damn bad. He probably said more things than this.

When it was Mr Tan, the worst came to worst. First, he said that my tuning was sharp. I accepted that comment anyway. Later on, in Sleigh Ride, in the swing part, he told me that my rhythm was wrong and then asked me to practise solo in front of the band while he conducted me. By this time, I was laughing inside, cos I was unlucky to get picked on by all the conductors to play some notes in front of the band. I didn't like it.

So this ends my unlucky band day and I left early to put my instruments in the viewing gallery and left the college.

So as I reached the Holland Village bus stop, I spotted the 48 bus at the opposite side. So I ran out of the 74 bus I was in and dashed across the road and chased the 48 bus. As I was about to reach the bus stop, the bus started moving. I ran on while the bus was still moving - it just didn't want to stop for me. I ran till half-way between the previous bus stop and the next bus stop and stopped running because the bus was moving quite slow until then. Stupid bus driver, more blind than a bat. So I walked over to the next bus stop and waited damn long for the next 48 bus.

DAMN SUAY TODAY. But so happening.

even more of vietnam

Photographs of Jia Jun in the Vietnam OCIP trip makes me laugh so hard that my tummy hurts. Somewhat like the first 2 lines of Photograph by Nickelback. He is so lame and retarded to purposely look like a retard or look away from the camera and smile at other things when everyone is facing the camera. Please refrain from NPNT unless you don't have facebook to search for Loke Jia Yi's Vietnam photo album or Tessa Goh's albums.

Tell you something interesting: There is no minimum age for drinking or smoking in Vietnam. Which meant, drinking in Vietnam was legal! Yay! Anyway sorry, I don't smoke, too smelly or a waste of money if you smoke. I still got a life worth living. If this was the case, we surely had to drink in Vietnam.

So Zaneth was looking at some liqeour in the supermarket to bring home, and I joined him. The vodka over there was damn cheap. Vietnam made ones cost 42500 Dong and the one I bought was about 100000 Dong. It was some German vodka called Caprice and it was mixed with kiwi, so it looked green. It was a mere 16% alcohol content. So Zaneth and I bought the same thing. I invited some people to drink that bottle I bought that night (the last night).

Drinking together in the room was great but the drink sucked because the vodka wasn't that good. I kept eating oranges because I didn't want to get a hangover. Zaneth was damn on, Jia jun too. Both of them turned red. I drank 8 shots but didn't turn red. Dunno why. Tessa, Yong Xin and the other girls in the room had some. I could have had more to drink haha. I only experienced partial highness, and my movement a bit slowdown, but other than that, I was quite alright after we finished the bottle. Then, Tessa and Yong Xin thought I was drunk, because I entered the bathroom while offering people to drink more and kept spamming the oranges. Then I went to sleep because they asked me to haha.

Meanwhile, while I was sleeping, I heard that Jia Jun was playing cards, and he kept throwing the cards everywhere. Then, Yong Xin, even though she drank relatively little, she kept mixing up the suits in bridge. I mean like how come they so easily to succumbed to the influence of alcohol?

So that's the end of today's post. I will talk about more random things in Vietnam next and I shall keep jumping about the events that took place. In other words, not in chronological order.

more of vietnam

I'm feeling a bit sick as I'm writing this, but I'll probably go for band.

I proud for my ACJC Band Sec 4 juniors who are coming into the school after the appeals. Congrats to all of you!

I still miss Vietnam. It was so fun. It was probably 10000 times better than JC Band Fest. Since none of you readers experienced it, you never know how much I enjoyed it.

Our group comprises 3 teachers and 19 non-Vietnamese and 4 Vietnamese, of which one of them, Hang, was from SAJC. Before the trip, some of us probably didn't know each other. We stuck to our own cliques or rather, group of familiar friends. After the trip, all of us bonded; we knew each other. I could sense it because I knew the feeling, reminiscent of my Sec 4 class, as if we went through thick and thin together. I can even say that I knew the teachers quite well. 10 days together as a group worked its magic. From mere strangers to a tight group in 10 days. Quite a feat.

Even my class or the current ACJC Band has not managed to do this yet. Perhaps after the very final trip to Switzerland, Vienna and Hong Kong, ACJC Band will bond together as a tight family. Perhaps at the very last part, there is hope.

During the Vietnam trip, I really must applaud and praise the Vietnamese in our group, Hang, Quynh, Phuong and Han, for their translation and help in all things Vietnamese. The teachers must be thanked too, for their behind-the-scenes support and organisation. Everyone did a great job, especially the non-Singaporeans, who took up the main leadership positions and did wonders with their jobs. I'm so happy for everyone, who has at least put in effort to make the trip a success. As for myself, I thought that I tried my best to do a good job with the photography, however, the fate of the photographs remains dubious. I just hope that they come back in one piece.

One thing still bugs me, which is my underutilization during the trip. At the end, I may have been tired, but I still felt that I could do more. Improvements could be made, such as actions to prevent the end-trip reprimanding of the Singaporeans by Mrs Soong. As a point to note, we were just following orders, so the best way is to give more responsibities to us, the Singaporeans.

On a more positive note, many of us never believed that the trip would be a huge success. Many of the ideas we put into use during the workshop were still in their untried and untested status, fresh from the preparation period. New challenges sprung up everywhere and old plans were rendered useless. Impromptu arrangements were what carried our group along. Yet, it was a success. As I was the photographer, I could read from the Vietnameses' facial expressions that they were joyful when the group did it's stuff. From their joy, we obtained fulfilment.

From our fan clubs, we also obtained fulfilment. The more prominent ones were mine and all the guys' except Zaneth, Adeline's, Han's (all the ones I can think of for now). The best fan club is Aditya's, arising from the fact that he is probably the first Indian in Vinh University. People do touch him to see whether he's real. During the powerpoint picture presentation, a picture of him sent the crowd into laughter as they recognised him. He got his hands shaken, e-mail addresses given to him, multiple pictures taken with him and a lot of what you 'd expect from a fan club. Mind you, I wasn't spared from these fan club stuff. I'm probably the only one who saw every of the 6 groups in rotation everyday, unlike the workshop people who saw 2 groups a day and never taught the same group ever again. From this view, I felt so special.

Everyday, I walked along the corridor and from the classrooms, I would see like the whole class who were not involved in the workshops staring at me. On the first day, there was this group of girls on the corridor and I walked past them. They giggled. You get the idea, do you? In a foreign land, you get treated like someone damn special. So weird. Suddenly, from a nobody, everyone turned into somebody, even people get headhunted to specially take photos with a certain group.

When it was time for home visits, the worst came to worst because two boys were fighting over who gets Jia Jun. I kept thinking that Vietnamese guys are gay because they can get very touchy with me but this matter was way blown over the top. Mdm Lim has a video of this intense argument and it's probably in Aditya's computer. Actually, the fact is, I have to think that Vietnamese guys are not gay, otherwise, I have think I'm actually gay because I'm forced to touch them if they touch me, which is so not true. Let's say that they are just hyper-metrosexual, which is a highly evolved form of the metrosexual male type.

If you want to talk about the girls, perhaps guys who are unable to get Singaporean girls can try looking to Vietnam. By looks, most of the girls CMI but there are hot ones out there, like one of them during my home visit (basically, it was a 12A5 class party). I think the girls over there will be less demanding and more caring towards guys haha. They surely know how to cook and the ones from Vinh High School come from good families. Good Vietnamese brides are not in short supply but I won't be looking for one though. :]

That's all for now. I will continue another time.

vietnamese students

Today was the day I finally stayed at home the whole day and I finally completed The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess in like 60 hours, minus the fishing game and poe soul quest. Yay! So now I can concentrate on SSEF and study for J2.

