homework, to do or not to do?

Actually, the title might be a little misleading because I have actually finished most of my holiday homework. I am currently only left with two - chemistry worksheet and a history essay. It is the history essay which puts me off because I really have NO MOOD to start on it at all!
I usually have an enthusiasm for such things! I would be thinking, "okay, let's start on this and get high marks!" Yep, I am a person who REALLY CARES ALOT about marks. People often ask me why I do so well and I think the main reason is because of marks.
Seriously speaking, I hate studying. I have actually contemplated quitting school and getting a job before. Yep, I did! I think it was around last year when I starting to have these crazy thoughts. I felt like I did not have any direction or goal in life and that I was just wandering aimlessly. I did not know what I wanted to be when I grow up.

I was especially frustrated because I did not seem to have the passion for anything in life.

So, I have always been living in the moment. Even now.
I guess marks are just a short-lives motivation for me. I WANT to get high marks - that's essentially the key to whatever I do. To get the best results possible. I love self-satisfaction :D

Okay, anyway back to the topic - history essay. I heard from one of my friend Siyun that we did not have to do it O.o But I am really doubting that such miracles could come true! I believe that we will STILL have to write the essay eventually, it's just a matter of when. D: So, I WANT to do it ASAP, I am just too lazy to start on it!

And yes, I realised that I have been very lazy these days~!!!! I have SOME stuff on my agenda but I always find some excuse to push it back or refuse to do it -.- I NEED TO GET STARTED.

Oh yeah, I went to watch WICKED with Siyun (that was when she told me we did not need to do the essay), Nicole and Krystal.
We met up at Suntec and ate Astons! Siyun and I did the horrible mistake of ordering spaghetti - I did it to get the soup. LOL. The spaghetti was horrible. I never liked spaghetti with sauce. What's more, we ate dominos during lunch while doing project with Huiyi and Xuechun.
Krystal came over and said, "I saw you two eating spaghetti and I was like, why? why?" HAHAHA. yes, I now know my mistake. I WILL NEVER ORDER SPAGHETTI FROM ASTONS. To quote myself, "I was foraging for salmon amongst the spaghetti."
We laughed over a lot of stuff while eating. Oh yah, we also talked about Xiaxue and Naomi. I HAD NO IDEA WHO THEY WERE INITIALLY - "living in my own bubble".
I was just listening to them talk about them. Anyway, I was interested and since I was reluctant to start on my essay, I went to check out their blogs just now heh. LOL. Xiaxue's blog was pretty interesting and the most recent one about being selfish is kinda cool and truthful. I also went to read Naomi's one which was regarding her haters lol. She actually took the time to print screen her hater's twitter comments and post it on her blog, hahaha. I wonder how she has the time to do such stuff, while I am here worrying about my essay =_=

So, yeah, we then went to MBS. We took some pictures using Nicole's camera :)
And then, at 7.30pm, WICKED started.

Wicked was really good and awesome. Electrifying, an eye-opener! :D The songs that they sang were actually good! The whole stage set-up was really cool and nice as well! The story really felt like Romeo and Juliet at the beginning (where they announce the whole story's ending at the prologue lol). The green girl really creeped me out initially. haha! Anyway, the story was really touching as well. I actually cried a few times during some of the parts.
The last musical I went to was Mamma Mia! which was when I was p4? I don't remember much of it already, just a woman at the top of a make-shift cliff singing something. So it was a really wonderful experience to watch such a fantastic play AND remember it! :))

And I finally managed to watch Guzaarish just now! The storyline is SSSSOOOOO similar to Me Before You!!! They should have collaborated or something, haha! Anyway, the movie was a tear-jerker :') You really feel as if you are in Ethan's shoes. Anyway, the movie is about a man who petitions for euthanasia because he is unable to move any of this body from his head onwards. Furthermore, he was a famous magician before that so the suffering and entrapment he feels is much more intensified. The movie is shot beautifully and everyone should watch it! :))

Yay, the past few days' events have been recorded :)
Now, on to whether I should do my essay...

Holidays!

It is finally the end-of-term holidays! YES!

Although I look forward to the holidays, in truth, it will be bombarded with homework. Also, the holidays is only one week long. There is an additional day of holiday tomorrow due to good A-level results of my school. I will probably be doing my chinese newspaper article review and my chemistry project. These are my top priorities! I still have a few, wait. That's an understatement. I still have TONS of homework undone. 

I am seriously hoping that I will be able to do them fast, and well. :))

I am currently obsessed about this movie, "Jodhaa Akbar". Yes, it is a Bollywood movie.

