Toy Stor(e)y

It was big and long. Reaching far up. I never knew it could be so long. As it loomed closer to me, I stared at it in awe, eyes wide open, mouth gaping, a slight smile on my face.

A crane outside my window and I live on the 10th storey. There's a lift upgrading programme going on. It's quite awesome. Even now as I'm typing, the crane's outside and if I were to look upwards, I can't see the top of it.


Unfinished shaft outside balcony window:


A portion of the shaft of the lift on the back of a erm, truck/lorry/vehicle:

Crane lifting shaft up

You know what they do after that? The workers outside my balcony window will fit the shaft onto the other blocks of shafts already stacked on top of each other. Like playing Lego, only that the actual Lego blocks are a thousand times lighter than these blocks.

Suddenly I feel like I'm living in a box. Or a girl and her family living in toy houses. All of us are, aren't we? Toy houses with toy lives, going to toy work, earning toy money, doing toy studies, studying toy minds, playing toy music, doing toy math or making more toys on toy beds so the population of toys will continue to live.

The toy story.

Baby hamsters

Exam's the day after tomorrow, so I've got time for a couple of posts. Like I've said before, our 3rd generation of baby hamsters are quite big already.

Firstly, to give you all a sense of how large or small the hamster is, here's a picture of the portion of the tank it's in:
See the little white container at the bottom? The little brown thing inside is the baby hamster.

Baby hamster trying to get into the container of food:

Baby hamster trying to eat big (relative to its size) hamster food:

It was all very cute and sweet so I leaned over to the other side of the tank to tell the father hamster that his babies are very grown up already:

Father hamster can't be bothered and wants to sleep like that.

Random photo of Olivia's finger and the other hamsters:

Our house feels like a hamster breeding zoo.

Third paper (3/6)

Third paper just this morning. It was Health Psychology and I'd say the questions are actually very, very doable, which makes competition very, very tough.

It was held in that dreaded Sheares Hall, the one where I walked out of a year ago in the midst of Cognitive Psychology exam, and the one where the exam for the same module was held in again the second time I took it. Needless to say, when I found out last night the exam venue, I took out my notes from my bag and looked through some of it again. This morning, the moment I stepped in there, everything flew out my head. This time round though, I sat down in the canteen and made myself look through all my notes because there was no way I was going to have a repeat of that terrifying episode. Although I was actually very nervous outside the hall, I thankfully calmed down almost immediately when I sat down in seat 77.

See! Even the seat number is against me!

I know it's silly, but in a way I have associated that place with the feeling of "impending doom" and all sorts of weird scenarios go through my mind at rapid pace when I'm there for an exam.

In any case, I don't think I did very well but considering the amount of time I took revising it, which was not a lot, I guess it was alright. Taking an overview of this module from the start to the end, I'd say I'll be getting a B for it.

Sigh. Only a freaking B.

The rational part of me says I could have done better but just forget it already and concentrate on the next paper. The emotional part of me is more conflicting. One one hand, it screams "You could have done FAR FAR BETTER" and refuses to let go of it. On the other hand, it says, "Wow, I actually kind of enjoyed answering the question. I'm sure I'm going to get an A."

*raises eyebrow*

However, emotions are important, ok! They serve very important functions in our social and daily lives. As such, this brings me to the next paper to study for - Emotions.

Oops, too much essay writing in exams has influenced this post.

And Good Luck to all taking their examinations!

Second (2/6) and third paper

Screwed the 2nd paper up a little today.

3rd paper tomorrow. I think I am so dead.

Reminder: Ben & Jerry's Free Cone Day

REMINDER!

Tomorrow's Ben & Jerry's Free Cone Day! Go grab yourself a cone!

Details in the linked blog post.

Second paper; Hamsters

Second paper tomorrow. I told myself I'll go to bed by 10.30pm and now it's 10.50pm. Tomorrow's a GEM paper. Supposedly easy to score. I took a day and a half to study for it. I'd better score!

Actually I took a cute baby hamster photo today because the four babies are actually big enough to run around and (try to) eat (big, hamster) solid food and I wanted to show you all just how tiny they are! However, I spent a full 11 hours studying today so I'll blog about the baby hamsters some other time.