This is my view on the Vietnamese students in Vinh High School for Gifted Pupils in Mathematics, Physics and Informatics.

They are a friendly bunch. Whenever I entered a classroom to take photographs, a handful of them would say hi. Some of them would stare at me, expressionless, some will swoon in delight and disbelieve as if a normal Singaporean was a superstar. Not to mention that they have a passion for learning and they are extremely enthusiatic, judging from their high noise level in a language that I fail to decipher. When they are split into groups, they compete with one another wholeheartedly, expressing their competitive nature. Their standard of English is poor, but good enough to understand some of everyday speech, thus one would find it difficult to express complex ideas in English to them. Their English vocabulary is in fact quite exceptional for their level, inferring from the play they could play the forming the words from a larger word game or hangman. Never underestimate their ability in the sciences. Tell them something scientific, and they would question your claim. Language is their only barrier to a world of possibilities. Give them something to do, and they would give you more. For instance, tell them to build a bridge with a simple design, and they would construct a bridge which is more than just a bridge - it is their hard work and dedication. Most of them may be poor, but they are satisfied. Whenever you see them, they emanate joy, and you too, will be joyful. Not to mention that most of them are cam whores, bringing their cameras wherever they go and requesting people from our group to take photographs with them. Most of them are not camera-shy, instead they stand as intepid subjects in front of the camera, with a victory sign included. Playing football with them was an forgettable experience. We were pitted against their best, and we lost 4-1 without a tinge of regret. We shook hands and exchanged jerseys. Everyone cheered for each other. When the final day arrived, they gave presents without our request. We hugged and we exchanged e-mail addresses. We gave our school badges and we received their school cloth logo. We gave away our collegiates and they asked us to sign on it. They never fail to surprise us with their hospitality and concern. They are brimming with optimism and hope for a better future. They are indeed the embodiment of passion in the pursuit of perfection.

a summary of the vietnam trip

Today I went to school at 10am and everyone was told to write reflections for the Vietnam OCIP trip. I'd rather blog about it but I was told to write down and not type it, and then give it to Mrs Soong. Not my kind but it was fun to share my views and hear everyone else's view towards the OCIP.

After that, we took 92 bus to somewhere and went to Haato, which is something like Settler's Cafe, for lunch and played Taboo. Jiajun was some pro at Scrabble and helped me when I was at a loss for words. Some people met some unknown people there and everyone stayed till after 4pm, then went home. I took 156 bus with Huimin, and I dropped off at Copthorne Orchid (must remember how to go there next time).

THE END. Boring day. Doing the damn Maths tutorial 21 now.

In any case, I miss Vietnam. Now, life is back to boringness and band and studies and SSEF and crap. I shall talk a bit of Vietnam here.

Anyway, my DSLR photos will be missing over the next ___ days because Aditya ran away back to India with the photos I took during the workshop. The Vietnamese are probably going to harrass me for it. Help me!

Summary

Vietnam: friendly and enthusiatic Vinh students + nice weather + new ACJC friends + new Vietnamese friends + strengthened existing friendships + legally drinking + cards + brilliant place for photography + many life-skills learnt + visit to the SOS orphanage where there are really happy children + very accommodating Dang Thai Mai Secondary School students + cultural exchange concert + mostly nice food + expected quality of accommodation + football with official referees and shirt-exchanging + giving to and receiving gifts from the Vinh students + buying gifts for Christmas + secretly buying fake but real-looking Crumplers at night + Ha Long Bay boat ride + last minute spending of Dong at the airport + attending some communist propaganda youth celebration thingy at Vinh U + other memorable experiences = very unforgettable and memorable trip; once in a lifetime

Yes, I never regretted joining this OCIP and ponning Band Fest. Truly, it has been a great experience that I will never forget.

Over the next few days, I probably go through it in detail. (:

back home

Welcome back to the land of stress and more stress, Ian!

After I arrived in Singapore, I rushed from the airport to Esplanade to attend the JC Band Fest Concert with Irvin and missed the Man Utd vs Liverpool match. (OK, he left early to watch it with his friends haha) Anyway, generally, Honour Band sounded good. To be honest, the two other bands, Holst and Fennell, were generally lacking volume (loudness) and feel/musicality and I thought that Fennell was the better of the two (cos of better ACJC help, I think). Hmm, every band could do with a better tuning of chords. But not bad for a concert that was prepared in 4 days.

Okay, time to start some Vietnam recollections.

If you are a Vietnamese reading this... Xin Chao! Spread this blog to your other friends too. Cam On! Photos will be up in some days' time, so do not fret.

When I was there, I loved my job man, and so I thought I wasn't stressed there. I was the photographer with a Digital Single Lens Reflex (DSLR) camera, which means I looked damn professional. Using the DSLR to take pictures was so awesome that I fell in love with it. But too bad it wasn't mine, but nevermind that - it's the experience that matters.

As the photographer for almost all the important events of the Vietnam Overseas Community Involvement Programme (OCIP), I feel that I have the most comprehesive coverage and knowledge of what goes on everyday. This means that what I whatever that I will blog about will encompass my wide scope of the events.

SPOILER: I now have a fan club in Vietnam.

Okay, I'm going off for now, another day I will start cos it's late and today there's a reflection meeting in school at 10am.

sorry, emo time!

Tomorrow I'm leaving for Vietnam, but I shall write one more post before I leave.

Anyway, I'm especially damn low today, which is the opposite of high. Yeah, you get what I mean. The feeling of sian sian the whole day, feeling depressed for nothing, except that I don't tell people why...

Actually, the reasons are so mixed, I don't know what to say. Some people think I got external H3, research attachment, better grades than others mean I must be damn ownage. I don't know what to say, but I feel like going into hikikomori, if you know what that means. No, I won't be lah... joking only. My life is still worth living, I'm alive and well. Maybe the things I worry about all the time are just an illusion.

So like there's band, which I am damn passionate about but damn demoralised all the time since today. Dr Lee thinks I played a lot of wrong notes today, which is like wtf, since I know that I didn't play so many wrong notes as he said. Then Ms Sng kind of brought the band back to reality, that next year will be damn tough. Then, there's SSEF to finish, which I ever talked about in other posts. There's a whole load of homework and studying for me to do.

Then there's a feeling that I'm being underutilized, kind of underemployed as I know my capabilities are much better than slacking around everyday mindless doing things without a real purpose, feeling so empty and useless. I want to be used! Furthermore, the thing is, almost everyone in my class is some sort of leader in their CCAs. How about me? Who am I? I am a proud member of SMC and Band. Haha, dream on. Damn sad lah. Do you think I'm a happy-go-lucky person now? NO! I've changed! Ever since the day Mr Kayden Lim gave me a talk on getting a damn leadership position because I was denied a scholarship cos of this very reason, this underemployment problem has been recurring. I did say to him that I pretty much wanted that SMC vice-president position, but now I know it's unattainable. If I could now, I would plead with Mrs Soong about getting it. I feel that she would say: "How can you contribute?" I know I can contribute greatly in many things, but I've not been given the chance, or I let my chances fly by. Perhaps I could contribute by initiating change and making existing processes more efficient. Yeah, that's my forte. I know it's difficult being a leader, but looking at myself, I say, why not? I'm passionate, I have fire. My dream: "I want to lead people. I am a visionary. I envisage better days ahead."

