The second last day of school was still enjoyable. Leadership camp was quite fun, but only because of the activities. Monkey See Monkey Do was so epic, our class had "great" coordination. Nicholas got picked at least once in each game, wasting one chance of each zookeeper. And it was so simply because he was the one who called the shots even though he was never the Monkey King. Forfeits included singing Baby, Mass Push-ups and Choong Meng's own set of push ups.
Then there was another activity where we had to form a circle, be connected in some way (simplest way was hands) and move one full circle as a group and arrive back at our own seat. 2 circles of 19 each, the slower group was forced to do a forfeit. Well, my group was faster thanks to Kaiser's method of getting together as a smaller circle so that we could move faster. As such, the other group had to walk down the corridor of our floor shouting that our class rocked. It was really funny and some of our group even joined them.
Then we had yet another activity where we remained in our circles and the coach would shout out a number. If 1, we moved one step forward as a group maintaining our circular shape. If 2, we backtracked two steps. On 3, we all had to sit on the knees of the person behind us. The circle had to be small enough for the right amount of space between each person. Ming Xuan was behind me while I supported Alex, and San Zeng, that idiot, caused us to break formation by giving Ming Xuan a zap, who transferred the same action onto me. I'm incredibly vulnerable to that, so of course I was shocked. After the coach was satisfied, we had to do it as a whole class. This time, Jia Hui was in front of me while Ming Xuan remained behind me. At least Keng Wee was there to separate him and San Zeng now :D. Anyway, we were not quite successful, but the coach seemed ok with it. When she told us to reverse positions such that I now had to support Ming Xuan, we fell a total of 3 times.
There was one last activity, although that was after recess, which involved 6 to 7 people in a circles sitting down. Legs were stretched out to meet at the middle, and by holding on to each other, we had to get up into standing position at the same time as well as not bending our knees too much. We failed that, so the coach allowed us to get up one by one. After we were successful with that, we had to go up 2 people at the time. Then 4. After that, was the whole group. We managed to do it finally albeit shakily.
Recess was not as entertaining as yesterday as we got only 40 minutes and there was no one to talk to. My juniors.... all disappeared :(. Meanwhile, Darrin totally ignored Ming Xuan throughout the day and me as well, but he decided to stop that ridiculous attitude towards me at the end of the day.
Report Books came back today instead of tomorrow. 18/38, better than I expected as I felt that I really did badly this time round. Of course, that isn't satisfying either. And at 18th position, my average is 68.8. So those ahead of me are really those who qualify for this class. San Zeng beat me totally this time round. From following me by 0.1%, he is now ahead by 1.3%. Darrin and I currently have a 0.5 mark difference, while poor Ming Xuan fell to the back at 28. Not to say he's a weak student, he's just giving us chances for now :D. He definitely has the ability to do well, after being able to tell me every single thing I needed to know even though he doesn't look like he heard them either. He has a knack for knowing the essential stuff that I usually miss out, so he's the number 1 reliable person to look for whenever I am in need of information.
Training was not too bad, but I definitely did not play as well as I did on Sunday. Lost to Kai Xun 3 - 2, then to Yan Tian 3 - 1. When I asked for a rematch, I beat Kai Xun 3 - 0 and lost to Yan Tian 3 - 2 after that. And that's ALL I did that is worth mentioning, in 3 hours.
Wednesday, 26 May 2010
Tuesday, 25 May 2010
Somewhat ridiculous day today. We started off with a Etiquette talk about how to be a gentlemen. The speaker was really funny with his actions and his stories, some really disgusting though. He got Kaiser to spray cologne in public as a demo. He taught us how to stand, walk, sit and introduce others (seniors first)
That talk lasted until 9.40am. Then it was recess, until 11am. A nice lengthy session of slacking. I just got 3 pieces of French Toast, went back to class with Russell, finished it then realized that it was only 10am. Went back to the canteen, got a pack of French Fries, then sat and ate it. Soon after, Benedict came with his own pack of fries, filled with light sauce by accident, and chilli. The smell was horrendous. It's like a garbage bin, seriously. And he still said it was nice. Well, we sat there and talked. Benedict's recess was from 10 to 10.40, so we had twice the amount of their time. Soon after, Tristan came, then Xin Wei joined the group followed by Reuben. We sat and chatted until about 10.55am. Then we went to the hall to watch a movie.