Oh yar, there's one baby hamster that is blind in one eye. When my father saw it, he said we must keep it because it is so poor thing.

What?

I replied (exact words edited),

Are we a Hamster Disability Centre or something? First we have the 2nd smallest baby of the first lot (because the smallest one was eaten up) and now we are going to keep a half-blind baby.

I was just kidding. The half-blind baby's really cute but looks so poor thing. So unless somebody really wants it, we will keep it for sure.

And I think the female of the first lot of babies is pregnant.

Oh god. How many generations of hamsters are we going to own? The male hamster should quit being so horny already.

First paper (1/6)

Had my first paper today - Personality Psychology. (Trust me, I still can't tell what you are thinking.) It was not perfect nor as good as I would have liked it to be because the first question, if done properly, can be a really fun question to answer (under non-exam conditions) but I did not answer it as nicely as I would have liked. However, considering my very low level of self-efficacy, I was just glad I had revised, was able to write something decent in the first question and answered the rest of the questions, hopefully, a tad more than decently.

Felt guilty about wasting a whole booklet though because I got my second booklet and managed to write 3 words in it just 5 seconds before time was up. Deciding it was stupid, I abandoned the book, wrote the 3 words somewhere in my first booklet instead and handed that up. Then I left the blank booklet on the table and walked out with the rest when we were dismissed, with that 3 words inside uncrossed. I hope the examiners don't take the time to find who that person is at that desk, find the original exam booklet and check if I had forgotten to hand it up. The possibility only occurred to me when I was already on the shuttle bus out.

The lecturer gelled his hair today. Heh. *blush*

Oh yar, I have almost given up on writing introduction and conclusion because I have become so slow in thinking that I have no time left. Thus, here's a conclusion to make up for all the missing conclusions.

In conclusion, it was a good beginning to the exams. The rest aren't exactly killers, except for Health Psychology, but I haven't done intensive revision yet either, so...

1 down, 5 to go.

Nervous

Nervous. Can't even think of going to school tomorrow and sitting in the exam hall.

Very "cold feet"

Ok, now I'm freaking out.

I found myself engaging in numerous random, seemingly involuntary movements while studying. I only do that when I'm nervous (and completely out of sorts).

Right now my Self-efficacy is superbly low.

Self-efficacy: The belief held by an individual that he is able to execute a certain behaviour in order to attain some goal. The ability to summon one's resources, cognitive, motivation etc. to get through a long process filled with barriers. I can't even get myself to put in lots of effort.

My English suck.

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Hamster(s)

Not enough time to blog. Seriously, this is my most serious and most well-used semester - including exam period. Ironically, I have 6 modules and 6 papers to take, supposedly my most heavy semester so I'm supposed to be a complete wreck and all, which I still am. Sorta.

Anyway, hamsters say hi for me since I'm not free.

Tried to take a picture of father hamster sleeping with its head sticking out of the tube but it woke up and showed me his ass instead:

Father hamster peeking out

Father hamster sleeping in the wheel

I think the weather must have been too warm for it to sleep inside any enclosed area. It has been sleeping in the running wheel or somewhere in the tank, whole body stretched out. Sometimes it sleeps on its back, sometimes on its side,


sometimes it finally sleeps like a hamster - all curled up.

Anyway why the heck would it be sleeping in the wheel?!

Baby hamster

At least I think it's the baby hamster. Or it might be the father. Forgot which it was because picture taken quite some time ago. It's not technically a baby anymore but well, we haven't quite worn off calling it that. It's akin to calling a human "baby" in his/her mid-twenties.

Dammit, I'm supposed to not blog and let the hamsters do the talking.

Getting cold feet

Blogging from my phone. This is going to cost me.

Exams are in 2 days and I'm not confident. In fact, am very scared.

Sigh.

Cousin's ROM

This afternoon was spent at Mandarin Oriental Hotel attending the ROM ceremony of my cousin, Junxiang and his now-wife, Shandy.

It was odd, seeing the cousin who was the naughtiest of us lot get married first. The same cousin who scared me at Haw Par Villa's wax museum, threatened to push me into the pool with a dragon sculpture and fought with me over who owned which body part of our favourite uncle. He also attended the same university as me though in a different course. I remember the three of us had lunch and studied a couple of times together when I was in year 1 and 2.