God, please answer my prayer, I am Your useless servant, give me something to do. Or perhaps You do have a greater plan for me out there.

Maybe I should withdraw from having mundane worries such as being a leader in some sense. Whatever I do now, may not even affect what happens in my future working life. Let me forget them all and cherish the things I have.

the last one before the TRIP

Note: The large post that I'm currently writing will appear after my trip to Vietnam of OCIP (after 16 December 2007).

Hey, you all won't be seeing me for JC band fest because I'm in Vietnam for OCIP and having fun/self-torture from 7 December 2007 to 16 December 2007. Yeah, I'm leaving this Friday at 2.10pm for Hanoi on a SQ flight. I'm going to Vinh, which is south of Hanoi, for some science exchange programme with Vinh University and teach English at the SOS Orphanage. I'm the photographer btw, dunno why though, but expect me to flood facebook with pictures after the trip.

Anyway, today was a nice day cos I received my external H3 acceptance letter for NTU's Contemporary Physics. Yay! Thank God and must praise Him. Because I thought that I was not going to get it as it was very very late already, but I did get it eventually. The situation was that the General Office sms-ed me a notification but I really did not get it... until today, they called me up, and apparently I was in school for OCIP preparation and I rushed down to get the letter. It sounds amazing because I'm still allowed to sign up and accept the place by tomorrow, 6th December despite the dateline being on 30th November.

After OCIP preparation today, I went to buy 2 sets of school uniform, new shoes for Vietnam trip and collected my funky spectacles. But it's damn retarded cos the idiot shopkeeper at BIbi&BAba packed in the wrong pants and gave me acs(i) bermudas, argh, I had to ask my mum to change for me tomorrow.

My new Adidas shoes I bought from Queensway, and the shopkeeper actually discounted the shoes from $111 to $78. Huat ah! Cheap already! Woo hoo! Yeah, if you guys are looking for shoes, get the best bargains at Salem & Sons over there. I swear by the store because I bought my soccer boots from there once at $50 flat. DAMN CHEAP!

My spectacles is plastic lol, and it looks as if I'm going to army. And the frame, I think, is quite big. I really look damn different and it's good to look different for a while. Don't NPNT please.

This concludes my final blog post before the Vietnam trip. Please tag and read my other posts. If you are not interested, fine lah.

Bad Press

I did receive bad press about the last post saying that Zi Shen looks like Pei Shi. Don't ask me anything about it. Ask Ryan Wan, he suggested it first, I 人云亦云 only. Perhaps everyone needs a picture of Pei Shi first, which I currently don't have.

Anyway, I'm in the middle of writing a large blog post. Should be quite interesting for all ACSians. haha.

Leave everyone with a long joke:

A: I've heard that cardiovascular exercise can prolong life; is this true?
Doctor : Your heart is only good for so many beats, and that's it... don't waste them on exercise. Everything wears out eventually. Speeding up your heart will not make you live longer; that's like saying you can extend the life of your car by driving it faster. Want to live longer? Take a nap.

A: Should I cut down on meat and eat more fruits and vegetables?Doctor : You must grasp logistical efficiencies. What does a cow eat? Hay and corn. And what are these? Vegetables. So a steak is nothing more than an efficient mechanism of delivering vegetables to your system. Need grain? Eat chicken. Beef is also a good source of field grass (green leafy vegetable). And a pork chop can give you 100% of your recommended daily allowance of vegetable products.

A: Should I reduce my alcohol intake?
Doctor :No, not at all. Wine is made from fruit. Brandy is distilled wine, that means they take the water out of the fruity bit so you get even more of the goodness that way. Beer is also made out of grain. Bottoms up!

A: How can I calculate my body/fat ratio?
Doctor : Well, if you have a body and you have fat, your ratio is one to one. If you have two bodies, your ratio is two to one, etc.

A: What are some of the advantages of participating in a regular exercise program?
Doctor :Can't think of a single one, sorry. My philosophy is: No Pain...Good!

A: Aren't fried foods bad for you?
Doctor :YOU'RE NOT LISTENING!!! .... Foods are fried these days in vegetable oil. In fact, they're permeated in it. How could getting more vegetables be bad for you?

A: Will sit-ups help prevent me from getting a little soft around the middle?
Doctor : Definitely not! When you exercise a muscle, it gets bigger. You should only be doing sit-ups if you want a bigger stomach.

A: Is chocolate bad for me?
Doctor :Are you crazy? HELLO. Cocoa beans! Another vegetable!!! It's the best feel-good food around!

A: Is swimming good for your figure?
Doctor :If swimming is good for your figure, explain whales to me.

A: Is getting in-shape important for my lifestyle?
Doctor :Hey! 'Round' is a shape!Well, I hope this has cleared up any misconceptions you may have had about food and diets.And remember: "Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways - Chardonnay in one hand - chocolate in the other - body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO HOO, What a Ride" Like Eng Loong... haha
AND......For those of you who watch what you eat, here's the final word on nutrition and health.

It's a relief to know the truth after all those conflicting nutritional studies.
1. The Japanese eat very little fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.
2. The Mexicans eat a lot of fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.
3. The Chinese drink very little red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.
4. The Italians drink a lot of red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.
5. The Germans drink a lot of beers and eat lots of sausages and fats and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.
CONCLUSION:Eat and drink what you like. Speaking English is apparently what kills you.

update update!

Here I am, responding to my dead blog.

The past few weeks were quite hectic, containing one new matter that could destroy time to do any proper schoolwork in the holidays.

Overview:
1. Lots of Band
2. Tune-in 2
3. Band Chalet
4. NRP Presentation
5. Singapore Science and Engineering Fair (SSEF)
6. 4A1 Class Party (1 of 2) (1st one for Zi Shen as he's leaving for army)

1. and 2. Band. At Tune-in 2, there were so little Secondary 4s as compared to yesteryears. Our dear ACJC Band is so dead. Zhi Wen said yesterday that appeals amounted to 10 as compared to the usual 20. So sad. I swear I must do something. *secret for now*

Band practices are becoming a normal part of life again after promos (this statement is a bit wols). After a year in band, the band pieces I have now are becoming much much much easier to learn; a testament to the amount of improvement to my clarinet skill since coming from my dreamtime Barker band days which hindered my improvement. Dr Lee's selection of pieces are nice: Rhapsody of the Theme of Paganini, Armenian Dances (Part 1), Charming Asia and lots more. Ever since switching to E-flat Clarinet, I've been getting some solos and duets with the piccolo. It's quite a challenge as the E-flat Clarinet is such a small instrument so it's hard to press the keys.

3. Band Chalet. It was fun. I shan't go into the details here. To summarize: BBQ, soccer, frisbee, red house, night cycling to esplanade and bedok resevoir (I didn't do this), pool, watching YEL and kenneth get high and making confessions, disgusting at YEL's puke at the sink, cleaning the chalet with the responsible Sathis, card games, long conversations in the room at night over ghost stories and the likes, stoning in the morning and afternoon, going orchard to meet kenneth, eating at seligie beancurd and banquet across the road thereafter, daytona, being amazed at Zhan Wei's skills at time crisis, YEL forever trying to bring Sarah closer to me kind of actions, the list goes on...
Check out Shaun Tay's or YEL's blog for more opinions on the chalet.

