why i want to quit MA2101

i'm considering dropping MA2101.

reasons for dropping:
- i suck at the topic. seriously. from the beginning of the semester till now i have never fully understood a single lecture.
- module with the highest stress level.
- says prof lian, "If you can't spend at least 10hours a week, drop it." i can't spend 10 hours a week on it.
- the lecturer and tutorial sucks.
- other modules warrant my attention more than this one.
- i'm the lone arts fac student fighting against the china people. what chance will i have?
- an F on my transcript doesn't look very nice.

reasons against dropping:
- don't want to abandon joseph by himself. won't be very nice of me.
- says ashley from juice, "You want to challenge yourself and see if you can overcome. If you quit, you'll always wonder if you could have done it if only you stuck with it."
- a W on my transcript doesn't look very nice either.
- i'm going to be behind on my major modules.

so. which way to go?



mood: confused
listening to: whenever you remember - carrie underwood

very quick one

been real busy this weekend. so much happened but no time to talk.

ah bor and family came down from sabah. mai mai came up from melbourne. popo and gang came down from kulai. so, saturday, full house practically all day. jack n syn-syn stayed over friday night and saturday morn mum made us bring them out. went to watch POTC at cineleisure. $9.50 wasted. the quality of the movie was so bad there. anyway, then, brought them shopping with the rest of the family at parkway. THEN, in the evening, big family dinner at my place. woah. never been so re nao since CNY. the food was ok. not the best but edible.

had to cancel the choir practice that night cos jess msged me to say that there were only like, 2 people planning to attend. the rest of them, exams, assignments etc etc. so, cancelled and poor tian could not be reached so i think she didn't know we cancelled practice.

rushing out all my tutorials. all my own darn fault lah. *repeat after me* NEVER AGAIN SHALL I LEAVE TUTORIALS TO SUNDAY AFTERNOON. rushed out the MA2101. starting to have regrets about taking that one. i'm just working blind. have absolutely no idea what i'm supposed to be doing. i couldn't do a single proving question cos i don't know how to even start. which is also my fault, i should have paid more attention in MA1101 cos those questions look familiar. anyway, then went on to MA1102. that was marginally better. at least i don't feel as much pressure to do well. then the EL2101 which went quite well. GEK1500, absolutely no pressure at all. just read the textbook and hope that tmr's class is like a lecture.

happy note: CLAY AIKEN'S CD IS HAVING A WORLDWIDE RELEASE ON SEPTEMBER 18 AND SINGAPORE IS RECEIVING IT A FULL DAY AHEAD OF THE US!!!!!!!!!! aaahhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!! it's so true. and for once, the rest of the world are envious of singapore claymates. muahahahaha! gonna look out for pre-orders. such a momentous thing, i wanna be part of it. be a part of all the fun. :D :D gonna go and scout out the cd shops around clementi. ok, i'm rambling. time to move on.

in remembrance of LC. click HERE (Pt1) and HERE(Pt2)




mood: hyper
listening to: flying without wings - ruben studdard

i found this beautiful song to share...

Mark Harris - Find Your Wings
From the album The Line Between The Two

It's only for a moment you are mine to hold
The plans that heaven has for you
Will all too soon unfold

So many different prayers I'll pray
For all that you might do
But most of all I'll want to know
You're walking in the truth

And If I never told you
I want you to know
As I watch you grow

Chorus:I pray that God would fill your heart with dreams
And that faith gives you the courage
To dare to do great things
I'm here for you whatever this life brings
So let my love give you roots
And help you find your wings

May passion be the wind
That leads you through your days
And may conviction keep you strong
Guide you on your way
May there be many moments
That make your life so sweet
Oh, but more than memories

(Chorus)

It's not living if you don't reach for the sky
I'll have tears as you take off
But I'll cheer as you fly