Now they have already graduated for a year and I am ending my 3rd year of university studies. It was not too long ago that I was only a year 2, watching them work on their Honours theses in the library. Last week, I stood in the library and watched the Journals section, remembering they liked studying there the most because it was quieter and warmer. I realize I miss them and those few times spent together. Time has absolutely flown past and I realize that somehow school don't feel the same, knowing they are no longer studying there. Well, at least I still have 2 other cousins in there still! =)

So today I watched my cousin get married. I really like Shandy and am happy that she is now related to us. Yet at the same time I have this odd feeling that we are all growing up.

And my fantastic relatives have skipped directly from asking, "Do you have a boyfriend?" to "When are you getting married?"

ROM ceremony was held at Axis Bar & Lounge at Mandarin Oriental Hotel. The hotel was a lovely place - even the toilets were gorgeous! They had hand towels, tissue paper and proper soap bottles with equally wonderful smelling soap. The bar itself was beautiful as well, a lovely place to relax and, I'd bet, awfully romantic at night.

The area where the ceremony was to be held:


Junxiang in the jacket on the right, his parents and my father on the sofa:

Junxiang

Flowers to be held by Shandy later on

Quite some time later, Shandy arrived with the photographer and just about everyone else, except the Solemniser.

Shandy

Shandy's only 2 years older than me.

Junxiang opening the gift from Shandy

There's a photographer on the right and the white blur is one of Shandy's closest friends who was taking video and photos the entire time.

I was starting to get really hungry by then. The waitresses were serving tea and coffee but for some reason, probably because I wasn't sitting down, I did not manage to get a cup of drink at all. So I stood in the bar, drinking water from my own bottle. Anyway wherever I sat, I'd have to move off because the photographer kept taking photos where I'd be in the way.

It was funny, watching the photographer take photos of the couple because they were so shy.

Finally, the Solemniser arrives.

The couple clarifies some things about the ceremony with the Solemniser (which is really too solemn a word because this Solemniser is anything but solemn).


At one point, Junxiang asked him quite loudly,

Where is the script? I can't remember the whole thing.

We all laughed.

Finally and somehow without much warning, the ceremony starts. The whole thing was carried out with everybody standing. You'd think that everyone will be sitting down in chairs, watching the whole ceremony quietly, but NO.

This is the most squashed ceremony I could have ever imagined because everybody was just kind of crowding around, watching everything very closely. Whenever there was a significant portion in the ceremony, like the exchange of rings or the holding of hands, there was a huge rush to take a photo of it. It was really hilarious because there was really only a small distance between the couple and us. Heh, I am one of those rushing to take pictures and was squashed several times.

Ceremony was quite long and in the middle, we clapped and the Solemniser said, "And we are only half-way through it!"

So after they have said their "I do"s, they went on to uh, I guess the second part of the marriage vows.

Junxiang, repeating after the Solemniser, saying his vows:


Shandy, repeating after the Solemniser, saying her vows:


It was at this point that Shandy started crying while repeating the words. She had to pause several times to hold back her tears and at the last line, stopped for quite some time, trying not to cry until she forgot the line and the Solemniser had to repeat the last line again.

Junxiang's face just crumpled up when he saw her cry and he wiped away her tears after that. You could have felt everybody around on the verge of tears as well. Mine just leaked out of my eyes.

Solemniser asked rhetorically, "Isn't love the most beautiful thing?" Then I think he pronounced them husband and wife (haha, I don't remember) and said he may now kiss his lovely wife. So they kissed.

And then the Solemniser said,

You can see they have been practicing last night.

I told you this Solemniser is not solemn.

They then signed the certificate, lawfully making them husband-and-wife.

And finally we had our refreshments. Singaporeans as usual, piled lots of things on our tiny plates. I felt like we were eating at a coffee shop instead.

Watched the newly-wed couple and realized nothing about them has really changed. If you look at them from the same perspective as before, they are still a couple in love. If you look at them from another perspective, they are still in love but are now married. It is sweet, but odd.