4. NRP Presentation. I didn't quite like it though. Let me describe the two assessors. One is an Indian (I'm not racist, I got Indian friends too you know!) who got damn bored during my poster presentation (he kept looking elsewhere and closing his eyes) and retardedly asked dumb questions cos he probably never listened to my presentation. He kept saying he got no time to assess my other project mates and like an idiot, quickly left, leaving my 2 other project mates without a 2nd assessor. This caused a lot of problems as I had to contact the student help desk and get another assessor for my mates.

The other assessor was a Chinese (I'm not racist, I'm a Chinese too!) who asked the worst kind of questions one would expect. He asked me could I assume this and that crap... So, never had I faced such a tough time in answering questions. My two other project mates were seriously owned by him. This arrogant guy kept disagreeing with their projects. He kept saying "This cannot work in Singapore" and "No... No..." , shaking his head. I ask you, have you ever met a pessimistic assessor with so much subjective things to say about other's projects? And of course, they were also owned my his questions. I must say we hated him, so much that I talked with Hongtao (the 29 year-old phd student who guided us in the project) literally and figuratively behind the guy's back when he was assessing Evelyn, my project mate.

5. SSEF. Oh cool. This is called self-torture. I actually proposed to Edmund, my project mate that we 3 people should merge our projects and sign up for SSEF. This means that we have to get a lot more experimental data at a different and much bigger location. In case you don't know what I am talking about, part of my project is to take the signal strength from many access points in the wireless network at many loacations within a place. This is horribly tedious work if you ask me. No more holidays. D:

6. 4A1 Class Party. This occurred yesterday. It was fun, like all the previous 4A1 parties this year (This was the 3rd one). Before I went to Jon Ngiam's huge house from band, Ryan Wan said that Zi Shen looks like the Sec 4 Pei Shi who DSA-ed through ACJC band. So when I reached there, I saw Zi Shen and seriously, I thought that Zi Shen and Pei Shi were separated at birth. He really resembled the girl which the band went ga-ga about. I had to take photos of Zi Shen, so I went on to do it. The photos will be uploaded soon on a photosharing website. Anyway, the purpose of the 4A1 party was to give Zi Shen a party before he leaves for army soon, so in a way, it's like taking a "before army" photo of Zi Shen haha.

So, we ate KFC and pizza. Everyone was in a good mood. We played pool, monopoly, piano-ed a bit. Btw, I played Brahm's Intermezzo No. 2, Op. 118. Woohoo, I already can perform it. Yeah, it's the piece I took from Youtube in an earlier post on this blog.

Oh, there's another class party on 12th December, to celebrate Bryan Chen's return to Singapore. Too bad, I won't be there as I'm going to Vietnam for OCIP from 7 Dec to 16 Dec. Anyway, the way Mrs Soong described the itinerary sounded like it is going to be exciting and full of surprises. Yeah, I looking forward to it! :D Nvm that JC band fest takes place during this time.

Thinking of class parties, I feel that my present class ACJC SA1 '07/'08, is seriously lacking in this department. Man, I feel like I shall be the one to bring them all together this holiday for some fellowship as no one has ever done that since the PAE days. Time to take action! But, too bad, I'm almost out of time to do anything this holidays.

Hey, SA1ers, if anyone of you reads this, will you be the one who will organise a class party? I shall see.

Update:
Click below to see my friend who looks like Pei Shi
http://www.flickr.com/photos/21432555@N05/

A brief overview of the NRP research paper

Woohoo! Gone are the days of endless toil and pain. But the days when I will pon band still remains. That's sad.

Yes, I've submitted the bloody research paper for project EEE11. And they say out there that the school of EEE is the most difficult if you went to NTU. An achievement? Maybe not. A lifetime achievement? Yes, through and through.

Imagine having to toil through endless calculations that any sane person would not do. I swear the computer saved my ass because there was this calculation in my results that required 315 calculations and it's a function that includes a summation of a series.

But still, the computer never saved exactly spared me from endless calculations. Sorry, I'm not a programming expert. So I had to calculate 250 times of the pythagora's theorem in a Cartesian coodinate system. If I actually went into the actual details, there's much more than this. In fact, for one, I actually had to manually record all the calcualtions on paper. That's tough enough. There are other tough stuff too, but I shall not mention for the sake of brevity.

Ok, all of these calculations for what? Be shocked. Because WTF, it's just 5 probability density function graphs.

Next, I referred to at least 10 other research papers for my literature review. That is tough because I had to write up a related work section using the sources and everyone knows that research papers are too cheem to even read and understand.

BLah... for brevity's sake. Who is brevity? Does he deserve a sake? (sorry lame and not funny)

Okay. 3555 words in a 6 page research paper, using extremely cheem language, with a reference section in APA citation style (this is tedious to type you know!). You will instantly know that this is indeed a lifetime achievement because I don't believe that I will write another of this in this topic of indoor wireless positioning system forever! haha.

Next Saturday I shall have to present a poster and an oral presentation at NRP Symposium 2007, wish me luck! If all goes well, I could probably get a Gold or even more. I haven't started on any of them yet. So, I shall need to mention some sacrifices: Pon band on Friday. Time that could be spent mugging with the holiday homework. Time for socialising. Time for blogging here. Time for facebooking.

But nevermind all those, as the rewards are great.

Violation of rule number 7

Today, I shall violate rule number 7 of Ian's rules for blogging.

The red book called the RIGHT WORD sucks and 1100 words is 1000000 times better. Get it? No, I haven't started on it yet.

I just can't stand ponning so much band...

This will be short one.

I'm currently in the middle of chionging my Nanyang Research Programme project, so I'm busy for whole days in a row. It's been a almost a week (since Monday) since I started chionging and I must say this sucks. It's not even exam time but I'm like super busy and having an eternal migrane. Take last night, when I was thinking so much that I couldn't sleep till after 3am. Today I actually spent a whole day at the NTU Positioning and Wireless Technology Centre from 10am to 11pm, almost dead already. Staring at the glaring screen and looking at tiny numbers is a sure formula for an eternal migrane. Oh well, I shall have to hand up the research paper by Monday midnight, before Tuesday comes around.

I can't stand the idea of ponning so much band. Last Saturday I couldn't attend band because it was the music theory exam day. Today, I had to be at NTU to do this tedious shit. Next Saturday, I shall have to present an oral presentation and a poster at NTU. If I want to complete the poster in time, I shall have to pon band on a weekday. So there's Tuesday, Thursday (Tune-in 2) and Friday for band next week. Ok, I shall forgo Friday. There's really no choice because my project is seriously a solo project that should be done by at least a group because it's really so tedious.

I am hating this time of my life. "Holidays" indeed.

Ian's rules for blogging

I observe blogs quite often. I can't stand it when blogs are so ______ (could be any reason). So, I have formulated some rules for blogging.

1. Please write in proper English, or at least make an effort. I can't stand it when people write in SMS English or Singlish, super broken up English or English interspersed with ... and more ... .

2. Pictures must be followed with relevant captions that are explanatory and should not be random pictures that do not show the point the blogger is trying to make.

3. If you want to write personal stories of your day/experiences, the rule is to only write interesting events. As for other matters, do not bother mentioning as people do not want to read them. You should write "boring" events in your personal diary at home.

