Repetition

Notice the sudden return of the plain ol' black blog? the blogskin screwed up again, so until i bother to find another blogskin, the same old black template will have to do :(

now that hockey A divs are over, im still not used to all the free time that i now have. for the first time since i can remember, there's a day of the week where i end school at as early as 3.30pm! and that would be today :) and yet, as crazy as it sounds, im contemplating once again using my wednesdays to go for hockey training, this time to help train the juniors. today, i saw the girls' team juniors actually training by their own initiative, without any prompting from the seniors. i have a string feeling that their self-motivation will carry them far next year. i hope we'll be able to get coach trainings year-round this time so that they will be able to fulfill their potential by next year, unlike us. but if there isnt, and if the girls' team seniors dont come down for training often enough, i'll even discuss with nigel to merge stickwork training for the guys and girls. im determined not to let both the guys' team and girls' team juniors down, especially since so many of them have the drive and as-of-yet untapped potential to excel.

my fears from before are resurfacing; im slowly turning into a monster. if you catch me in my transformation, don't hesitate to plunge the stake into my heart before it's too late.

In letting myself down, I have let the world down

H3 physics is finally going into the quantum physics phase, so at least i sort of know what's going on now, instead of during biophysics when i just swallowed technical bio terms while blindly nodding my head in false understanding. and the new lecturer is damn funny! XD his lecturing style is very frank and down-to-earth, and he has a way of reapeating the same phrase over and over and somehow make it sound funny. he has so many catchphrases: "You understand?", "That is high school concept, now I teach you university concept", "But that is a very simple and naive understanding of the idea". while telling us today that the fermi level of a doped semiconductor can be controlled, he kept saying "no, it doesn'talways  mean that the fermi level will go up, but YOU can choose it to go up" that it sounded like a political rally. and also, now that the H2 physics lectures in school are also going into quantum physics, i'll finally be able to apply what i learn during H3 into my H2 work.

i've been screwing up a lot recently... whether it's the econs essay or both of the H3 tests, and even in simple things like handing in homework or doing tutorials. in the past it rarely bugged me because i'd simply think that im the one screwing up and it's my own problem if i die, but now i always get the feeling that there's someone else besides myself whom im letting down every time i close the book or put down the pen. i really wonder sometimes how things could have been different if i remained a nobody in NJC and if the school didnt make it so blindingly obvious that they expect me, count on me to do the school proud. is this good? when the source of motivation for education is external rather than internal, what use is it to the individual?

and this song is awesome! an old gem i discovered from A7X's first album, Sounding The Seventh Trumpet. listen out for the amazing drum solo at 1.30. here's Darkness Surrounding by A7X:

Of black pots and blacker kettles

Today was the H3 physics test, which was unlike anything i've ever seen or imagined. first off is the mark allocation for the various questions, which went something like 20, 16, 16, 8, 40. that's right, you get a 40 mark question in a 100 mark test. and the rest of the questions were not exactly easy either. minus 16 here, minus 20 there, and i guess i can kiss this 7.5% goodbye.

i've suddenly been thinking today about the social outcasts of my life; those few people whom others always seem to have a problem with, or talk bad about behind their backs, or exclude from their social circles. sometimes i wonder if they are blissfully unaware of the fact that many of their so-called friends just tolerate their presence, or if they can see exactly how those around them hide acid tongues behind their sugary smiles, and simply swallow this toxic cocktail and carry on with their lives. why do we judge those around us with our imaginary gavel, when none of us can claim to have reached perfection? why do we blame them for not fitting in, instead of blaming ourselves for not letting them fit in? why do we treat them like that, but point out immediately when they do the same to us? i just hate this kind of gossip and exclusion. i hate relationship politics. call me naive or idealistic, but i truly hope for the day when swords can be beaten into plows, and clenched fists can be persuaded into open arms.