And yes, I watch bollywood movies (to those out there who don't know). In fact, I love them! I have a few favourites - Devdas (a must-watch!), Kal Ho Naa Ho, Dhoom 2... and many more! Because I am unable to find the disc for Jodhaa Akbar in the National library, I am now watching it on youtube. However, I want to watch it on BIG SCREEN!! So I actually emailed Vasantham (yes, I DID!) to screen the show during the Saturday 4pm timing where they show bollywood shows! HAHAHAHAH. 

And I also find this guy DAMN HOTTTT. HRITHIK ROSHAN!! (I'm just gonna spam his pictures now haha)

He acts in Bollywood shows! And he has two thumbs on his right hand (cool). His eyes have this really cool colour like grey/blue. GAAAAHHHHH. (okay, I know I'm fan-girling, wtv) 

He actually looks abit like Jason Mraz, but in a hotter and nicer way, heh.

If I ever see him, I wanna get a picture with him! :DD

I told my friends at school during physics lesson about him and his hotness and they all went, "huh! where got?" Either that, or "I didn't know Sue Qin's type was this kind." Yep, now you know! I went crazy about Takeshi Kaneshiro once too!

Yep, but now Hrithik is cooler. Much cooler. He has this Caucasian look :) :P <3

Anyway, I stayed back in school today with Siyun and we talked. ALOT. haha! It was really a good, nice chat that we had. We got free tickets to Sheryl and Elaine's ___. HAHAHA. It was really good! And it was so fun to watch them! Yep, and SIYUN WATCHES BOLLYWOOD MOVIES TOO!!! HAHA. I showed her alot of movies and we were discussing storylines and stuff :))

Overall, not such a bad day!

Oh, and I finished Me Before You by Jojo Moyes. SUCH A GOOD BOOK. It really sets you thinking about life and its meaning, as well as the power of love as well. You definitely won't regret picking it up! :D

And then it happened...

I am just here to review on a book called "And then it happened" by Linda Green.

Basically, I would rate this book 3.5/5.

It is quite a good book, but not an especially good one. I think that what annoyed me initially was the style of writing of the author. The author tended to write very long sentences, which forced me to re-read some of them in order to make sense of what she was saying.

The storyline goes like this: Mel and Adam have been together since 13 years old. (Seems kinda 'One Day'-ish) They are in love and have a child called Maya. They have a close friend called Steve, who is married to Mel's best friend, Louise. One day, Adam gets into an accident and goes into coma. This book narrates the trials that Mel faces during this period, and how she gets over them.

The storyline is really quite interesting. The chapters shift between the views of Mel and Adam every chapter. (similar to One Day again!) What particularly made me irritated was perhaps Mel's character after finding out about Adam's accident. She cried for a long period of time, which made me feel like going up to her and slapping her in the face and screaming at her, "Get a hold of yourself!" The vulnerability and self-pity she exhibits can be rather over-excessive in the first few chapters after Adam goes into coma.

Perhaps what could be noted could be the phrases that the author repeats towards the end of the book. I read the words and vaguely remember just seeing them a few chapters before, which makes the reading process undeniably unpleasant. UNLESS they had some significant or symbolic meaning to them.

What I REALLY liked about the book though, was its sense of realism and its ending. SPOILER* The ending might make some of us feel unsatisfied, as if it could have been better. However, it would be important to know that in real-life cases, happy endings do not happen. The stark realism of the ending really struck me and left me wondering where did the real Adam went? However, it is also weird and too exaggerated that the 'new' Adam and 'old' Adam are SO different! Their tone and intonation just do not seem like each other. I admit that they will never be the same, but they can't be that different, can they?

Well, either way, this book would made a good read for those who want a touch of realism and romance mixed together.

I am now reading a book by one of my favourite authors, Jojo Moyes, "Me Before You". If you have not read her previous book, "The last letter from your lover", you REALLY SHOULD. IT'S DAMN GOOD. <3
I also bought another book, "Before I Go To Sleep", which is on waiting list :))

fond memories

hmm... I think I have not posted anything on CNY yet.
Anyway, CNY was great. I had reunion dinners with both paternal and maternal relatives :))
Although, it was really quite awkward sometimes because I don't recognize some of the extended relatives. Some problems with extended families!
I went karaoke with my maternal family too. After that, I went to have dinner with 2k!! :DD