4. If you want to put song lyrics in your blog, please embed a Youtube video of the artist singing that song. Do not assume everyone wants to read the lyrics or everyone knows the song.

5. If you are feeling emo somehow, you may rant on your blog. But please write something optimistic at the end of the blog entry.

6. When you visit someone's else blog and you know the person, please make it a point to tag or comment. It makes their day and they will be motivated to continue writing more blog entries.

7. Please do not write one word/one sentence entries and expect the whole world to understand what in the world you are saying. The purpose of the blog is to share your views and you should elaborate properly!

8. Please do not write one topic or experience and jump suddenly to another unrelated event. Please write coherently. If you wish to express a new idea/experience, start another paragraph.

9. Please do not clump everything together in a single paragraph because it looks disorderly and it puts off people from reading.

10. Please do not use blog skins that make people put in effort to find the button that leads to your post. People want to see your posts, not the blank page of pictures!

When I got the time, I will think of more complains and new rules!

You may wish to forget the above and just remember this: Blogs should be completely readable by anyone and should be self-explanatory.
Just ask yourself, if you were to be some other random person reading your own blog, would you understand what you are writing?

If you think these rules are too troublesome, continue to write in your own way lah. Your blog is your blog, so put whatever you want on it.

The state of ACJC food

I love talking about food. Too bad, ACJC does not provide good food. It is my honour as an unofficial food critic to complain like a STOMPer and not go to STOMP because it sucks anyway. Before I start, I must follow a rating system, ok, it's easy to follow: it's the 1 to 5 out of 5 rating system.

Let's start from the drinks stall. Nice snacks like toasted bread although sometimes it's sold out. Haribo is good. The popular but super diluted Milo bottle is a rip-off at $1, why not buy a Milo 80cents transparent cup version which contains more Milo at a less diluted state. Ice coffee bottle is good strong coffee which is enough to keep you awake in class or exam. Ice teh is a little dilute but good enough. Ribena is a bit dilute. Best thing about this stall is that you can buy relatively cheap 500ml bottles of drinks like coke, sprite, H2O, 100 plus, etc... yes, at $1 only.
Verdict: 3.5/5

Next up, the snack stall. Waffles are the best thing, suit yourself, buy any flavour you prefer. Potato wedges are sinful but delicious, but always buy them when they are hot, otherwise they suck. Sandwiches are alright only. Chicken chip is so-so. I like the fishballs. Paus are delicious if you don't want to eat anything else. I still don't get why people continue to eat the big Japanese sugar biscuit when you can get sick of it after eating like half of it. Basically, in this stall, everything is edible and good.
Verdict: 4/5

Next, the sandwich stall, which the owners got sick of selling noodles and switched to sandwiches instead. I thought that the fried dumplings of the noodles stall was nice though. Basically, this sandwich stall is inexperienced and I think they have diversified too much to selling all kinds of crap. I ate from here only twice. Ok, give them just a pass as find the food a little less than average.
Verdict: 2.5/5

Next, the taste of the orient stall or economy rice. The bottom line is, the new owners suck. First, they give too little and they actually count the portion they give, so they are not generous enough. Secondly, variety sucks because some food many people can't live without are missing from the menu. Thirdly, I don't like the new guy's face lol, dunno why. But the auntie with the cash is polite haha, a rare one.
Verdict: 1.5/5 so get out of here please!

Next, the fruit stall. This rocks the most, especially when you specifically ask them to not add water to dilute your juice and everything will taste nice if you don't mind paying just a bit more. For cut fruit, pineapples are surprisingly good. But their sugarcane juice may sometimes taste weird though haha. Overall, this fruit stall is good, and they sell way cheaper than their hawker centre counterparts.
Verdict: 4.5/5

Next, the malay food stall, makan bagus. I like this stall but as usual, it's an old malay woman serving the food and the queue will be very slow haha. Beef rendang is above average. Fried chicken drumstick is nice, especially with the chilli sauce. I cannot take the sambal stingray, too hot, cos the last time I experienced 10 full minutes of freaking hot hot hottness in my mouth that I almost died, and the water cooler was futile. Beef noodles are good and is cheap as dirt. Ai ya good stall! Bagus!
Verdict: 3.5/5

Next, the indian food stall. Ok la. Their fried rice is good but wait long long long long. Their roti prata is horrible, not cripsy at all. Papadam is zomg good. Friendly people. I likes.
Verdict: 3.5/5

Next, the Yong Tau Foo stall. Everytime I eat this, I will fear that I will get stomachache, like poor Jasmine who was hospitalised. Manfred says Tuesday are Yong Tau Foo day, supposedly the food is the most fresh on that day or it's early break, so fresh Yong Tau Foo cos its early in the morning! If you look carefully in the soup, you could possibly find an insect lol.
Verdict: 2.5/5 they are lucky that they are not out of the canteen due to hygiene problems

Next, the pig and chick stall. Why is this so popular? Because it is fast and reasonably priced unless you buy lotsa additional stuff, and its the only proper thing that you can eat in ACJC. The rice is tasteless and never ever buy the char siew. Porridge is good. And always, always, spam your food with free fried onions and black soya sauce to make your food tasty. However, if you look at the chicken macaroni soup, you will always see many insect parts or whole insects in it, makes you wonder if insects form part of the ingredients to make this dish haha.
Verdict: 3/5 Boo for finding foreign matter in soup and tasteless rice!

Next, the Western food stall. Forget this stall. They make me wonder how they make ends meet. Overpriced, untasty, unappetizing, a stall doomed for failure... need I say more? But still make edible food though.
Verdict: 1.5/5

Finally, the heritage cafe... hmm... we call it cafe anyway. Infamous for long waiting times, bad service and overpriced stuff haha. Only thing good here is the torikatsu burger, a sinful and expensive but super delicious. I would come here only to buy the cold 1.5 litre 100 plus and take some cups and enjoy with my friends after some sort of physical stuff.
Verdict: 2/5

Indeed, ACJC has a food crisis. Somebody should step in to remedy this problem and tame the tastebuds of ACSians who think that bad food is normal in school. My solution: if you have the time and money, always go out of school to eat. Go to dover market and eat lemon chicken rice, ban mian, char kway teow, fried hokkien mee and drink $1 bubble tea. Go to holland village and enjoy burger king, subway, the hawker food there, crystal jade, and other nice stuff. Go to Ghim Moh market and eat the super famous and freaking nice char kway teow. Anymore suggestions, anyone?

Brahms Intermezzo op. 118 no. 2

Brahms' Intermezzo Op. 118, No. 2. It's so beautiful. Listening it to can be moving. You should listen too. :D

I just started on it last Saturday. My right hand part is good liao. Left hand part needs a lot of work, especially when Brahms' pieces usually require a rich bass sound. My version sounds like shit lol. Even after I get the notes in some weeks' time, I still need to work on the expression, the feel, the musicality. It can be hard to reach the level of playing on this Youtube video by Citlalli Guevara.

theory music exam!

Currently, I'm studying for my grade 6 music theory exam which happens tomorrow. I think memorising foreign terms is the toughest part! Let's quote Chiaki's line from Nodame Cantabile: "forte! forte! con fuoco!" lolx! But European terms are sure much more interesting than English. They sound more appassionato, sound more nuovo, there's assai molto affettuoso and they are filled mit feurig.

okays. I gotta go study more. here's what to expect next... the situation of food in acjc, my nrp project, pw op?, other more interesting stuff if i got inspiration somehow... byes.

the interlude of the hiatus

I'm still under hiatus... but I'm bored.