It finally ended at about 5pm. My uncle fetched us home, I nearly puked on the car because of the mixture of food and tea in my stomach, the rocky ride and the fact that the auntie beside me kept yawning and I kept imaging her breath in the car and around my face. Had to open the car window, eat a sweet, hold a plastic bag and pray we would arrive at our destination(s) soon.

So I declare my cousin is married! =) The first over on this side of the family.

I wish both Junxiang and Shandy a happy marriage! 祝夫妻俩，白头偕老！

p/s If my Chinese words are wrong, do tell me! Thanks!

Term Paper grade

Oh my god!

I scored a 18.5 out of 20 for my Personality Psychology term paper!

Oh, thank you! Thank you!

*Falls heavily on bed and start sobbing*

Unknown numbers

Last night I received a SMS from an unknown number. The person said he had my number in his old phone but don't remember how he got it. He knows my name, I don't recognize his but I think "NUS" was familiar to him. The thing is, he is an oil rigger who works offshore and have been one for almost 2 years. I'm sure I don't know any off-shore oil rigger person. But it was (almost) the longest finding-out-who-is-the-person-of-the-number-in-my-phone SMS conversation I've ever had which ended with us having no idea who the other is or how the number came to be in his phone. It also ended with him saying "take care, good night, guess you have school tomorrow so you have to rest."

It was definitely weird and my intuition tells me to be careful.

There was this one other time this guy accidentally SMSed to the wrong number (my number) and we ended up chatting anyway through SMS for quite a few weeks/months. He was a bartender who did not seem to have a good temper at all though he was decent to me. He tried asking me out but I constantly refused. After a while we stopped contact completely.

The wonders of SMS. Sometimes I think my phone is an IRC chatroom all on its own, or some ulu-ulu corner shop where people accidentally come upon and decide to have breakfast/lunch/dinner there.

MYMP 's Especially For You

Get this widget | Track details | eSnips Social DNA

Make Your Momma Proud (M.Y.M.P) is a Filipino acoustic band.

I hope the embedded MP3 works. If not, here's the youtube version. Erm, I advise you to try and just listen to the MP3 instead of watching it on youtube. The video looks kind of old, it sounds better on the MP3 and, I know I'm evil, but they don't look all that good either in that video and it might ruin your experience of the song. You'll get what I mean when you watch it. The voice is awesome, though. And check out their website, they look a lot more different there!

Thanks to Seraphim-now-turned-Barbers-Bang-Bang for this recommendation.

Quote - A full circle

Professor Goh, in last lecture of math,

... I have even made it a point to wear the same shirt I wore on the first day of lecture, so that we have really come one full circle...

Twitter-vomit

Not enough time to study = no time to bathe = no time to blog

Don't tell others I have not bathed.

There were so many times today I wanted to log in to twitter to twit using my phone then I realized I don't have an account anymore so I put my phone down again and laughed at myself - HAHAHA!

Ok, that was for fun.

Anyway my day was so much cleaner without twitter. Cleaner as in no interruptions (I mean besides the TV). My brother fell ill with fever so he did not return to camp tonight, instead he's going back tomorrow. His platoon is now 5 people short because 5 others called in sick as well - 3 truly ill, 2 chao-geng.

He came back and said he fired a gun and it was damn shiok (feels satisfying), then I murmured under my breath that Freud would say something like "that shows you unconsciously want to kill" and then retorted to myself, "Yar, right, whatever, Freud, haha!" All in public, while queuing outside Suki Sushi. Then he demonstrated all the positions, cocking and what to do when the bullet got stuck... In public too, outside Suki Sushi. Oh he also said the firing was loud.

By right tomorrow he would be throwing grenades around but now I guess alternate arrangements will be made. I told him he's sick, then wait he go back blur blur hold on to the grenade.

When Brother went down to fetch his girlfriend this afternoon, I asked Olivia at the dining table, why can't the girlfriend just come up himself, why must he go fetch her? She replied,

Because she is his (mouths silently) darling,

Then she giggled. I told her because then he can hold her hand and kiss her with none of our family present.

Oh yar, cousin Junxiang and his finacee, Shandy, are going to the Registry of Marriage this coming Tuesday. So exciting!