It was really fun. I went to Yohanes' house and meet some of them first. They were playing risk, although in actuality, they only really played for 30 minutes!
We decided to go to Changi Airport's Terminal 2's Sakae Sushi. We booked a tatami room :)
The dinner was really funny! We talked a lot, and joked around :D Yohanes tried to make us guess a scenario and we did not get even one correct! We came up with a lot of funny scenarios instead which got us all laughing.
And when we played black magic, I always seem like the last one to get the trick, especially FUZZY WUZZY. All of them tried to get me to figure it out, AND I FINALLY DID, HAHAHA! We also took a lot of photos :)
It was the first proper class outing in a really long time, and more than half the class attended it: Yohanes, Suting, Genevieve, Grace, Ying Xuan, Krystal, Pamela, Felix, Bryan, Alvin, Valen, Jinheok, Boning and me! I am pretty sure I got everyone there... >.<
I am really glad that we got together after so long! :)) I think that 2kellyx has got this 'thing' that most classes don't have! I hope that we will get together again after like, 20 years, when all of us are married with kids :')

Anyway, I am having some problems with my own class' stuff now... hmm... I better not mention it, haha.

I am currently trying my best to do my commonwealth essay, but I figured that there is no use trying to force myself to do something that I cannot now. I am going to watch my bollywood show! :))

In a Grove... and stats!

Lessons have been pretty interesting these days, I wonder why...

Let's take History for example. My teacher has given us something similar to a short story, "In a Grove" by Ryunosuke Akutagawa. It is an interesting story. A samurai's corpse is found. There are three suspects for this murder: Masago (his wife), Tajomaru (a bandit) and himself (he might have committed suicide). Testimonies have been collected from the woodcutter who found the body, a travelling buddhist, a policeman who arrested Tajomaru, Tajomaru, Masago and Takehiko (the samurai). What is certain is that Masago was raped by Tajomaru; what differs is what happened afterwards and who killed Takehiko. You can read the story here.

Most of my classmates felt that it was Masago who killed Takehiko. They argued that perhaps both men loved her and wanted to protect the fact that she killed Takehiko. Others felt claimed he committed suicide to 'save face' as it was better than dying in the hands of a mere woman. Somehow, I have a feeling that my history class is very wary of woman, especially beautiful ones. HAHA.

We are supposed to determine who is the murderer and write an essay on it. This is very interesting, and different from the normal lessons that we have done. After searching it up, I found out that it was never the author's intention to have a real murderer. What he was trying to prove was that our initial guess of the murderer is shaped by our moral inclinations and biased judgements. As humans, it is very hard to see the REAL truth. This story serves to prove that. What one character says is always refuted by another. It is almost impossible to decided on a real murdered based on their testimonies. 

After reading that, I was dumbstruck. How do people ever come up with such novel methods to prove a certain point? I was very impressed by this. However, I felt stuck at the same time. How am I ever going to decide who is the real culprit? This is when the true objective of the project hit me. I was supposed to use my INVESTIGATIVE and ANALYTICAL SKILLS to help me argue for one of the character. The main point wasn't which character I chose. The objective was to see how I made use of the testimonies by the non-parties and general knowledge to prove that the character that I have chosen is the murderer. 

Perhaps I will put up my essay the next time, if I remember!

Anyway, I was interested and went to find out the statistics for my blog. Here are some:

Pageviews all time: 4,741

Pageviews last month: 153

Audience: Singapore (3,332), USA (726) - Wow, who reads my blog in the US?!, Russia (71) - I guess they google translate or something???, etc.

Post with highest views: tag (click here) Apparently someone quoted from my blog and it appeared in the straits times! HAHA. I still cannot find the newspaper article... Maybe I should do some searching now...
[updated] I FOUND THE NEWS HAHAHA!!! It's here. It was featured on The New Paper, Thursday, December 03, 2009.

"But netizen Sue Qin, writing on her blog, felt that some of the rules in the Chua household (featured on the programme) are overly-harsh, citing the ones forbidding sleepovers, boy-girl relationships and another rule which stipulates that the computer be in the living room so the parents can see what sites the kids are visiting.

She added, however, that most of the rules – like the ones against skipping school, smoking and alcohol – are “kinda expected”.

She felt that Singapore is conservative because we are made up of races which have their own strict traditions about raising children.

“While too much control is not good, too little control is also not good,” she wrote."

AHAHA, I ACTUALLY FEEL QUITE PROUD OF MYSELF. How old was I? 13? HEHE ;D

And I am going to end my blog post now! The most recent book that I've read is by Lauren Oliver. It's called Delirium. I'm giving it 4/5 stars! Overall, the story is really good, except for some sappy romantic parts which makes the book lose some of its adventurous 'feel'.

School... again!

Today is the second day of school, when lessons officially start.