Someone please tag. Entertain this blog.

I give you a topic: The solitariness of an impecunious bachelor exemplified in a black minimialist depiction.

Is my cheem English enough to intimidate yours? Or can you think of something better for a blog description for this blog?

physics olympiad

I stepped into the atrium at the entrance of LT28 in NUS. I was surrounded by the greatest brains in the country. What else? It's the Singapore Physics Olympiad (SPhO).

RJC and HCI oversent their people again. So many of them. Shaun Sim jokes about Mr Daniel Khor complaining about this unfairness. He also says about him wanting ACJC peeps to stay for the entire length of 4 hours. Siao. Some unfaithful people just couldn't do it haha.

The paper was just insane. I shall not harp on it. But there were some seriously easy questions like projectile motion ( 4 marks) and 1 explanation question which is free marks. You see, in physics, its not the physics that kills, its the Maths. All in all, I only knew how to do a handful. It was a pity there was no rotational stuff or relativity, which are easier stuff. I consider it an achievement to sit through 4 hours with a demanding paper. For the last 2 hours, it was very unproductive, and that was when the headache sat in.

If Shaun Ng can do only 3 questions, I think my standard isn't that bad after all. Shaun Sim says he knew only the first question and the easy ones. I thought that first question wasn't that hard at all, even though I could'nt do it but I knew the principle behind it (You see, physics is easy, Maths is difficult).

From now on, I shall continue my hiatus till 31st October, my OP day. Then it's time to chiong NRP.

The 2nd hiatus

Ok. It's supposed to be called post-promos. But I still got 4 major stuff I need to do.

1. Singapore Physics Olympiad
SPhO is coming up this Tuesday. I'm at Young's Modulus in the University Physics textbook. Still got a long way to go to cram all the physics. Yes, people, today I've been bombarded with congrats but I'm still a long way from being ready.

2. Nanyang Research Programme
NRP. I'm supposed to resume after promos but obviously I haven't.

3. Project Work
The last hurdle... OP! I've to finish finalising the content tonight but I've haven't started my work.

4. Chinese A levels
I'm supposed to write a Chinese zuo wen everyday but I don't I think I can with all these equally important stuff. Perhaps after SPhO I will chiong here. If I were to get an A for Chinese, it will be the biggest ever shocker. C5 in Os to A in As. Cool. I can say this because I thought my oral and listening was unexpectedly worthy of distinction... which means at least 2 grades up!

In lieu of these demanding and horrible stuff, I've decided to make this blog dead till 29th October 2007. The date of the Chinese A levels. Yes, the second hiatus. Rather unexpected. So goodbye and have fun because almost everyone else can enjoy their post promos with only PW and Chinese As. Also, prevent me from playing and time-wasting if you see me around. Thanks. (:

bubbleteaboi: a short story

My internet username: bubbleteaboi

This is the username that I have always been using since Primary 5. I tell you all a story of why I use this username.

Prior to using bubbleteaboi, I never really had a permanent username. In Runescape, I used pikaking_15. In yahoo mail, I used ianlee_1990. In Neopets, I used charkiller and pikaking_15 and several others. In Tactical Commanders, I used some weird username. Of course, these usernames are now defunct in the mentioned sites.

bubbleteaboi holds a special significance to me. The username occured to me as I was thinking of a username for probably a new account in Neopets shortly after the following event. In Primary 5, I went to some Methodist funfair in which my class, 5.9 of ACS(J) (2001), had to man some store. During that time, it was the peak of the bubble tea craze. Of course, in funfairs, there had to be a bubble tea stall, so across our stall was a bubble tea stall. In all, I drank and bought 3 bubble teas during the whole time I was there. My friends thought that drinking 3 bubble teas was quite a feat and they were quite amused. So there came about the name bubbleteaboi!

In Primary 6, when ACS(J) held its carnival, my class set up 6.9 cafe + LAN shop at the school library. As I was bubbleteaboi, me and several friends thought of making bubble tea for the cafe. It was a brillant idea because many people bought our bubble tea even though it really sucked. In the end, I think my class collected the most money in the funfair and I know I did my part in contributing to it. (:

I have variations of the username. For example, bubbletehboi, NoL.BuBbLeTeA and bubbleteab0i. These were inevitable when I wanted to create multiple accounts for the many games I played. Variations of the username can be found in Gunbound, Neopets and Warcraft III, Hotmail, HardWareZone and the other websites I use.

A search in Google shows that bubbleteaboi comes out in Everquest. Seriously, I had never even played that game. So sad, there's others who use my name, I thought it was original enough. Nevertheless, I have never found another person in any site using my username. That's good enough. (:

Here's another thing tied to bubbleteaboi...
My usual internet password: *secret*

There's letters and numbers, so there's many permutations. (: This was suggested by Bryan, my cousin, when I was thinking of a new password and he just happened to be at my house. I'm still using it now, even though I use different ways of the basic form of the password for different accounts so don't ever think of hacking haha.

That's all. If I told you all the details there is, I'd be expecting a virtual disaster. haha. :D

Bugged Microsoft

Microsoft is super bugged or weird. Try the following now. I tried liao. haha. (Only Microsoft OS)

MAGIC #1
Nobody can create a FOLDER anywhere on the computer which can be named as "CON". This is a reserved word...TRY IT NOW ,IT WILL NOT CREATE " CON " FOLDER or file

MAGIC #2
For those of you using Windows, do the following:
1.) Open an empty notepad file
2.) Type "Bush hid the facts" (without the quotes)
3.) Save it as whatever you want.
4.) Close it, and re-open it. is it just a really weird bug? :-??

MAGIC #3 microsoft crazy facts
At Microsoft the whole Team, including Bill Gates, couldn't answer why this happened! It was discovered by a Brazilian. Try it out yourself... Open Microsoft Word and type =rand (200, 99) And then press ENTER then see the magic.......

funny peektures and others

Some pictures to laugh at...

yeee.. lol he or she?
Poor ducks! lol.
ok. noted.
wtf!?
Play too much liao.

true. lol.

lol.

So deprived.

THIS ONE JUST READ LAH! Makes SENSE. Beauty looking for rich mate owned.
Beauty said:
Okay, I’m tired of beating around the bush. I’m a beautiful (spectacularly beautiful) 25 year old girl. I’m articulate and classy.I’m not from New York . I’m looking to get married to a guy who makes at least half a million a year. I know how that sounds, but keep in mind that a million a year is middle class in New York City, so I don’t think I’m overreaching at all. Please hold your insults - I’m putting myself out there in an honest way. Most beautiful women are superficial; at least I’m being up front about it. I wouldn’t be searching for these kind of guys if I wasn’t able to match them - in looks, culture, sophistication, and keeping a nice home and hearth.
Anonymous replied:
Firstly, I’m not wasting your time, I qualify as a guy who fits your bill; that is I make more than $500K per year. That said here’s how I see it.Your offer, from the prospective of a guy like me, is plain and simple a crappy business deal. Here’s why. Cutting through all the B.S., what you suggest is a simple trade: you bring your looks to the party and I bring my money. Fine, simple. But here’s the rub, your looks will fade and my money will likely continue into perpetuity…in fact, it is very likely that my income increases but it is an absolute certainty that you won’t be getting any more beautiful!So, in economic terms you are a depreciating asset and I am an earning asset. Not only are you a depreciating asset, your depreciation accelerates! Let me explain, you’re 25 now and will likely stay pretty hot for the next 5 years, but less so each year. Then the fade begins in earnest. By 35 stick a fork in you!So in Wall Street terms, we would call you a trading position, not a buy and hold…hence the rub…marriage. It doesn’t make good business sense to “buy you” (which is what you’re asking) so I’d rather lease. In case you think I’m being cruel, I would say the following. If my money were to go away, so would you, so when your beauty fades I need an out. It’s as simple as that. So a deal that makes sense is dating, not marriage.
Somebody's Interpretation of the moral of this story:Financial education is very important! It is always good to be able to write and express yourself well.