(Chorus)

cruel crazy beautiful world

been really busy with the nus choir auditions. wed, thurs and fri were the auditions. i decided to skip friday night cos i couldn't take it anymore. it's times like this when i admire people like joseph and paulus for their boundless energy and friendliness. my stock of friendliness kinda ran out on wed night. anyway, had some interesting characters come for audition. memoriable ones was that poor girl that fell asleep waiting for her turn, that totally pompous and hao lian shanghai tenor guy, that boy-boy guy that started playing with a yo-yo. lol. ask me if you wanna know more cos i don't want them to find out if i bad mouth them (esp the china guy). the first day was really chaotic. i forgot to number the first few audition sheets so the first 12 people were totally messed up and had to rely on memory to determine who came first. the system was a bit sucky cos we had auditions downstairs while the holding area was the lobby upstairs. apparently a few people got lost looking for the auditions. 45 people on the first day. second day was marginally better, we knew what to expect. except that for some reason, harmonica ensemble was using our practice rooms. so, we had the auditions proper in the dance studio (downstairs again) and then the interviews in the conference area just off the lobby. so that was slightly messy especially at the end when they decided to speed things up a bit by doing the interviews first before the auditions (vice versa before). almost 50 people the second night. wind ensemble had their welcome tea/dinner, and they had food left over so choir ate it up. nice food btw. they got good value for their money. didn't go for the 3rd day auditions so can't comment too much. heard there was 60 people. wow. a bit paiseh part, on day2, this guy ferdinand came to me and said that he'll be coming tmr but late. and i told him, don't worry, just come down, and gave him my number to tell me if he changed his mind. i completely forgot that i was planning to not go for day3. so, anyway, fri night, he called me and informed me that he was on his way and bringing a friend along. omg. so embarrassing sia. i feel like i kinda let him down. kinda like, you assured me that the thing is still on and put yourself as point of contact, and yet you don't show up?! i think he got into choir anyway so i'll apologise if i run into him tmr. about 75 people got in. joy, harris and melissa(i think) got in. yay!

anyway, as part of our recruitment, we had booths all over the school. my shift on wed at the engine fac was really interesting. erm...we didn't exactly do anything as proactive as we had been on the first day. ;D but it was interesting nevertheless. at the booth next to us, there was this gimmick thing to fold paper cranes. it's from the nus breakers, 'training' to break a record of largest number of paper cranes folded (this coming tuesday). so anyway, there was this guy that was carrying a loudspeaker and urging people to fold paper cranes, cos apparently they were using charity, for every paper crane folded, song he will donate a bowl of rice to the red cross. so the guy was like, "my brothers and sisters of nus! come and do a good deed today! don't turn your backs on these needy people!" he went on and on and on and on practically non stop for 2 hours. oh. my. god. i have NEVER seen something like that before. but later on, he got a bit overboard when he said, "if you understand what i'm saying, then i don't understand why you are walking away from me." i'll remember that guy forever i tell you. he should be a politician. or the guy that gives political rally speeches. my partner at the booth was saying that he's probably a political science major. haha! and yes, i did my bit for charity and folded his darn paper cranes.

outside of school note. something interesting i did over the weekend...for all you who don't know (which is probably everybody), one of the clay fan boards that i frequent is the WMS board. and they've got a very interesting concept there about clay and clones. the concept is that there are clones of clay running around doing appearances for him, which explains why he looks slightly different in every appearance. so anyway, this part of the board generally deals with fiction and story writing. and well...i wrote something over the holidays. haha. and i posted it up this weekend. feels proud. first time i did something like that. so, click HERE if you wanna see it. if you don't, it's perfectly ok. it's a crazy thing i'm doing anyway. welcome to the insanity, as they say.

i realised that i never really addressed the issue of the SEP. well, i was rejected. and yes, i am very very disappointed. i wrote before that maybe it's because of money issues. probably that's why. i mean, i meet the minimum grade criteria. ok, i scrape through. they want a CAP of 3 and i got 3.2. i guess this is one thing that i can't really just ignore. i mean, it affects me in a way that i didn't expect it to. i guess i was hoping way too much that i would get it, and when i didn't... my friend got in. she's going to UNC-CH. that's the school that i was secretly really really hoping to get into. i didn't put it as first choice cos US is a bit expensive for me. we both put that as our 3rd choice. she got it. i didn't. and i'm pretty sad about it. i saw her entry some time back on how she's finally gotten through the paperwork and she's getting ready to go. i feel like crying when i think about it. i tell myself that it's stupid thing to cry over. it's just SEP. i can always try again next time. but i don't know. i'm doing a 3 year course. yr3 sem1 will be my last chance. i don't want to go overseas as a post-grad student. i wanna go now, and i wanna go with friends that i'm close to. i know it sounds whiny. i don't want to spend the next semester hoping and hoping, then applying and hoping again, only to be rejected a second time.