Initially, the idea of lessons really put me off there. However, today was better than what I expected it to be. I thought that the lessons would be really drawn out and exhausting because it lasted until 4.15pm today. However, time passed surprisingly quickly, except for the first 2 hours which felt like forever then. 

My new chinese teacher is a female teacher called Ms Sau. She taught me CME before. I was quite disappointed when she did not recognise me when she named the students whom she knew, but then, I must admit I didn't make much of an impression when she taught me the other time. Chinese lesson was quite interesting. It was about this female author called Zhang Ai Mei. I think that's the name. Apparently, she's a prodigy, a genius. How envious! We were told her life story which was kind of sad and pitiful. She wrote so much books on love, but her life was far from blissful. However, I think the scars as well as the joys of her love inspired her to write such great short stories and novels. I wonder if I can ever be like that as well. 

Literature - Romeo and Juliet. A classic. Although I don't mind reading Romeo and Juliet, I would really like it if the school could arrange for us to study a modern play rather than a Shakespearean one. I recently watched this film "Closer" which is based on a play of the same name. It is a modern play written in 1997. The concept was pretty simple, but the way it was played out was really cool and interesting. It is about 4 people, with 2 couples who commit adultery. The play is supposed to highlight the degrading nature of love and marriage in the modern times. Really deep...

Oh yeah, I recently read a news that the new salary proposal for the Singapore government is out. Now, the president's salary will be lower than that of the prime minister, which is kind of weird as the president is thought to be the 'head of the state'. Hmm... Though I guess I welcome the new salary change (it is now lower). I mean, it means less tax money being given to them? Haha. Next, they should deal with the rising cost of... everything. I mean, I have no idea why but, if our SG dollar is getting stronger, then shouldn't the items here be sold at a lower price?? I don't really get the idea of inflation but I think I will probably learn about it in financial literary lessons next week :)) Looking forward to it!

I finally sent an email saying that I want to redraw from AEP. The teacher asked to meet me, Dion and Beatriz because we all want to quit. Ms Gao will be there (@_@). I am seriously scared that Ms Gao will interrogate us like those officers in the police station or something!

Anyway, I celebrated Christmas and my cousin, Irene's birthday recently!

Christmas was at my auntie's house. I cooked Aglio Olio!! :DD Everything was finished eventually; I was so happy!!! Previously, some of the chilli padi's juice got onto my fingers so my finger was burning all the way to my cousin's house. Though, my efforts were definitely paid off seeing how they all enjoyed the spaghetti! :) We also played several games like charades. We had a gift exchange session. My present was for Iris. It was posters of Super Junior since she loves a member in it. My present was from Ivy. It was a lovely brown bag! My friend, Shermaine, said it looked nice when I brought it to the 3K class gathering.

Irene's birthday was fun too! We watched Running Man, which was this variety show where some celebrities played a game like Police and Thief. It was very funny! My mom and I chose a dress for Irene as her present :))

There was a 3k class gathering as well to celebrate Christmas.

I planned a treasure hunt with Dion, Beatriz, Trevor and Randy initially. However, it was all for naught when some envelopes when missing and no one wanted to play D: I bought a bracelet for Shermaine and I got a photo frame from Jing Ying. Thanks! I also played bridge with Jalyn, Beatriz, Chun San, Miss Lim and Jaime. There was this really funny moment when Chun San lost and Miss Lim (who was trying to make noises to hint to him while sitting beside him watching him play) asked him why he played some cards the way he did. He answered, "I play by instinct." And then there was this funny laughing moment because we all know that you can't rely on instinct in a bridge game. Haha.

It's now 9.17pm. I should prepare for school tomorrow and go to sleep :))

I now realised that my minimum sleep hour has to be 8 hours or the exhaustion will accumulate and by Friday, I would be very worn out.

I shall do my NYAA during the weekends. Hopefully, I can complete skills and service by then!

New Beginnings

Every year is a new year...

Upon looking back, I realised that last year passed by very quickly. Everything was a blur, I guess. New classmates, new subjects. When year 2012 is over, I will be in Senior High. Aah, I feel nostalgic just thinking about it (laughs).

This holiday is perhaps, in some way, the start of a new beginning for me. I have a new laptop! :) For me, who is quite engaged with the internet in more ways than one (like now), this means quite a lot to me. HP Pavilion g4 :)

I am looking forward to Christmas! I am going to have a family gathering with my maternal relatives, with potluck and such. My year 2 class is planning to organise a dinner gathering as well. Hopefully, the organising goes well.