Never meant to shine

Got back my H3 math test yesterday, and it was a massacre. 8/52 - that was how bad it was. now im seriously rethinking why i joined H3 maths in the first place. maybe my self-doubt is justified; maybe im simply not the amazing scholar that everyone wants me to be. perhaps i should have just stuck to being an average low-key student like the cat high days, instead of trying to be a star and burning out for everyone to see.

yesterday was the preliminary round of SPARKS, which im joining for the second time. the first time i joined, which was last year, it sort of scared me off. the preliminary mcq round was extremely hard (at least it felt really difficult with our then-sec 4 science knowledge), while the hands-on finals ironically required little to no knowledge of science and more or less boiled down to a luck. i actually wasnt planning on joining again this year, but lishang and brenda dragged me into it. this year's preliminary round now has an mcq section as well as a hands-on section. the mcq is now even harder than last year's, testing such topics as relativity and quantum physics. the hands-on round this time was to build a tower out of uncooked spaghetti and marshmallows which could withstand being tilted without toppling over. the design we came up with was so crazy that i just had to take a photo of it:

yes, it is leaning to one side, and yes, it is meant to do that. we were acting like complete jokers during the entire event XD well anyway, we managed to get into the finals, and we're the only ignis team to make it in for both JH and SH levels, despite tying with solaris for having the most teams in both JH and SH categories. lionel and i were joking that this is a sign that the average intelligence of our house is falling lol

tmr is the first H3 physics test, which will be 7.5% of my final grade. i really hope i dont screw up as spectacularly as the H3 math test, otherwise i really wouldnt know what im doing in any H3 anymore.

edit @ 10.09pm: loled when i saw this tutorial question while studying for H3 physics. i swear that this is an actual question from the tutorial. i know it's supposed to be biophysics, but this looks nothing like biology or physics:

Aliens are invading the earth. From a captured specimen we (the human beings) find out that the aliens have brain neurons which on average have a diameter ten times that of ours, whereas most of the neurons to their muscles are much thinner than ours. One day you meet an unarmed alien on the road. What do you do: Stay to fight or run away?

Answer: The velocity of neuron signals increases proportionally with radius of the neurons. From the size of their neurons, you can conclude that the aliens think very fast, but move very slowly. However you don’t know anything about how strong they are and how much pain they can endure. Moreover, they may be so smart that they fool you if you come close. So the safest thing would be to run away (you can surely do this since muscle-neurons are much thinner than yours) until you gain more knowledge about strength and pain endurance.

i think im better off watching sci-fi movies rather than studying for H3 physics :D

edit @ 10.44pm: remembering something that xiaolan said yesterday, i decided to search google and see if i can find past-year H3 physics papers. instead, i found a bunch of blogs of people who took H3 physics in previous years. i skimmed through 3 of them. the first guy was from HCI, and apparently he was struggling through lectures just like i am now. the second guy, also from HCI, took 2 H3s, the same 2 which i am taking now, but he took 3 H2s and 1 H1. the third was offered a chance to take 2 H3s, but he also had to drop a H2 subject to H1. im not saying that i combed through every single google search result, but i think it can be concluded that im venturing through quite an uncharted territory here, and frankly speaking it terrifies me; it terrifies me that the path im taking has so few footprints before me, and that the number of people who can truly relate to my situation probably amount to less than a hundred. not only that, the first 2 blogs were about guys who were (i dont mean to sound evil, but...) kind of like your stereotypical nerds, and none of them were slackers who spent all their time with hockey and heavy metal and took 2 H3s together with 4 H2s. if there exists a certain type of person who's destined to excel in H3s, it sure as hell doesnt sound like im that type of person.

Karma chameleon

Sometimes i think that my behaviour is like that of a chameleon; a chameleon can be any colour it chooses, but it always chooses to blend in with the background. all my life i've always tried to blend in with the crowd and be one of the masses. i've always hated standing out or being unique, but now it seems nearly impossible to just become an average student with the excessive attention that the school is giving me. today during H3 maths, mr teo asked me whether i wanted to board so that i can be tutored by "a graph theory expert" (quoted from him) who happens to be boarding this term, and even offered to help me get in even though it's past the application date. i hesitated and said that i needed to ask my parents first, cos i feel that it's really very unfair to the other H3 maths ppl who only joined this year. why do i get the special treatment while the others are forced to wait till the graph theory lessons start again in term 3? why cant i be treated just the same?

sometimes, the line gets blurry between striving for myself and striving for the school. i begin to ask myself how much of this i am doing is for the sake of my own satisfaction and sense of achievement, and how much is at the behest of the school. i wont deny that i want to get good grades for my A levels, but nowadays i wonder how much of this was implanted by the teachers who have been talking to me over and over again.