The reason why this post sounds weird is because I read Edmund's post first and his style influenced me.

Then I thought about it, how often when you see people walk towards the lift, then u faster press press press the close button press many many time!! then the lift close, you safely have the lift to yourself as you sing nonsense and repeat i fark u lah 1001 times and say i going to kill u ah your whole family all die i gangster i tell you etc. oh yah when the lift close fully then u point middle finger at the person who was running toward the lift (butcan no longer see you). Maybe I have mild OCD. Maybe. Sometimes I wish the person running towards the lift was a guy and he happened to have an erection then when I close the lift doors then his lan jiao will gana stuck and he will scream AHHHHHHHH!!!! NOOO!!!!! then if the lift move up can see his lan jiao moving from the middle of the doors, moving downwards then I can point finger and HA HA HA HA!! Ok no, I never thought of that before.

I'm his paparazzi.
For a moment I forgot my victim's name.

And this is what happens when I am deprived of twitting for 2 days - "twitter-vomit". It sounds more interesting than "twitter-diarrhea".

Deleting Twitter - my bubble world

It is 1AM.

I reached home 2 hours ago.
Was studying in school 12 hours ago.
Had the last lecture of this semester 15 hours ago.

At some interval or other in between those hours, I have accessed twitter on my phone countless times, checking updates and twittering. There are two possible conclusions I can draw from this:

1. Twitter has taken over my life
2. Twitter is very important to me

Both are true for me. I feel uneasy if I don't access twitter on my phone, regardless of whether or not there are updates. If there are no updates from others, then I'll be the one who updates.

I don't remember the first time I learned about twitter, but it has to be at least a year ago. It is virtually an entirely different social circle of mine. I can almost split my friends up into entirely distinct group, mutually exclusive of each other.

For me, twitter has gone from something novel to something personal. Although I would walk alone down corridors, attend lectures and tutorials alone, study and have lunch by myself, I was never alone because my twitter friends were always there. I have, countless times, logged in while eating, twittering almost anything I thought of or noticed. It is a tremendous urge to twit and share it. Fellow twitterers would know how much I twit!

Hmm, sounds like addiction.

When twitter is down or the phone's battery juice is used up, I'd feel a little upset and very disconnected from the world. I had a little virtual world around me, wherever I was. I was never alone, although I was by myself. There was always chattering, though it was quiet. There was always laughter, sarcasm and constant thoughts flying around. Of course sometimes despite it all, I still feel a little lonely - like each of us are in our own little bubbles. Sometimes these bubbles interact and we have conversations. Other times, these bubbles float on their own. Bubbles are transparent. We can see what others are doing and others can see what we are doing, just that we don't push our bubble towards them, so we don't reply to their twits.

Then there are one-way mirror bubbles, only that the one-way mirror works in a weird way - others can see us but we can't see them. It's a little bit like being naked, isn't it? These are the people who follow you but who you don't know so you don't actually see what they are doing although they know precisely what you are doing.

At an update number of 3,629 twits, I have decided to delete the account. If I sign up another account again, I'm sure I'll catch up soon. In the meantime, I'll be losing touch with the world. For a good cause. I hope I don't miss too much. Bye bye, twitter. Thanks for accompanying me. I wonder how long I can last without you. Heh.

Oh yar, deleting Twitter would give me a lot more things to blog about.

Ben & Jerry's 30th annual Free Cone Day

Photo from simplyjean

Ben & Jerry's will be giving out a Free Cone (with ice-cream, of course) this 29th April 2008, at any of the participating scoop shops listed below.

Date/Day: 29th April 2008, Tuesday
Time: 12pm - 7pm

The 5 Flavours offered:

1. Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
2. Chocolate Fudge Brownie
3. New York Super Fudge Chunk
4. Strawberry Cheesecake
5. Chunky Monkey

Participating outlets:

The Cathay
#02-12
2 Handy Road (S)229233

Great World City
#02-40A
1 Kim Seng Promenade
(S)237994

Raffles City
#B1-80 252 North Bridge
Rd Raffles City Shopping
Centre (S)179103

United Square
#02-K1
101 Thomson Road
(S)307591

White Sands
#01-39
1 Pasir Ris Central Street 3
(S)518457

VivoCity
1 HarbourFront Walk
#02-135/136
VivoCity
(S)098585

Jurong Bird Park
2 Jurong Hill Singapore
(S)628925

Singapore Zoo
80 Mandai Lake Road
(S)729826

Check out their facebook group.

