JB trip 2

Went to JB yesterday with rayner, bingde, weichern, chunwei, siuchun and kunlei. Had lunch at the food junction in city plaza den bingde and kunlei were like urging the rest of us to try this particular dessert called RED RUBY. Apparently they felt that it had a rather unique taste haha.. but I found it quite normal leh, just chestnut coated in red jelly or something. Nothing special really.

After that went to Neway to sing ktv from 1-4 pm and shopped around abit for clothes. Think Malaysia having some sort of sale now then almost everything was on discounts of 40-50%. Bought 2 t-shirts and a collared tee for $40 sing, and mind you they aren’t imitations.

That was followed by a short tea break at Secret Recipe. Well, it’s quite the same as here in terms of things sold and everything EXCEPT the prices are in ringgit wahaha.. one big slice of cake costs RM5 (which is about S$2.20). After that we took taxi to JUSCO and settled our dinner at pizza hut (also for half the price you find here), before making a dash for the last bus home.

Enjoyable experience overall, just that maybe had too little time to shop. Next time go can catch a movie there also (10RM for a ticket) =P.

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Anyway guess yesterday was a mix of emotions for everyone. None of the people I know really flunked this semester, though majority of them seem to have performed below expectations.

As for me, there’s really nothing much I can do about my results anyway. Thinking of going to my fyp prof and telling him the situation see what happens.

What will be, will be.

Sigh...

Just received my results for this sem.

I knew this semester was crucial.

I knew I had to do well.

haiz.

Why does nothing seem to go well this semester?

I need a miracle.

Christmas

12月25日。

今天是圣诞节。

但今年的圣诞节，似乎没什么意义。

看着街上亮丽的灯饰，处处都充满着圣诞的气息。看着街上一对对的情侣，看着天上悬挂着的满月，心里不禁有股酸溜溜的感觉。

她也在看着同样的满月吗？

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Hahaha zai act cheem! No la I’m not emo (ok maybe I am a little bit) just hope that everyone’s having a great Christmas today!

As for me, I spent my Christmas eve yesterday with Weiliat and Jiangyuan at the new KLP. Apparently a lot of people know about the place already. There’s quite a number of people ice-skating and at the arcade there yesterday. We even had to be on the waiting list for bowling.

So while waiting for the bowling alley manager to call us, we decided to play…. PARA PARA! hahaha… me and weiliat even managed to get jiangyuan to join in the fun!

weiliat's robotic dance moves =X

jiangyuan having fun

Bowling was not bad, considering I got a new personal best of 174 wahaha (weiliat: hao lian!)

er.. we're not gays if that wat ur thinking

After that jiangyuan pangseh-ed us and went home for dinner, sp me and weiliat went to eat fried hokkien mee at geylang. After that went to drink soya bean milk den went home at 9pm. Yes. 9pm. While everyone else is leaving home to go countdown somewhere I was GOING home hahaha. Sad.

Yeaps and that’s how I spent my Christmas eve. =)

My Examiner is Chee Hong

Yes. I’m not trying to be rude or anything, but that’s his name.

Yesterday I had my FYP CA2 presentation to him. Having the presentation in his office was intimidating enough, added to which he kept frowning throughout the 20 minute presentation, you can imagine how I felt then. However, as professionally as I could, I finished the presentation. Then came the missiles to shoot me down.

First, he complained (yes not commented, but complained) that my presentation was too brief, when it was he himself who asked for a 20-slide-20-minute presentation. Then he started shooting me down in areas which I felt was aimed at me supervisor (prof K) rather than me. Throughout the whole process he did not ask me any questions that tested my concepts, but rather complained that the experiments I did seemed like a waste of time. Hello, ALL the experiments were done upon the request of MY SUPERVISOR, NOT ME.

And then I learnt the truth.

This examiner (prof P) is the founder of an engineering company (I later learnt that my own supervisor has his own company too. Rich @$#!). Apparently it seems like he and my supervisor are rivals in some sense. Worse, we once approached his company wanting to purchase some instruments, but later decided against it as it does not suit our requirements.