THIS ONE damn funny. sillyporeans are smart.

There's a general saying - "Laughter's the best medicine". Hope the following article works wonders for you too.Why Singlish is better?Use Singlish. It's so much cheaper, shorter, faster.Why do we insist on using the Queen's English, when Singlish is so much more economical and effective?Compare and see!

When going shopping...
Britons : I'm sorry, Sir, but we don't seem to have the sweater you want in your size, but if you give me a moment, I can call the other outlets for you.
S'poreans: No Stock!
When returning a call...
Britons : Hello, this is Mr Bean. Did anyone page for me a few moments ago?
S'poreans: Hello, who page?
When someone is in the way...
Britons : Excuse me, I'd like to get by.
Would you please make way?
S'poreans: Siam lai! or Siam, hor! or Skius!
When someone offers to pay...
Britons : Hey, put your wallet away, this drink is on me.
S'poreans: no need lah.
When asking for permission...
Britons : Excuse me, but do you think it would be possible for me to enter through this door
S'poreans: (while pointing at door) Can pass or Not?
When asking to be excused...
Britons : If you would excuse me for a moment, I have to go to the gents/ladies. Please carry on without me, it would only take a moment.
S'poreans: Go toilet. Buay tahan ahh.....
When entertaining...
Britons : Please make yourself right at home.
S'poreans: Don't shy shy lah..
When doubting someone...
Britons : I don't recall you giving me the money.
S'poreans: Got meh?
When deciding on a plan of action...
Britons : What do you propose we do now that the movie's sold out & all the restaurants are closed?
S'poreans: So how?
When disagreeing on a topic of discussion...
Britons : Err. Tom, I have to stop you there. I understand where you're coming from, but I really have to disagree with what you said about the policy.
S'poreans: Talk cock lah you!
When asking someone to lower their voice...
Britons : Excuse me, but could you please lower your voice, I'm trying to concentrate over here.
S'poreans: Eh, Tiam leh!
When asking someone if he/she knows you...
Britons : Excuse me, but I noticed you staring at me for some time.Do I know you?
S'poreans: See what see?!

i feel like suaning

After physics SPA went out with 1SA2 peeps and allan and david. Watched Nanny Diaries. Ok movie. Give it 3.5/5 rating. I very lenient already. Basically wasted and let the day rot at Cine.

Physics SPA was no problem. Tricky though. This one's about a metre rule pendulum.

Tomorrow is Chemistry SPA. Hoping for the best.

I shall be random and talk about random stuff. Maybe I should suan my own class.

I just visited the 1sa1 class blog. It's still dead. I just tag it in a bid to revive it. The class jacket project is still in the works. No posts in both the old and new blogs for very long already.
Today at cineleisure, I saw most of the scones watching movie/eating Subway as a class. However, 1SA1 seems to have had no proper class outings since like 1st 3 months period at bala's house.
In class, whenever a person proposes a class outing, not much enthusiasm is shown.
In the candeck, 1sa1 has never sit as a class eating together during breaks since like 1st 3 months period.
Not a single birthday has been celebrated as a class since like 1st 3 months period... even the scones are more interested in this department.
Mr Ong Jin Yi once said during tennis PE that most of the guys don't mix with the girls when playing tennis.
I still haven't experienced the togetherness of 1sa1 as a class that I had experienced with 4A1.

I have presented more than enough evidence to treat my own class as a class which is a not a class. Certainly, this must not continue. I know all of my classmates are proud to be in SA1. It is a class with an outstanding reputation in ACJC. We are surely trying our best to keep up to it. But there exists an innate defect in the intricate social fabric of our class. I cannot pinpoint the source(s) of the problem, but it is apparent.

From now on, I pledge to keep SA1 as a class that truely exists as a class. As an individual, I do not possess the power keep such a pledge. As a class, we do.

blogging using OPV-MOV style

today i will blog some things that concerns many people. I will be using Mdm Ong Leh Hwa's OPV-MOV style lol. Sorry for lack of evidence.

1. Friendster vs Facebook...

Which is better?
My stand: facebook. haha.

Other people's viewpoint (OPV):
Friendster can personalise the profile, can write comments, less complicated than many application facebook, Facebook not many of my friends use...

My own viewpoint (MOV):
Facebook has many fun applications - can interact with friends better. Can also write comments on wall, the photo book can put higher resolution peektures. The company is worth at least US$1 or 2 billion, wanted by google, yahoo... David said: once you use facebook, you're not going back to friendster (i'm using both now anyway)

Conclusion:
Facebook wins hands down because it encourages you to be involved in fun activities with your friends.

2. Is the Singapore education system a waste of time?

My Stand: Yeah, it is.

OPV: Very thorough... CCAs + academic.. "all-round" holistic education... makes you well-rounded (fat!), prepare you well for working life, give you time to mature before you go university or else you make a fool of yourselves there

MOV: Why are there 16-year-olds foreigners in university (my brother discovered this in SMU)? Can't we have more too? (more flexibility), Primary school and secondary school is a waste of time... when reach junior college suddenly must chiong so many things cos the afternoons of secondary school we are very free, the things they teach in primary school or secondary school are all lies... eg. Chemistry O level... chemical bonding... wtf no orbitals... and so on... freaking waste time, hello... give people who want to deprive themselves of a normal playful childhood a chance to study topics that are relevant to them and the topics should not be lies that simplify the gist of the topic.

Conclusion: Singapore's education system should adapt a more flexible system and stop faking to say that the system is very flexible now... it's not, ok... especially when you see young and smart people of other countries in the universities and the ultra smart Singaporeans are still stuck in Junior College or Pre-U. Give them the express route to develop their talents.

That's the end. haha.

no more promos!

Promos have ended. Start of SPA period.

Shaun Tay's msn nick said about the law of diminishing entertainment is setting in. Yes, how true because playing is getting boring haha.

Last friday, there was General Paper and Chinese. GP was ok, at least B, could be A. Chinese was ok, C is enough. (sorry for my lack of vocabulary)

On monday, there was Economics. I cannot figure out why they had to split the paper into case study and essay with a break in between. Case study I can own. Essay was horrible because I managed only 3.5 pages and other people can write 5 at least lol. Verdict: give me A leh! I can't live with B for econs.

On Tuesday, there was Physics. MCQ was lolx. So easy. But in my dumbness, I changed one of the right answers to a question and realised I got wrong when I thought about it just after the paper was collected. lol. Paper 2 was a killer. haha. There was tons of definitions, just when you thought that the education system is moving away from rote memorisation, they are still going back to it. Verdict: A for physics! I need a H3 here.