i'm never gonna get round to that scolding i owe them. today was a milestone in Jubilate history. (i still haven't gotten used to the new name yet) today was LC's second anniversary. it was also the last day of LC. at the gathering just now, it was announced that LC would be closing. i know dawn told me the news ages ago. and i still haven't figured out what this would mean for choir. people will be leaving definitely. things are gonna get very disrupted. so sorry to tian that she had to join at such a time. for me, i want to continue the choir. i think, if only for the sake of functionality, the choir still has to go on. but i don't know what to do, where to go from here. LC was an important factor in the existence of the choir. just tonight, 5 members have already declared that they're leaving. 5 outgoing to 1 incoming is just not enough to sustain ourselves. at least, if the church gets pulled down and we forced to scatter, it's a good excuse for us to suddenly drop numbers. in a way, it feels a bit paiseh. just today, khoo did promotion for our choir. he says he wants to build the choir until it becomes 50 strong. imagine what it'll be like when the very next week the numbers drop to a single digit number. i don't know. it's simple for me, i'm in it for the music. but others...how can i motivate them enough to stay? i don't have a personality like dawn. i'm not outgoing like nick. it's one thing to say that choir will continue and that i will not let the choir collapse under my leadership, and quite another thing to actually do it.



mood: tired, confused
listening to: silence

i owe my choir a good scolding, but...

...not today.

today was not bad. the mass went well, after the initial kan cheong attacks. and kan cheong attacks because of what happened that warrants the scoldings. i asked them all to come down at 7pm. at 7pm, the only people there were tian, randall, andrew and andrea. all the way until 7,30 less than half of the choir was there. we had not warmed up, not practiced, nothing. and we're going to do a relatively important mass. st ant's began quite scarily. fr paul came in and did not go to the altar seat through 2 verses of "shine jesus shine". so panicking me decided to just end the song and i was right! as i ended the song, he moved up to the stand. and the rest went quite well. happy that i got "alleluia" right! yay! my first time doing that version! i absolutely loved "ave maria" and "praise her with a flower". could hear the congregation singing, and really got into the feel of the song. i think it was probably my best ever at the organ. :D especially the "flower" song. it was supposed to be recessional, but the people were not moving. :O so, we sang the entire song through and people were blasting so much all the way to the end. touched. it's times like these that it feels worth all the stress.

lectures went quite well also. spent most of the last 2 days in the foreign lands of science fac and engine fac. MA2101 on monday was not bad. i kinda like the lecturer. prof lian. he's the really no-nonsense type. the type that really gave me the impression that he was going to yell at the latecomers. there was this thing he said, "if you don't understand the lecture, go back and study your notes. if you still don't understand, come and find me. if you're scared to find me, then you should drop the course." woah. somehow i appreciate such frankness.

MA1102R was ok. very cheena lecturer. Wang Fei is his name. don't know his title. the fancy computer stuff that he tried to use, ie, the stylus, repeatedly refused to work for him. and the mic also was so soft no matter what he tried to do. but calculus seems easy at this point. he says it's more computational rather than analytical. so thank god for that. i've got enough of analysis with linear algebra already. saw cass in the class, but i don't think she saw me.