How unlucky is that? To get this Prof P as my examiner and Prof K as my supervisor. F**k.

And today I made a wasted trip to NUS again (wats new). I had hoped to finally be able to get started on a experiment today, when everything is finally ready to be tested. I reached the lab only to realize that the power supply is not there. I mean, it was ALWAYS there in the lab (who would wanna steal sth lidat?) but today, someone borrowed it. WTH. Talk about being unlucky huh? Someone up there must be laughing.



ANYWAY. Went to watch 投名状 with rayner bingde and weiwei yesterday at century square. Wanted to catch the 7pm slot at TM but ended up the seats were sold out so we went for the 845pm slot at CS instead. Not a bad show I’ll say, albeit abit draggy (127 mins) here’s how the story went.

李连杰stars as a general who was pang seh-ed by another ally and has his whole army wiped out at the start of the show. He managed to survive by feigning death, and was rescued by this woman (刘德华’s wife) who ran away from her tribe. Both fell in love with each other. When he woke up in the morning, she was gone.

李连杰 was then brought to刘德华’s band of bandits by 金成武 (acting as Andy’s brother). The trio then took an oath of brotherhood and brought their men to become soldiers of the imperial court, where they can get paid and would no longer be bullied by soldiers. The story goes on as the trio begins conquering cities against all odds blah blah blah…

Ok shall not type the wholes story out here. Eventually cracks appeared in their relationship and all 3 ends up dead.

To me, besides all the bloody and gory battle scenes (a soldier blown into pieces by a cannon) there seems to be a deeper lesson to be learnt. All 3 brothers seemed to have done the right thing, yet all ended up dead as a result of the scheme of 3 wily old men.

李连杰 demonstrated utilitarianism. After the battle of Suzhou, he ordered the deaths of 4000 survivors of the city because there was not enough food to go around, and they had to carry on conquering Nanjing to make the lives of 1 million others better. To him, a small sacrifice is necessary for the greater good.

刘德华 was the typical good guy, but was assassinated by Jet Li eventually under the imperial court’s orders.

金成武 plays the obedient brother who agrees to everything Jet Li says, and yet at the same time is also fiercely loyal towards Andy Lau. He avenged Andy Lau by killing Jet Li, and turns himself in to be sentenced to death by the imperial court, so as to honor their oath.

Worth watching =)

我和伟烈有个约会

I had a one-day date with weiliat yesterday. =p

He came over top my place and we played bball in the morning. Played 1-on-1 race to 7 and won 7-1 hahaha.. weiliat dun be disheartened k? I had homeground advantage lol. After that went to kovan to eat teochew porridge. Then we proceeded to NUS where I went to do my FYP and weiliat went to settle some stuff in his hall.

Think my Prof is starting to get a little unhappy with me cos I didn’t finish the experiment he assigned me to do. Well to be perfectly honest I admit that I’ve been dragging it, but it’s only because I didn’t know how to go about doing! I mean, all he does is to tell me what kind of results he wants, but does not provide me with the means to do it. Feels like doing lab without a lab manual. Then after consulting the other PHD students and people in the lab, then I realized that it is not actually possible to do the experiment since the apparatus required doesn’t even exist in the first place! Then after I reported the complexity of the experiment to him then he realized it’s not really feasible, but gets abit upset all the same.

Well, my fault lor.

Anw after that met weiliat again and went to clementi for dinner, followed by pool at clementi. Played race to 5 and won 5-2 wahahaha… then he was like complaining that he was spending the whole day entertaining me. Play bball also lose… then accompany come school… then now pool also lose…. Lol =X

In any case, really enjoyed myself, though its just 2 lonely guys spending the day together hahaha.. oh no, sounds gay =X brothers forever.

Busy!