and speaking of fading into the background, i suddenly realise that a lot of the friendships i made are disappearing too. it just hit me that i dont even keep in touch with many of my fellow OG17 people anymore. the situation is still alright with the usual clique, but i havent spoken to some of the others since last year's orientation. i guess when you meet so many different people in such a short time during orientation, it's natural that you wont be able to maintain contact with all of them. sometimes the personalities just dont click well enough for friendships to be formed in such a short time. at least things are better with OG10 this year. i really hope that they (or should i say "we") will remain friends long after orientation and perhaps even after NJC.

and NJC says that i owe them a college blazer, when i have never so much as touched one of those garishly red garments my entire life. and the problem is that the loan date was so long ago that i cant remember if i let anyone borrow my ez-link card to borrow a blazer. im gonna go clarify things tomorrow, so hopefully i wont end up paying for a blazer i never used.

i've been having problems with youtube since last night. for some reason, i cant play any youtube videos embedded into my blog, which is also the reason why the music player doesnt work anymore. also, i cant play youtube videos on people's youtube channels, but i can view videos normally when im not in somebody's channel. are you guys having this problem too or is it just me?

H3 physics test this saturday. i have an ominous feeling about it.

Final fireworks | Rekindled inferno

Two things.

firstly, it was our final A div match today, against TPJC, and in my opinion our best overall performance. we managed to win 2-1 and at least not finish last in our group. i guess for myself it was a sort of confirmation that although we aren't the best, we can at least win matches. it was also a confirmation for me personally, as i managed to score one for the team. all in all, i still have regrets that we only had a full team and started training seriously so late, but still i think today was the closest we have ever come to reaching our full potential. i think i'll still go down for training occasionally, to help train the juniors or just for a casual game of hockey. maybe i'll end up like haikal, coming back to NJC to teach and help out with hockey at the same time? who knows what the future holds for us. i guess deep down im just hoping that after two years of blood and sweat (literally), hockey won't just leave my life just like that, without a trace.

secondly, i spoke with the chinese HOD today, and i guess im retaking chinese. just thinking about all the precious one-hour breaks foregone for excruciating chinese lessons for another two months already gets me down, but i guess since i've chosen this path for myself i should see it through to the end. it's just depressing that while i used to have the 27 jokers with me, now im nearly alone in this journey, except for chongwee and maybe a few other people i know, if im lucky. it's difficult to comprehend just how much a difference the company of friends makes until it's gone.

continuing my current obsession with A7X live in the LBC, here's their performance of Scream, which i think is one of their best songs. people say that the lyrics are evil (they tell a story of a man raping / torturing / killing(?) a woman) and thus the song should be boycotted, by i think otherwise. movies like Saw may also be "sick" like Scream, but they provide insight into the mind of the killer and give us a glimpse into their world of insanity, which i find to be highly interesting indeed (fun fact: Scream was used in one of the Saw movies). many controversial works which seem to promote an "evil" message, such as 1984 and Animal Farm (both some of my favourite books) are actually highly intellectually intriguing thought experiments into the taboo and not the "satanic scriptures" which they originally appear to be. in anycase, here's Scream by Avenged Sevenfold, live at the LBC:

Risen from the ashes

In case you got a shock when you saw this, let me tell you that YOU ARE AT THE RIGHT BLOG. yup, finally got round to changing the blog template, and the general theme of the blog as well. i suddenly remembered something i mentioned a while back, and as you can see it has become the main theme. "burn bright like a star, burn out like a comet" will probably be my driving motto for the rest of the year until A levels, so might as well reflect that here too. and as an unintended yet amusing side-effect, i think i now have one of the most pro-ignis blogs around. lionel would be proud :D

i also decided to remove all links from my blog a few days ago, in case you didnt notice. it was something i've been thinking about for quite a while now, since most of the blogs linked are barely alive anyway, and those i havent linked are people im not too familiar with. now the side of the blog looks really empty :/ maybe i'll cram in a few widgets just for fun. plans for another time, i guess.

well, that's all i have to say, really. nothing much to update besides the fact that the blog is revamped. and to celebrate this, here's Burn It Down by A7X (look, it has something to do with fire too! :D )



UPDATE @ 12.55 AM: just added a music player with all my favourite songs. this blog is going multimedia man! :D

The pawn wants to move back

Before i even stepped into NJC, i already heard many stories about it; about how it was a school for prodigy-wannabes, about its stifling mugger culture, and about the immense academic stress it puts its students under. obviously, those aspects of NJC didnt appeal to me much. when i was officially accepted into NJC, i made a commitment to myself, that no matter how hard life got, i would steer clear of this sickening stereotype of NJCians. "i will be the exception," i told myself, with perhaps excessive confidence. "i will be the counter-example."