Finding an authorized place to sit was the immediate problem as Hong Fu was not present to organize the class. In the end, Zhi Ming took a random spot. It was a really huge space. Keefe, San Zeng and I followed suit, after which Ming Xuan came. 5 minutes later, the whole class was clustered in that space, but all I cared about was that there was enough space to lie down and stretch my legs because that's the hardest part, sitting in the hall. Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within was shown, a 2001 movie which totally made no sense in the beginning. There was nothing at all to explain the events at the start, but the plot gradually unmasked itself. I felt that it was really lame but it did seem good for a movie in that era so yeah I shouldn't be complaining.
Half of the hall were immature people who clapped at every change of scene which they felt deserved a round of applause which was totally uncalled for. They were really idiots who felt that they were cool, to use a less insulting term. Well, Apollos kept disturbing pupils outside the hall who came to count the number of lights in the hall as it was part of their activity. He gave them random numbers and told them to go away. Meanwhile, San Zeng, Ming Xuan and I, we were fooling around for quite a bit.
That talk lasted until 9.40am. Then it was recess, until 11am. A nice lengthy session of slacking. I just got 3 pieces of French Toast, went back to class with Russell, finished it then realized that it was only 10am. Went back to the canteen, got a pack of French Fries, then sat and ate it. Soon after, Benedict came with his own pack of fries, filled with light sauce by accident, and chilli. The smell was horrendous. It's like a garbage bin, seriously. And he still said it was nice. Well, we sat there and talked. Benedict's recess was from 10 to 10.40, so we had twice the amount of their time. Soon after, Tristan came, then Xin Wei joined the group followed by Reuben. We sat and chatted until about 10.55am. Then we went to the hall to watch a movie.
Finding an authorized place to sit was the immediate problem as Hong Fu was not present to organize the class. In the end, Zhi Ming took a random spot. It was a really huge space. Keefe, San Zeng and I followed suit, after which Ming Xuan came. 5 minutes later, the whole class was clustered in that space, but all I cared about was that there was enough space to lie down and stretch my legs because that's the hardest part, sitting in the hall. Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within was shown, a 2001 movie which totally made no sense in the beginning. There was nothing at all to explain the events at the start, but the plot gradually unmasked itself. I felt that it was really lame but it did seem good for a movie in that era so yeah I shouldn't be complaining.
Half of the hall were immature people who clapped at every change of scene which they felt deserved a round of applause which was totally uncalled for. They were really idiots who felt that they were cool, to use a less insulting term. Well, Apollos kept disturbing pupils outside the hall who came to count the number of lights in the hall as it was part of their activity. He gave them random numbers and told them to go away. Meanwhile, San Zeng, Ming Xuan and I, we were fooling around for quite a bit.
Monday, 24 May 2010
It's a great start to a fine ending week. Although it was tie day, we were given leeway during the major talk of the day to take it off in our favour. And now, I am treasuring every period in school that is kept away from studying, so I'm quite happy with the post exam schedule as it's all talks. Last year I'd rather have lessons, this year, I prefer them.
The first period today was started off with the confirmation and finalization of Exam Results. But before that, Ms Leng mentioned about our Conduct grade. By default, everyone has a grade of "Very Good", which will be demoted to "Good" should the student be faulted thrice. She added that 2 people in our class had gotten "Excellent", one whom had been given that because he did his job well, and another for honesty. For the former, Ming Xuan thought that it was Kaiser. She elaborated on the one who was honest by saying that it had made a difference of 5 marks in one of his papers and was thus recommended by the teacher for his conduct grade to be promoted, and immediately Ming Xuan and Darrin looked at me because they knew about the loss of 5 marks in my Physics paper which pulled down an already unsatisfactory grade to a borderline pass. Well, now we have a strong feeling that it's me, but we can't be sure until the report book comes back on Friday. Kai Xun felt prejudiced as he had lost 7 marks in his Higher Chinese Paper due to miscalculations as well.
I didn't care about the marks displayed on the sheets of paper. We had 35 minutes for 38 people to sign and confirm their marks, so we lacked time as some busy bodies also enjoyed comparing their results by pondering over the sheets of paper for extended periods of time in such an inconvenient environment. Also, what's done has been done. I'm not going to bother about the current screwed up combined results, I've gotten motivation from her to do better in the future.
After signing on the 6 sheets of papers, we were brought to the TK Low Hall for a talk on commercials. The teacher in charge felt that the 3 classes present were really quiet and encouraged a little bit of noise. Well, the commercial talk was really funny. He started off by telling us that NASA had recently found a moon which was full of cheddar cheese, even the surface was liquid cheddar. I almost believed it. Then he let us imagine scenarios in which more powerful people told us that same thing such as the principal and a news broadcaster. Under which circumstances would we believe that story? The news broadcaster is the most likely one. So that's how commercials started.