Been wanting to blog for quite some time but simply cant find the time or energy to do so till now. Even as I’m wrinting this blog entry I’m on my way to NUS. For FYP, wat else?
But more on that later, first a recap of what’s been happening the past few days.

Thursday.
Went to teoheng ktv with weiliat huihuang rayner and bingde. Come to think of it it’s the first time my friends from 2 different cliques sang ktv together. Had a lot of fun with bingde’s kaopeh-ness and huihuang’s “think of me”. I have to admit life’s never boring when you have friends like huihuang and bingde hahaha.. GREAT. After that went to meet up with the lan gang to a dimsum shop near Mustafa area.

Friday – Saturday.
Do FYP report. Full stop.

Sunday.
Celebrated Rongxian’s bday at Marina Square. Had lunch at Imperial treasures and was served by this.. erm.. aunty by the name of Susan. I mean no offence, she’s efficient in her service la.. but like bingde said, her demeanor suggests that she’s better suited to working at kopitiam =X Went to bowl after that and Wendy had the highest score of 104 hahaha (though its la sup =p) cos when she throws the ball moves too slowly for the system to detect and she gets a second try wahaha. But it was bingde who won the day with his typical-bingde-style-guailaness near the end of the game. Absolutely hilarious.
Lihui and Cuihua had to leave early and the rest of us proceeded to teo heng (again) to sing ktv from 7-9. Bingde left to join his artsclub friends and the remaining of us had dinner at 五星鸡饭.

Monday.
Went all the way back to NUS to submit my FYP report to the examiner and pass some stuff to a fellow FYP student. After that traveled all the way back to kallang again to meet huihuang and weiliat at KLP (Kallang Leisure Park). Nostalgia flooded me as I walked along the once-familiar path to my secondary school hangout place. Memories of ice-skating, bowling, playing arcade, eating at BK etc. KLP really changed a lot. Looks pretty much like a shopping mall now. Went to the arcade to relive some of the old days by playing para-para lol. Really treasure th moments of us doing something silly and laughing our asses off at each other. =) that was followed by bowling at the new bowling alley. The lane is goog and the balls are all new. Scored 153, 133 and 140 compared to the 102 when I played on Sunday haha. But my advice is to go play on a weekday morning, cos its cheaper ($2 per game). Dinner was at old airport road, another favourite hangout during my high school days. The Fuzhou Fishball noodles are still delicious as ever =D.

Tuesday (yesterday)
Went to visit my grandma at simei then back to rayner’s house to watch Singapore vs Thailand. Must say that Singapore has still quite a way to go, and seriously I’m skeptical about them qualifying for the World Cup 2010 (don’t misunderstand me, I still support the Singapore Team, but the way they play is rather disheartening). Bingde and Chunwei came after that and we had a game of mahjong while waiting for Chunwei’s Liverpool game at 3am. I won $8 yes lar =p.
Rayner drove us out for supper (teochew porridge). Chunwei watched his soccer match while the rest of us dota-ed 3 consecutive games (3 wins haha) all the way till 615am. Went home for a couple of hours of sleep and here I am, dragging myself on my way to NUS again.

So well, the past few days have been eventful and enjoyable, but everytime I go out to have fun with my friends there’s always this nagging feeling of “something” that needs to be done. And yes, that “something” is the dreaded FYP. Yet at the same time really cant bring myself to dive in and concentrate on FYP. In the 10 days that followed the end of my exams I was practically doing my FYP CA2 report EVERYDAY. In fact, I was so sick and tired and mentally drained from working on the report that I decided to conclude it though I could have added more stuff inside. That shows how sick I am of it.

On top of that, I got other miscellaneous stuff that I need to do. Writing Xmas cards, Going to AMK to configure my PSP, buy external hard disc going Simei to visit my grandma (who recently injured her knee during a fall and had to be hospitalized) etc. All these makes me reluctant to spend a 1.5 hour trip to NUS and 1.5 hours back just to do some petty experiments. The trip to and fro school really drains me and usually takes up my whole day.