GEK1500. one of those that's going to be like genes and soc, i can sense it. the lecturer, dr soh, is the most cheena one i've got thus far. the type that can't pronounce "R" but does it as an "L". "zero" became "jilo". "clap" became "crap". omg! there was a rep from the textbook publisher there to talk to us, and after he was done, we clapped for him and dr soh said, "later, let's see if there's any 'crapping' for me also." *jaw drops* oh.my.freaking.god.

and you know how i used to say that arts fac is run down? i changed my mind. science fac is the most run down place of all. LT26 still uses those fold up wooden chairs for lectures. LT21 is so ulu and feels SO old. there's construction work all over the place. the only things that look new there are the computers and projector screens. everything else...imagine years and years ago style, with aircon. LT25 of 2 sems ago deceived me. none of the arts lecture theatres are like that lor.

anyway, it's nice. tmr going back to my old stamping ground, the arts fac. i miss it already. oh and talking about missing, i miss my MA1101R lecturer, mr toh. don't know why. i think i'm inadvertly comparing my other maths lecturers with him. lol. he should be proud. he did a relatively good job in lecturing back then.

oh, and btw, westlife is coming to singapore in sept (i think it's sept). dilemma whether to go or not to go. i used to really like westlife. but...it's the cost. and also, no one to go with me. so, anyone who knows me and wants to go to a westlife concert with me, let me know!

alrighty. all for now. need to get down to that article for zac that i got no motivation to do. :p



mood: content
listening to: without you - clay aiken; kimberley locke

and it begins again

tomorrow, the new semester starts. have to say, it's mixed feelings for me. on the one hand, it's the end of boredom and slacking. on the other hand, it's the end of boredom and slacking. don't know what's going to happen this new year. i'm a year 2 now. one year closer off the edge of all that's familiar. *shudder* back to the crazy rat race of school. back to jostling with the crowd in the bus, corridors, canteen...back to the insane deadlines and assignments. 5 day week this time. :p

anyway, the last half of the week was fine. thursday lost my voice cos of eating mum's chilli tuna that was super super hot (to me). thursday was the choir welcome tea. me, felicia and winnie went to jun's house to prepare sandwiches. we prepared 4 huge loaves of bread (cheese, tuna, egg mayo) plus 3 cakes and 2 big packets of potato chips. and it still wasn't enough for the freshmen. everything was gone in minutes. there was so many of them. in a way, it's a good thing. but who knows who's gonna stay and who was just eyeing for a free meal? lol.

friday was fun. went to sumi's house for a little get together with duan hui and toh ying. watched "WD" (which i think duan hui is a bit sensitive about telling the title out, so i won't) and a bit of "Munich". WD was cute. not rolling in the aisles kind of funny, but it was enjoyable. those girls are SO innocent! omg! can you believe that once upon a time, we were all just as innocent? "Munich" was heavy. a bit hard to get what was going on. but could tell it was one of those that is a really really good show. so, hopefully can watch it again someday. nino was going totally crazy. think maybe first time in a long time that he's got so much company in the house. he was slobbering all over me. first time a dog licked me on the face. he was biting my shirt also, don't know why. lucky it didn't tear or anything. sumi would probably whack him if he did that. wish i had a dog.

saturday. only thing to note was the choir practice. we've got a new member. Tian (pronounced like 'sweet'). bit hard to get used to her name. she seems a nice girl. hard to believe she's older than me. anyway, i was supposed to meet daryl at 7 to practice the organ. he didn't show up till 7.30. practice proper was supposed to start at 7.30. waited until 8 and there was still only me, andrew, tian, daryl, verena, nick and zac. how pathetic could that be? later on randall and aloy came in. and that was choir.

sunday. there was 2 infant baptisms after mass. fr khoo was late for it. me was hanging around waiting for the baptisms to finish and i can use the organ, so got shanghaied into playing for the baptism. lucky kids to get an organist for their baptism ceremony. in the evening, mum decided to have a get together for rosary. so the whole family, including ah-ku's side and janice's family came. was chaotic. janice could not sit still and she was distracting linus who was probably just looking for a reason to misbehave anyway. well, let's say i've attended more reverent rosary sessions.

this weekend, i've discovered the joys of online games. lol. downloaded free trial games of "mystic inn" and "magic match" and was playing it. haha! so fun. but sadly, can only use once or for an hour. i wish can play it till the end. but...people with no money to spend use free trials.
alrighty. that's all. i'll see ya when i see ya.




mood: content
listening to: this is the night - clay aiken

i've got my modules!!

EL2101 - structure of sentences and meaning
EL2151 - Social variation in English
MA1102R - Calculus
MA2101 - Linear Algebra II
GEK1500 - Inside your Personal computer



mood: happy!
listening to: nothing