We were shown several commercials in local TV which he criticized to be "bullcrap". Then he showed us Thai advertisements which he felt were really creative and true enough, the one about the Cheers Beer advertisement was incredibly epic. He edited out the part where the beer came in and I thought the purpose of the advertisement was encourage people to be happy. He explained afterwards that the happy people portrayed celebration, and where celebration comes in, beer is involved. Thus, the significance of the people's excitement was important in the advertisement. Well, the link is here. Cheers Beer Commercial.
Recess, at 9.20am. I went to the Canteen, saw an empty queue in every single stall and went to buy my usual Chocolate Bun pair. Then I got scolded by DK. He said "Who gave you permission to buy food?" Well, he was in the wrong at the end, and he didn't apologize. But then, I had run back to class and just eaten the food there. 1 hour recess, Kevin was blasting music on his mac.
At 10.20, we made our way to the Shaw Hall where we were told that we could remove our ties for a more comfortable environment. It was a school forum talk where we could suggest improvements for the school. I did not listen to the elaborations of each student much, but I could roughly guess where they were heading. Suggestions such as air-conditioners in classrooms, allowing PE-singlets to be worn even after recess, not a compulsory rule to wear the PE-singlet. I'm surprised no one asked for Mixed School (OK, not really surprised), and I don't want it anyway. One of them even asked why his friend was not elected president of the student council. Although that wasn't a suggestion to improve the school, it was really daring of him to suggest that. It's like asking Obama why McCain isn't the president of the US. And Ming Xuan's friend, asked if it was legal to play poker in school, to which the reply was obvious, after which he pointed randomly (I think) into the crowd and said that they were playing poker. I don't think it was true as the teacher confiscated nothing.
Anyway, for the fun of it, I told Ming Xuan his own handphone number. A couple of seconds later, my handphone number came back. Darrin asked him what his number was and got it recited back to him. Not to be beaten, he asked for his house number, and got in response the correct string of numbers. I was baffled by that, but he then told us that those were the only numbers that he remembered.
So that's that for today. We were stuck in the hall until 12.10pm. Tomorrow... we will be looking at a Film Critique?? And a... what's this, Etiq talk? OK.... sounds fun?
The first period today was started off with the confirmation and finalization of Exam Results. But before that, Ms Leng mentioned about our Conduct grade. By default, everyone has a grade of "Very Good", which will be demoted to "Good" should the student be faulted thrice. She added that 2 people in our class had gotten "Excellent", one whom had been given that because he did his job well, and another for honesty. For the former, Ming Xuan thought that it was Kaiser. She elaborated on the one who was honest by saying that it had made a difference of 5 marks in one of his papers and was thus recommended by the teacher for his conduct grade to be promoted, and immediately Ming Xuan and Darrin looked at me because they knew about the loss of 5 marks in my Physics paper which pulled down an already unsatisfactory grade to a borderline pass. Well, now we have a strong feeling that it's me, but we can't be sure until the report book comes back on Friday. Kai Xun felt prejudiced as he had lost 7 marks in his Higher Chinese Paper due to miscalculations as well.
I didn't care about the marks displayed on the sheets of paper. We had 35 minutes for 38 people to sign and confirm their marks, so we lacked time as some busy bodies also enjoyed comparing their results by pondering over the sheets of paper for extended periods of time in such an inconvenient environment. Also, what's done has been done. I'm not going to bother about the current screwed up combined results, I've gotten motivation from her to do better in the future.
After signing on the 6 sheets of papers, we were brought to the TK Low Hall for a talk on commercials. The teacher in charge felt that the 3 classes present were really quiet and encouraged a little bit of noise. Well, the commercial talk was really funny. He started off by telling us that NASA had recently found a moon which was full of cheddar cheese, even the surface was liquid cheddar. I almost believed it. Then he let us imagine scenarios in which more powerful people told us that same thing such as the principal and a news broadcaster. Under which circumstances would we believe that story? The news broadcaster is the most likely one. So that's how commercials started.
We were shown several commercials in local TV which he criticized to be "bullcrap". Then he showed us Thai advertisements which he felt were really creative and true enough, the one about the Cheers Beer advertisement was incredibly epic. He edited out the part where the beer came in and I thought the purpose of the advertisement was encourage people to be happy. He explained afterwards that the happy people portrayed celebration, and where celebration comes in, beer is involved. Thus, the significance of the people's excitement was important in the advertisement. Well, the link is here. Cheers Beer Commercial.
Recess, at 9.20am. I went to the Canteen, saw an empty queue in every single stall and went to buy my usual Chocolate Bun pair. Then I got scolded by DK. He said "Who gave you permission to buy food?" Well, he was in the wrong at the end, and he didn't apologize. But then, I had run back to class and just eaten the food there. 1 hour recess, Kevin was blasting music on his mac.