My friends are probably getting sick of me complaining about FYP every time I meet them, but I’m definitely not exaggerating how sucky it is. Unlike previous semesters where I can forget about everything after the exams and really enjoy my holidays, FYP requires me to put in continuous effort even during the holidays. Its not gonna be concluded till next year’s late April. And I cant afford to slack either, since my fate lies with my Prof.

To quote from bingde’s blog, “Every high score you get is accompanied by the hope that the mean is pathetic, and every low score u get is followed by the prayer that the whole cohort chui” How true. In Primary school 91 marks is an A*. In Secondary School 75 is an A1. But in NUS? Even if you manage to score 80/100 for a test, you will not be guaranteed an A. On top of that, you don’t get back your final exam papers, which makes up the largest percentage of your grade usually. Hence whether you do well or not depends on the person marking your script, and you’ll never know if he or she made a mistake in marking your exam scripts. Like I said, grades are more dependent on the lecturer rather than the module (just compare Proddar of Micro1 to ST of Micro2). Studies at this stage is no longer fun, no longer the naïve “pursue of knowledge”. Its all about the grades, about doing better than others. 13 weeks every semester for you to prove where you stand, and usually one mistake is all it takes for you to flunk. No second chance.

Alright. Enough about academics. I can only hope that Santa will give me the grades I hoped for on the 27th. Meanwhile, I’ll just try to enjoy myself whenever I can.

投名状? Anyone? =p

Scary

Today was bad scare day.

I was thinking of getting an external hard disk to back up my lappy’s stuff, after seeing my friends’ laptops (Bingde’s and Zo’s) laptop’s chui. After all, all my pictures, music and academic stuff are in my laptop. That includes my FYP stuff.

Then today, as I was returning home from school after a meet-up with my supervisor, I thought that I might as well do some work on the 1–hour plus bus ride home. Hence I took out my lappy, and started typing my report.

Then it happened.

The screen suddenly turned blue, with the words “windows has encountered a fatal error” and “starting to dump physical memory…” printed in white.

Oh my goodness. Siao liao!!

That was my first thought as I stared in disbelief at the screen. Natural instinct took over as I held on to the power button till the laptop switched off. I didn’t dare to switch it on again.

So throughout the whole trip home I was praying hard that when I reach home my lappy would be working fine again, and what would I do if the worst-case-scenario came true: my lappy’s chui.

When I reached home, I pressed the “on” button and held my breath as I prepared for the worst.

Imagine my relief when the familiar windows loading screen appeared. My lappy’s fine, for now.

I’m gonna get an external the very first thing tomorrow.

Hang in there, dear laptop!!

Update

I always love this time of the year. The temperature dropping, strong gusts of wind, beginning to have the “Christmas” feel. I always preferred Christmas to CNY, despite there being no ang pows for Christmas. I even remember when I was younger me and my bro used to draw our own “dream-houses” which resembled something like a log cabin in the midst of heavy snow, with a big warm fire blazing at the fireplace.

But now that I think back on all the times of Christmas I’ve had, I realize why I look forward to Christmas.

First of all, its in the December holidays, where after a long year of studying and exams, I finally get to have a break from academics. And secondly, I used to have at least one chalet gathering every December. Be it with my Sec 2 class, my JC class or with HH they all, it’s a time of getting to know your friends better. Last but not least, my 2 most memorable overseas trip were also during the December holidays – going to Hawaii in Sec 3, and Busan in JC1.

Sometimes I really wish to relive these moments. =)



Anyway not much’s been happening in the past few days.

Went for my relative’s (someone I’ve not seen for so long I dun even remember how he looked like) wedding dinner on Monday, which was held at a PA clubhouse. The food was good, except perhaps the dessert (almond cream) ugh…

Yesterday went to play pool with HH, JY and John. It was more of accompanying them bah actually haha since I dun really play pool. Definitely not as much as HH anyway =X



Going out again tml, teoheng ktv! =)