Ok, actually I haven't had a BJ before either. The ice-cream one. The other BJ... Hmm... Out of point! Maybe I should go try it this time round. Grab yours this 29th April! (For guys, I don't mean grab your own!)

Quote

Father, filling out a survey,

Do hamsters count as pets?

In response to The West Wing (Dance Version) review

It's kind of bugging me so I thought I'll mention it.

In reference to this review of the The West Wing (Dance Version), I have read and re-read my post and I don't think it is really very, very harsh. Is it because they don't know me? Or is it because I did not put my thoughts across properly?

I was so troubled, I SMSed my friend to read it and tell me if I have really erred. I heard from him that that post might have hurt people concerned. I am sincerely apologetic and feeling very guilty. However, we can never escape from criticisms. Sometimes we just have to know which ones are worth taking a note from and which we should ignore, or which aspects of the post to take into consideration and which to ignore. Look, I am just one person in a whole group of audience. Many like it, some don't. Look at both sides and don't let the negative remarks take you down.

Actually I don't know if I should have used the word "review" since I am in no way a professional. But I thought it would be ok, you know, a review from an audience's point of view.

I simply did not enjoy the production as much as I had hoped to. Is it wrong? Must I enjoy it? Must all in the audience enjoy it? I only said very truthfully what I felt was contributing to my un-enjoyment (if there's such a word) of the play. I did not mean to sound like a professional critic in the process. Maybe I do not understand Chinese Opera and cannot appreciate it. I think I should have taken this into consideration while writing the review. That was wrong of me.

One reader said she has paid for the $19 ticket while I paid only $14.50. I don't know how much his/her allowance is every month, I don't know if he/she is the type who spend on movies and think a $3 lunch is cheap. For me, $14.50 is a significant sum. I had previously debated whether to go for this or the other play "Saving Grace", another NUS student production and I chose this because I had high expectations for it (one of my erroneous assumption). Concerts and plays are probably the only things I am willing to splurge on.

Then another reader told me to shove my comments up my ass. I felt very offended by this. I might have made some mistakes in the review of the post, but is it right to criticize your audience or even anybody, like this?

They might respond that I criticized them as well. But I criticized their acting and presentation of the play! I did not criticize the persons themselves! Whereas this reader had made a very personal attack towards me.

If they had told me that I was wrong and that my entry was too harsh, that I was not seeing some things right and would like to tell me the hard work they had put in to make this happen, in a polite way, I would have been very happy to acknowledge my mistakes. If they were very angry over the criticisms, I would even understand. In fact a couple of the comments told me relatively nicely how they felt compared to the above person I mentioned. I thank them for their patience and restrain.

My friend has also given me a view into how things were backstage and I truly appreciate his efforts to attempting to make me understand. I have yet to replied his email fully though (if he is reading this: I think the curtain call is absolutely necessary in any production! Their hard work have to be acknowledged. It is not the presence of the curtain call I did not like, nor was it the length of curtain call. Believe me, I have seen longer ones! It was just that a mere accumulation of dislikes which made the disorganization of the curtain call bug me).

I had tried to tone down the review because I am aware my unhappiness with the play is probably not going to be well received. Was also aware that my emotions were running high at that time, especially since I blogged about it soon after watching it. Also, I did not only include bad stuff in the review. In fact, I started off with what I thought was good. Are the good things not important? Why are people focusing on the bad of what I said?

I am actually very upset because I just expressed what I thought as a member of the audience but was criticized instead. I previously wondered if I was very "unprofessional" in the way I criticized the play. The email from my friend made me think about it and I realized that it basically stems from my ignorance of the amount of hard work they have put in. I have acknowledged that it is a mistake on my part, to not have taken that into account, because any performer would want the audience to know how much effort they personally have put in. But are the responses from them very unprofessional? I believe yes, but I now understand it is also because they had put in a lot of hard work and I had seem to, using one of their own words, demean it.