At 10.20, we made our way to the Shaw Hall where we were told that we could remove our ties for a more comfortable environment. It was a school forum talk where we could suggest improvements for the school. I did not listen to the elaborations of each student much, but I could roughly guess where they were heading. Suggestions such as air-conditioners in classrooms, allowing PE-singlets to be worn even after recess, not a compulsory rule to wear the PE-singlet. I'm surprised no one asked for Mixed School (OK, not really surprised), and I don't want it anyway. One of them even asked why his friend was not elected president of the student council. Although that wasn't a suggestion to improve the school, it was really daring of him to suggest that. It's like asking Obama why McCain isn't the president of the US. And Ming Xuan's friend, asked if it was legal to play poker in school, to which the reply was obvious, after which he pointed randomly (I think) into the crowd and said that they were playing poker. I don't think it was true as the teacher confiscated nothing.
Anyway, for the fun of it, I told Ming Xuan his own handphone number. A couple of seconds later, my handphone number came back. Darrin asked him what his number was and got it recited back to him. Not to be beaten, he asked for his house number, and got in response the correct string of numbers. I was baffled by that, but he then told us that those were the only numbers that he remembered.
So that's that for today. We were stuck in the hall until 12.10pm. Tomorrow... we will be looking at a Film Critique?? And a... what's this, Etiq talk? OK.... sounds fun?
Sunday, 23 May 2010
Today's training session was very good. The moment I arrived, cuo qiu. Then when the twins came, cuo qiu bi sai. I won, so I was rewarded with a drink that I had originally declined.
I left Julian behind as I went for Lunch alone. Feeling in no mood to eat, I merely took a chocolate cone from Macdonalds. I regretted this afterwards when I returned to the school, for by then I had started to feel hungry.
I was asked to play with Yi Kar, who had just come back from the Lianhe Zaobao tournament. I beat him 3 - 0, but he was really missing all his la qius, the balls went past his bat physically. I was promised another drink if I beat Yen Kar too, and it was 3 - 2, but he forgot about it. I didn't chase him for the drink. Next was Nicholas, I won 3 - 2, to which coach's response was for a best of 7, continued. Lost one, won one, so overall I won 4 - 3. Another drink if I beat 2 more opponents, coach said. Next was.... I'm not sure of his name??? 3 - 0 it was, anyway. The final opponent was supposed to be Liang Heng, who went home, and Nicholas wasn't happy with our match so he wanted to play again. I lost 3 - 2 this time, so coach passed him the drink.
The Doubles game was depressing, I was already worn out by Nicholas, I was paired up with the weaker of the 2, and it was very hot. The worst part was jiao huan. Yi Kar, Nicholas, that guy whose name I don't know and I. Yi Kar picked Nicholas immediately when given the choice as he felt that the other guy was much weaker, which turned out to be true. I lost 2 and won 1, and even then it was 3 - 2. Guess which one we won? The one with Yi Kar, of course!
Up next, was Gerrat. I can safely say that this was the most intense match of the day. He caught every single lucky ball I shot at him including those that hit the sides of tables or went just over the net, and they catch 99% of people off guard, causing them to lose the point. The net ones may be ok, but the balls that touch the side of the table are nearly impossible to return consistently, but that was what Gerrat did. He was ready all the time as though he expected his opponent to be aiming for that spot. So it seemed like if I did that, I lose, because I myself did not expect him to return those balls. I lost to him, 3 - 2, final set 11 - 8.
Then we have.... the Nanyang Triplet???? A drink for beating all of them, and I totally failed that. Beat Joy, got trashed by Jerilyn and lost to Yirong. Jerilyn's chang jiao causes the ball to feel so heavy and I can't pull the ball up. And then Yirong, with her Anti and her smashes which always seem to go in..... I just couldn't win.
I left Julian behind as I went for Lunch alone. Feeling in no mood to eat, I merely took a chocolate cone from Macdonalds. I regretted this afterwards when I returned to the school, for by then I had started to feel hungry.
I was asked to play with Yi Kar, who had just come back from the Lianhe Zaobao tournament. I beat him 3 - 0, but he was really missing all his la qius, the balls went past his bat physically. I was promised another drink if I beat Yen Kar too, and it was 3 - 2, but he forgot about it. I didn't chase him for the drink. Next was Nicholas, I won 3 - 2, to which coach's response was for a best of 7, continued. Lost one, won one, so overall I won 4 - 3. Another drink if I beat 2 more opponents, coach said. Next was.... I'm not sure of his name??? 3 - 0 it was, anyway. The final opponent was supposed to be Liang Heng, who went home, and Nicholas wasn't happy with our match so he wanted to play again. I lost 3 - 2 this time, so coach passed him the drink.