Next year... Truthfully speaking, I am not especially anticipating or looking forward to it. Because,
a) It means the start of school, which can be dreadfully boring and draining.
b) I am going to take my O level Higher Chinese paper. I am totally NOT looking forward to this, though I am to the next two years if I manage to pass it!
c) A WHOLE YEAR, before the next year end holidays!!!
d) Less time for me to... well, not do anything productive.
e) Less time to SLEEP - the balm that nourishes your soul, yadah yadah yadah~

AND, I have not decided if I should quit AEP or not, which is actually what I have just realised while typing this blog post! This is bad! I should hurry and decide; but I have a feeling that either way, I am still going to continue with AEP =_=

The first blog post in many months *claps*
Be willing to wait for the next one for a long long time! (sniggers)

P.S. I am in the top 25% :)

the end

    The end of the school term is nearing; the last day is tomorrow. I guess looking back on this year, it was rather a year of insecurities, new-found friendship, opening up, frustrations, disappointments, relief and lastly, happiness.

    The year had started with its fair share of problems - I was in a new class with new people whom I either saw, but did not knew, or did not knew existed in school before (how anti-social I am). I was feeling quite out-of-place, I guess. I did confide some of these feelings with my friend, and was surprised to find out that hey, I am not the only one! I guess I thought that I was the only one who would feel this way, but I was relieved to know that I was not alone.

    New friendships were forged between my new classmates, almost strangers before, and I. This kind of feeling is kind of exhilarating. Knowing that I can still make friends after being with the same class for 2 years is kind of reassuring in a way, I guess. :)

    This year was also a year where I had gone through some roller-coaster ride I guess. One of which was the MPP journey. I must confess that not everything is as perfect as it seems. I guess this happens because of our lack of willingness to give our best for something - we want something, but are not willing to work hard for it. Because of my team members' lack of enthusiasm and initiative, I got really frustrated and upset. I was fuming inside because I was astounded to their degree of 'unwillingness'. Because of that, I typed an email (while trying to be as polite as possible, but I believe I failed) expressing my disappointment with their attitude. What happened, was I guess really just a confession of my feelings as well as theirs. I think that after seeing things from my perspective, they are able to understand the tough spot I am in as the group leader. And I also believe that by winning the best Gov debate team award, it was a stamp of approval of us, and a definite boost to our confidence. I know that they were able to do it, and this was proof of it. :)

    I was also facing some insecurities, not just with my class, but with my CCA as well. After all, I had transferred, thus making my transition a bit 'weird'. The fact that I am not spectacular or proficient in my chinese adds on to the awkwardness. After hearing some things that I shouldn't, and did not want to, I felt really sad and angry. At myself as well as others. A million thoughts had ran through my head and I wondered, if it was not due to the single mistake of who-knows-who, how different might my secondary school life have turned out? I have since accepted the truth of it. Since it's already done, then it is done. What I am just really looking forward to now, is to just pass this phase and look forward to the next. And I promise that I will definitely get things the way I want in the future.

    I would like to say that academic-wise, I am not doing too badly. My wish would be to get into the top 5% of my level. I would see if that comes true tomorrow. *excited* Although, I do feel that I could have done better. I have worked hard, of course. But perhaps if I had worked harder, I would have been better. This is what I always regret, but then it is the driving force for me as well.

    Oh look! And there is a whole reflection from my about me whole year! My teachers would have been proud of me. :)

    Just one more year to senior high!

Exams

1 more week to exams...

I really feel quite frustrated, because I still don't feel like exams are coming...
But, I am really looking forward to the holidays!!! 2 months of it :D *happy*

I should really get into my exam mood more quickly... like now.

Okay, it's totally not working.

Books

The school celebrated Teacher's Day cum Mid-Autumn festival. The concert was really good, I must say! Hope that every concert can be like that too :)

I went to the Borders sale with Iris and my auntie. There were so many books! But the content was a little disappointing as most of them were cliche romances. I bought two books - Rupture and The Senator's Wife. Rupture looks quite good I think. I only bought the Senator's Wife because it was on A HUGE discount, and because it is supposed to be a national bestseller! x)

We then went for the John Little sale at the next expo hall! THERE WERE SO MANY STUFF!!!! And they were on discount~!! I think that although we went to expo for Borders, we bought more stuff from John Little instead, heehee ;P

I still have quite a lot of homework. Mostly project work.
I still have AEP. I think that I am going to quit it next year. It is giving me unnecessary stress, and it ruins my interest in art. D:

A few manga I just found that I really really like:
Hana ni Arashi
Kamisama Hajimemashita
Karakuri Odette

I love the style of drawing in all of them - they are kind of similar :))