By the way, I have heard of a number of people who have enjoyed the production, so I hope you all do not have a bad impression of NUS Theatre Studies' students in terms of their acting skills. Afterall, everybody has to start somewhere, make some mistakes and gain experience in order to get to the professional level.

Comments are welcome, flaming is not. Keep your "shove your comments up your sorry asses" to yourself, thank you.

Processes and Results

During Social Work review lecture today, our lecturer was talking about our Reflection Papers and how some of us might be disappointed with our grades. She said this one line,

You can say you have spent a lot of time on the paper, but in the end, it's the final product (that counts).

The first emotion I felt was anger and absurdity. The essence of that seemed to imply that whatever you do, the process don't matter, however hard you work it don't matter because it is the end product that matters. Then cognition sets in and I realize that that is how reality is. In this world, it don't matter what you do as long as you produce results.

On one hand, we say that the process of learning, of failing and experience gained is more important than the end product. The best students don't always get the best grades. Famous mathematicians and scientists were never necessarily the top in their classes. We talk about them, use them as examples, yet on the other hand, we are rewarded based on the end products, whether in our academic life or work life. I refer here, to DK's post on our fear of Making Mistakes.

[He asked why do we fear making mistakes? I believe it is because of socialization - from teachers, parents and the government. They have socialized into us the idea that we must be the best and must have something tangible to show for your achievement, be it a raise, a promotion or that First Class Honours degree from University.

If we do not attain any of these, they tsk at us, say "see lah!", make us feel bad about ourselves, sometimes talk behind our back or (in the case of parents) might tell us we are stupid. All of this make us feel bad about ourselves, so we try to do better, in order to be accepted, to take away that bad feeling.

So we try REALLY hard, but then we do something wrong and the information gets out to others. They tsk at us again, say "aiyo, why like that!", compare us to some sibling or other, compare us to your friend or other, compare us to a character in a TV drama or other. We might feel ostracized when others ask you (during Chinese New Year or other family gatherings) when are you getting a job, when are you getting a promotion or how are the grades and you give a less-than-expected response. They give an ugly face, say "is it? Aiyo! Why?! Must be never try hard enough, right!" then turn away (metaphorically).

We remember the first time round people also treat us in this similar way. We learn that failing leads to these bad things happening to us and being viewed differently in a negative light. So we work very hard and try not to fail (or fail too badly) in order to be accepted (or not to feel the bad feeling again). When we succeed, people crowd around us, tell us how smart we are, praise us constantly. Now, instead of you being compared with some greater being, others are being compared to you, the greater being, instead. It's a wonderful feeling.

Good feeling (and stuff) when succeed.
Bad feeling (and stuff) when fail.

You want to fail or succeed?

Ok, I think I used the concept of Learning in Psychology here... unintentionally.]

I just find it incredibly ironic that a lecturer should speak of that because isn't it the goal of education to inculcate in students the joy of the learning process, to emphasize the journey instead of the end? Isn't that why a % of examination marks have been reallocated and split up to consist of term papers and class participation? Is this not to encourage us to be aware of the process and not just the results?

I think the lecturer did not intentionally say it in that way, but she did not correct herself so I do not know if she really means it in that manner. My disappointment with the department just got larger.

Even more ironically, I found myself upset at the grade (a result) I had gotten because I fully believe my paper was worth at least 5 or 10 marks more than what it got. Based on what I have said above, shouldn't I be focusing on the process of my writing the paper? I don't know, I just think that they should acknowledge the work I had put into writing the paper. Furthermore, there are some things I have learned from the agency visit (which is the point of the paper) that I could never have put down in words. In the end, what are they judging? Our writing skills, that's all.

I was very hyped up and confident this semester because I have again experienced the joy of learning. I really thought the process was important, really wanted to learn how to learn. When she said this line, I once again started to doubt myself and the importance of the process. Was I going to fail again? I asked myself. I have so much on the line, put so much of my confidence in the concept of learning, on where I was going to try and place my sense of self-worth. She had to go and question me on that when I have not even tested out if the process is really as important, or even more important, as the results.