On Wednesday, there was Maths. A 3 hour paper. I finished in 2.5 hours. Managed to solved most of the difficult questions. Left out 1 entire question just because it was worthed only 3 marks and the working is pretty tedious. People said it was a killer. I say that it was of ok standard. Verdict: Give me A leh! Need to prove to kayden lim that I'm not a weakling at Maths. I'm just confounded by the real thinking that I need to do for doing a H2 Maths paper, so unlike A Maths.

On Thursday, there was Chemistry. Not many can finish the paper in time, including me. Do-able Section B and C, because Kuna said that the MCQ start later. So chiong my resources on these two. When I reached the MCQ, I had 35 minutes left. Aimed for 1 minute per question, but obviously that's impossible for me. I never exactly finished everything as I needed to skip several questions that require horribly tedious calculations to keep up with time. Verdict: sucky paper. If got luck, A is not impossible. At least a B is inevitable.

FINAL WORDS ON PROMOS:
Kuna said to have fun and treat exams as a personal challenge. Obviously, I can't have fun and I will never will in exams, especially that comment coming from someone who sounds like he slacked a lot in his studies (no offence here). When we study, we should be serious and focused instead, and yes, treat as a personal challenge. Fun only comes after the freaking boring study time and then the law of diminishing entertainment sets in... Oops, I got carried away. Anyway, promos was a crazy personal challenge because the time you get to study all the heavy content is only at night because 1 month before it there was still open house to prepare for and then school is like the whole day for the next 3 weeks. This means, very little time to study, and yes, lots of people do pon school. I'm not one of them anyway. As for my promo results coming out soon, I hope for the best and thank God for bringing me through it. I pity those people I know who are already planning to retain.

So after the Chem paper on thursday, me, eng loong, emily and sarah when to wheellock and ate sakae sushi and it cost about 70-something bucks. About 20 bucks per person. I swear we could have eaten the sushi buffet instead haha. I hate wasting my meagre amount of money, becoming bo lui fast. Sarah was so indecisive in watching class movie or continuing with us. Dunno what's with her. In the end, she ran off to Vivo. So there was left yel, em and me. btw, 6 pointers, em and me, think alike haha, we managed to pwn yel in the restaurant. In the end, we were pwned by him at the escalator, idiot. Then, we went to wander in Orchard and then went to Taka and eat somemore ( so full we still eat haha). Over there, Kenneth Koh joined us. Then em left. Then 3 of us met Liling and Cassandra. Liling was so stupid in self-pwning herself by saying why would me, yel and kenneth be together... oh ya, they are in the same section. (zomg. how long you need to realise that especially since you are in band?)We all walked around and then went to dhoby ghaut MRT to the arcade. In the arcade, one of the games was the many mini-games machine. Kenneth very siao in that game, dunno why, owned everyone. Later, I asked my dad send Kenneth home at University Road. He said he going mark bala house after that (I say: wah, rich people party). Kenneth's house is right at the end of the road, about i very very very very long way in from the Dunearn Road entrance. No wonder never see him take bus 48 with me cos he has to take cab to reach his house haha. By the time I went home already 10.30pm.

My weekend, including friday, is boring. Sit in the house only play Wii, which the most fun video console ever. I just started on Zelda: the Twilight princess.

SPA is coming out next week. On this monday is physics SPA and tuesday is chemistry SPA. Maybe I will study for them tomorrow because I know what's coming out already. Cambridge and MOE just got pwned.

Ok, I'm off for now. Very long post indeed.

hiatus for promos

i'm on hiatus for a while.... got promo exams

Funny - 小学生造句

I found this at a forum (http://http//forums.hardwarezone.com/showthread.php?t=1718458) It's ultimate sibeh funny till you can roflmao for a long time. haha.

Funny - 小学生造句
>>> 1.题目 : 原来
>> 小朋友写 : 原来他是我爸爸。
>> 老师评语 : 妈妈关切一下
>>> 3. 题目: ..一边 ...........一边 ............ ..
>> 小朋友写: 他一边脱衣服,一边穿裤子 .
>> 老师评语: 他到底要脱还是要穿啊~~
>>> 9. 题目: 其中
>> 小朋友写: 我的其中一只左脚受伤了。
>> 老师评语: 你是蜈蚣? ~~
>>> 10.题目 : 一 ...就....
>> 小朋友写: 一只娃娃就要一百块。
>> 老师评语: 老师笑到不行 ..
>>> 11.題目 : 你看
>> 小朋友写 : 你看什么看 ! 没看过啊
>>> 12. 照样造句
>> 例题: 你(唱歌 ) 我( 跳舞
>> 小朋友写 : 你( 好&#21527 我 (很&#22909
>> 老师评语: 你在写英文翻译吗 ??
>>> 13.照样造句
>> 例题: 别人都夸我 ( ),其实我 ( )
>> 小朋友写: 别人都夸我( 很帅 ),其实我 ( 是戴面具的 ) 。
>> 老师评语: 什么面具这么好用 ???
>>> 14. 题目: 好 ... 又好 ..
>> 小朋友写: 妈妈的腿 ,好细又好粗 ...
>> 老师评语: 那到底是细还是粗?
>>> 15.题目 : 陆陆续续
>> 小朋友写 : 下班了,爸爸陆陆续续的回来。
>> 老师评语 : 你到底有几个爸爸呀?
>>> 20.题目: 皮开肉绽
>> 小朋友写: 停电的夜晚,到处很黑,我吓得皮开肉绽!
>> 老师评语 : 看到这句... 老师佩服你。
>>> 21.题目 : 欣欣向荣- 比喻生长美好的样子。
>> 小朋友写: 我的弟弟长得欣欣向荣。
>> 老师评语: 孩子,你弟弟是植物人吗...
>> 还有一个更瞎的 …
>> 小朋友写: 欣欣向荣荣告白。
>> 老师评语: 连续剧不要看太多 ~~
>>> 22. 题目: 谢谢 ....因为 ......
>> 小朋友写: 我要谢谢妈妈 ,因为她每天都帮我写作业 ......
>> 老师评语: 原来你的作业是妈妈写的!!!!!!!
>>> 23. 题目: 难过
>> 小朋友写: 我家门前有条水沟很难过。
>> 老师评语: 老师更难过 ......
>>> 26. 题目: 天才
>> 小朋友写: 我3天才洗一次澡。
>> 老师评语: 要每天洗才干净 ~~
>>> 27.題目 : 一 …便…
>> 小朋友写 : 我一走出门,对面就是便利商店。
>> 还有一個更瞎的 …
>> 小朋友写 : 哥哥一吃完饭,就大便。
>> 老师评语 : 造句不要乱造...
>>> 31. 題目: 又 .....又 .....
>> 小朋友寫: 我的妈妈又矮又高又瘦又肥。
>> 老师评语: 你妈妈......是怪物吗 ?>
>> 32 果然
>> 上课小朋友说:昨天我吃了水果,然后又喝了凉水
>> 老师:这是词组,不能分开造句。
>> 小朋友又说:老师,我还没说完呢,果然晚上我拉肚子了!
>> 老师: …………
>>> 33 瓜分
>> 小朋友:大傻瓜分不清是非
>> 老师:小傻瓜也分不清
>>> 34 好吃
>> 小朋友:好吃个屁
>> 老师:………
>>> 35 况且
>> 小朋友:一辆火车经过,况且况且况且况且.....
>> 老师: ………….