The Doubles game was depressing, I was already worn out by Nicholas, I was paired up with the weaker of the 2, and it was very hot. The worst part was jiao huan. Yi Kar, Nicholas, that guy whose name I don't know and I. Yi Kar picked Nicholas immediately when given the choice as he felt that the other guy was much weaker, which turned out to be true. I lost 2 and won 1, and even then it was 3 - 2. Guess which one we won? The one with Yi Kar, of course!
Up next, was Gerrat. I can safely say that this was the most intense match of the day. He caught every single lucky ball I shot at him including those that hit the sides of tables or went just over the net, and they catch 99% of people off guard, causing them to lose the point. The net ones may be ok, but the balls that touch the side of the table are nearly impossible to return consistently, but that was what Gerrat did. He was ready all the time as though he expected his opponent to be aiming for that spot. So it seemed like if I did that, I lose, because I myself did not expect him to return those balls. I lost to him, 3 - 2, final set 11 - 8.
Then we have.... the Nanyang Triplet???? A drink for beating all of them, and I totally failed that. Beat Joy, got trashed by Jerilyn and lost to Yirong. Jerilyn's chang jiao causes the ball to feel so heavy and I can't pull the ball up. And then Yirong, with her Anti and her smashes which always seem to go in..... I just couldn't win.
Saturday, 22 May 2010
Lianhe Zaobao cup was not a disaster that I had expected. Even if I had been through the first round, Julian would have beaten me anyway, he got a Bye. I played with some SSP guy who didn't seem to be up to standards. But then, neither was I. I lost 3 - 0 with scores 11 - 8, 11 - 9 and 14 - 12. I served out at least 5 balls, was faulted for Service thrice and hesitated a lot which resulted in at least 5 worthless outs. Thus, I feel that I could have won but due to those ridiculous mistakes, I was unable to win. Yi Kar was my advisor for the match. Sean and friends showed their support as well which I really appreciate. Sean, Seth and Yi Kar will be moving on tomorrow so I wish them luck in their match. :D
Thursday, 20 May 2010
Training yesterday was good, much better than Sunday. I felt so lousy on Sunday and I left early at about 5pm. It was also very hot and I was sick. But yesterday, I felt that I was back up to my level. We all turned up after being told by Sean to do so, but the reason why was unclear and thus we were left in anger as for those who had not wanted to come, they had just followed Sean's words blindly. Kai Xun, although having missed training for several weeks, still kept his skill and could get back his control by the first ball, it was just incredible. I was having trouble even serving a simple ball, the bat felt so awkward. After a couple of hours, however, I felt much better. However, I still lost to him even when he was tired.
Friday, 14 May 2010
Monday, 10 May 2010
Chemistry wasn't too bad, but others felt that it didn't go well for them, so I don't know if I'm getting all the wrong answers and not knowing it. Ming Xuan said time was tight, Kai Xun had difficulty for MCQ while Keefe, definitely not in good shape, he left one whole page blank and didn't know that he did. It had torn off from the back of the paper and he didn't realize it. It was only when the teacher came to collect his papers that he did. Fortunately for him, it was the page containing the Periodic Table, or that page might have been full of questions, so it was only 1 side, and that one side contributed 7 out of the 100 marks available.
Sunday, 9 May 2010
"Studied" Biology and Chemistry over the weekend. I'm not confident of it. Going to hope for the best tomorrow.
I was trying to ask Ming Xuan and San Zeng a question yesterday so when I went online I saw them both and got them into a conversation. Then Ming Xuan said he did his Chemistry paper on Friday and said that he would be doing Physics on Monday. And I asked what he was doing that for if Physics was already over. Then Ming Xuan said "Different school", and I looked up at his address and found out that it was the wrong Ming Xuan I was talking to. Just then, the real Ming Xuan came online and I dragged him in for a 4 way confusing conversation. At least both Ming Xuans used contradictory font colours, one red and one blue.
I was trying to ask Ming Xuan and San Zeng a question yesterday so when I went online I saw them both and got them into a conversation. Then Ming Xuan said he did his Chemistry paper on Friday and said that he would be doing Physics on Monday. And I asked what he was doing that for if Physics was already over. Then Ming Xuan said "Different school", and I looked up at his address and found out that it was the wrong Ming Xuan I was talking to. Just then, the real Ming Xuan came online and I dragged him in for a 4 way confusing conversation. At least both Ming Xuans used contradictory font colours, one red and one blue.
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