Of course ultimately the results are still important. It is an acknowledgment that you have a certain standard. For us Singaporeans and probably a lot of others, results will always be important. It is the first thing we see. I just wonder, have we placed too much importance on it? So much so that my lecturer actually said those lines?

Lecturer's words made me very scared, doubt myself and plunge me into that feared darkness again.

Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence - Sakatomo Ryuichi

This is a song from the 1983 film Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence.

It was so beautiful I wanted to cry.

Gotten via a comment in Edmund's blog.

Hong Kong (Part 3)

Very, very apologetic for this very overdue post on the Hong Kong trip last YEAR. I remember Ruifang saying that she thought there would be Part 3 and 4, but I never got around to doing it. I also need to type less words and put more photos which shouldn't be a problem since I have probably forgotten a majority of the happenings.

Ministry of Bellz (MOB) Educational Trip (Part 3)

Day 2 - On the way to breakfast

Our very nice, friendly and efficient tour leader - Rainkey and Damien's foot at the left corner

me and Pearl (shucks, we really look very alike)

Roland daydreaming

His hand is not where you think it is.

Railway

Random picture of road and vehicle

At this point, the point I was trying to make with the pictures was that despite being out of Singapore, I still felt like I was in Singapore and everything was within expectation - roads, vehicles, trees. Makes me wonder how similar different countries are (oxymoron).

Random picture of a double-decker bus

Which reminds me I don't remember seeing any single-deck buses while I was there.

With only 4 - 5 hours of sleep the night before, everyone fell asleep on the ride to Tai Po for breakfast:

Kim Peng

I hope Kim doesn't reprimand me for putting this up.

Melodie

Debbie

The rest who were awake:

from back (left to right): Pearlin, Roland, Axils, Damien

Axils was yawning.

Traffic light and crossing

Our pedestrian crossings are of black tar with white outlines. They have striped roads and reflective plates:
The same, yet different.

Finally at Tai Po (again):Street scene

The attire of the old lady is really so typical it felt like I was in a TV show.

Breakfast place

How it looks like:

Pearlin, Damien, Kim in the diner

Damien and Kim

Receipt of the food we ordered and the list of dishes to choose from

If I didn't remember wrongly, we basically circled those dishes we wanted on the list on the right.

And boy, I'm telling you, were the food delicious!

I think this noodles is called 车仔面 that's in the name of the diner itself:


The porridge was very nice too, but it was this particular dish we loved:

It was our normal chee cheong fan but with these balls that I forgot were made of what. The balls are chewy and really addictive. It was drenched with some sort of curry which was not too spicy. Really fantastic. I'm drooling even thinking about it.

Day 2 - Night walk

This whole area is actually sloping upwards.

Many overhanging signs

You can never be too far from home:

Policeman

I took ages trying to take a clear shot of this policeman. Gave up in the end.

Clubs and pubs lining the sides

Policeman entering club/pub:

Wonder what happened.

Sloping upwards (Kim and Pearl on the right)

Erm, for some reason this set of railing was crooked and leaning to the left while the slope was sloping upwards to the right:

Roland posing for me

Oh by the way, it was quite cold and we were dressed in jackets, jeans and shoes but Roland here lasted the whole day in shirt, shorts and slippers. He was probably a heat generator in his past life.

Along the uphill street was the World's longest escalator - 800m and broken into sections where roads run through:

Escalator, with slope on right and in the background various other sections of the escalator

You can see that the escalator steps are really shallow, unlike most of the escalators in Singapore simply because of distance over which the street slopes upward. I found them interesting anyway.

And we climbed up all that slope just for this:

Krispy Kreme Doughnuts shop

It's not available in Singapore. Frankly, that was the first time I ate a fancy doughnut from a famous store. Feel so suaku (mountain pig).

Krispy Kreme's very big plastic bag, spanning across the width of the space between 2 seats on the coach, kindly held by Pearlin

Beside the shop, flats stood:


Heading down the slope:

Melodie

Bus stop

Very familiar, isn't it? I remember at this point Pearlin was fed up with me for stopping and taking so many pictures and I was fed up at everybody because I couldn't take good pictures. =P

We went back to hotel, exhausted.

Part 1
Part 2