and yet, with all things said and done, perhaps i was being too idealistic. of course, everyone knows that mugging and rote memory learning are not true paths to knowledge and enlightenment. who doesnt want to experience the fervour of a self-motivated, passion-fueled quest for knowledge, in an environment which fully supports and augments our capabilities in all mental faculties? that would be something universally desirable, but perhaps just as universally inaccessible, at least in Singapore. who would dare say that our current education system, which encourages rote memory learning to the extent that we are the only country to promote the use of 10-year series, is even close to the education ideal? the concept of the 10-year series is absolutely ridiculous - how can it be said that we are learning when all we do is simply memorise questions repeated from years ago? even worse, doesnt this signify that our teaching methods have not adapted and evolved over the years?

but what can i do about it? what can the humble chess piece do about the rules of the game? from the lowly pawn to the fearsome queen, all are bound by the laws of the chess board, cursed forever to move along their predestined paths. it is high time for this chess piece to cease his personal rebellion against the rules and quietly return to his role in the game. it was foolish of me to think that i could escape the rules of the game. perhaps it was even selfish of me. how can one expect to survive the game without following the rules?

here's A7X's Afterlife, live in the LBC. why? because it's awesome, that's why :)

And when I burn out, my ashes will fall like snow

About yesterday's PSC PAE... well, it was totally different from what i expected. and by "different" i actually mean "freaking difficult". although everything was MCQ, it's the combination of time shortage and foreign topics that really gets to you. for the numerical reasoning test, we had to 32 questions in 20min. and to think that our teachers always tell us 1min per question when it comes down to MCQ. there was a silver lining though, in that all the questions were asking the same thing of comparing between 2 quantities to see which is larger. i know some of you must be thinking that you could do that with your eyes closed, and honestly that's what i would think too if i havent sat for the test, but i guess when you are free enough and powerful enough you can make a difficult test out of anything. here's a sample for you:

Given that q > p, which is larger - A: (p + 3)(q + 2) or B: (p + 2)(q + 3)

Options: A, B, both are equal, not enough information to tell

if you took longer than 45s to figure it out, then you just spent too much time on the question. well, i didnt get it right, and it was only after the test that i realised that the answer should be that A is larger :(

next was the logical reasoning test, where basically we have to evaluate the what assumptions are made and whether a conclusion is accurate given a certain set of assumptions. long story short, they're basically looking out for potential lawyer-type people who can be their legal attack dogs and tear down any rebellious arguments.

there was also a hypothetical situation test, where they present various situations and ask us to choose the best and worst courses of action. for example, they might present a situation where you have to choose between taking the rap for something you didn't do and snitching out your superior, and ask you to make a decision. i cant see how there could be right or wrong answers in these questions. maybe there aren't. in which case the use of OAS is quite questionable.

finally, a personality quiz, not unlike the Meyer-Briggs test (i dont care how it's spelled, ok?) which i once took on facebook (im an INTP, a "theorist"). i always feel very pressured when i take these kinds of personality quizzes, because i always consider and reconsider every option and end up hesitating a lot before filling in an answer which is arguably not very "spontaneous", as the test requires. it was so bad, in fact, that i was one of the last few to finish the test.

this past month or so, i've been living with the motto "Burn bright like a star, burn out like a comet", but now im really starting to feel the heat. it's already friday and i've barely touched my holiday homework. i tried to do the physics papers but ended up struggling through and barely finishing. if i cant even perform for a subject that i used to have confidence in, what more can i say for subjects like chem and econs? i guess this is the price to pay for over-ambition.

Following in the footsteps of Icarus, I feel my wings leave me. As I reach my hand out, hoping to caress the glorious sun, he glares mercilessly into my eyes and mocks the mere mortal who foolishly dares to approach him, before plucking the last few feathers from my back and watching me plummet back to earth.

i've recently been watching A7X's LBC concert videos on youtube, and as usual they totally rock. no other band i know has that combination of musical skill and stage presence to get the crowd going during a live performance. what really got me was when they performed Second Heartbeat and M.Shadows got back to good old hardcore screaming again. i've been watching and rewatching this video the entire day. Second Heartbeat by Avenged Sevenfold, live at the LBC:

Losing the sparkle beneath the dust

It's the holidays!!! :D:D:D well, that's the kind of reaction you'd typically expect from someone gearing up for the holidays, right? or at least from a sugar-loaded overly-high tween girl. that's the kind of feeling i want to feel too. in reality though, it's closer to "huh what? the holidays? if you say so..." i guess i've reached that stage in life where the holidays just lose that sparkle which they had when we were seven. all i see is a mountain of homework and not enough time to finish it.

but still, holidays are holidays, and of course fun is an obligation! monday and tuesday were the hockey camp. first day started of with PT, then we played games and finally watched a horror movie. the scene of us watching the movie was just laughable: half of the people chickened out before the movie even began and were listening to music and playing cards during the movie, and out of the other half, majority were huddled together and hiding behind each other. so that left me alone actually watching the movie with my eyes opened (it sounds impossible to watch a movie with your eyes closed, but somehow they managed to do it).

day 2 of the hockey camp started off with a morning jog to the botanical gardens, round the big pond and back, then a screening of Coach Carter. it seems like no matter how many times i watch it, i'll never get bored of it. and i've watched it 4 times already i think, so that's saying quite a bit. anyway, camp was officially over after lunch, but we still had a match against seniors again at delta. i cant rmb the score, but i think the seniors won 4-3 or something like that. really played off-form this time due to lack of sleep from the camp, so hopefully we'll do better for saturday's pitch and of course our final match against TPJC.

have to go to ACS(I) tmr for the PSC PAE thing. basically it's a test used to assess potential PSC scholars, but somehow the description included in the email is underwhelming. from what i can tell, the test will be like one of those random IQ tests together with a personality quiz, almost like the ones you get on facebook. hmm, maybe PSC is cutting their budget or something (if you are a PSC scholarship judge reading this, please know that it is a JOKE :X ). perhaps a mugging session after that, so that i can finally start doing some of that long-overdue homework. oh well, we'll see tmr.

I shall be your puppet for now

Like it or not, it seems that im becoming quite the conversation topic in NJC. or more specifically, the fact that i got a B for chinese. apparently even the VP has heard of me - joshua was telling me that she was asking him abt me during the boarding school formal dinner (and she didnt even get my name right -.-). i'd like to think that NJC just cares so much abt me that they want to help me release my untapped potential, but given the fact that majority of the people persuading me to retake chinese "from the goodwill of their hearts" have never seen me before and probably cant recognise me on a busy street, im guessing that their priority lies with the school and not the student. after all, who cares who the hell i am, as long as im an NJCian and i get 9 distinctions, right? it feels kind of demeaning to be treated as NJC's unwilling mascot, but i guess i do want to do well for my A levels anyway. so i guess since we have a common interest, i shall be your puppet for now.

today was the senior-junior testimonial match. i think the team has finally gotten their killer instincts back, and our offense was finally decent. final score was 1-1, with lots of other near-goals from both sides. i think if we play against TPJC like how we did this morning, then we can definitely win and end our season with a bang. edwin talked to us after the match about training next year's team, and i feel that what he said made a lot of sense. if we dont pass down our skills to our juniors, and if the trend of hockey players not coming to NJC persists, the hockey team will be hitting a reset button every year. only if we ensure that our juniors are at least as good as us will we be able to have some progress, and eventually restore NJ Hockey to it's former glory (there was a time when we were actually winning medals T_T)

suddenly thought that this song really suits my situation now. Master Of Puppets, by Metallica:

Over

We lost against IJC. our season is over.

we played horribly today. somehow we just cant seem to go into attack. i have a very strong feeling that it's because we've only ever played against teams like nyp, teams that are miles ahead of us in terms of skills, such that we are permanently on the defensive. looking back, i realised we have never played an offensive game before, ever. but even then, we didnt even manage to score a single goal for both our matches, and being a forward i feel that i should shoulder the bulk of the blame. looking back on the effort we all put in last year, it really seems like such a waste and a pity for it to all go down the drain.

suddenly, i feel like im not a hockey player. it's like im just some random dude who decided to buy abhockey stick and shinpads. i dont feel like i've earned the honour of being in hockey.

Photophobia

My appeal for an extra academic unit was officially approved today, i.e. i now officially take 2 H3 subjects. finally, after more than a month of waiting, the answer is out and i can have a confirmed subject combination. still, the initial fears and hesitations i had when i first made this decision have barely subsided. the main question i still ask myself is "can i cope?" the school seems to have a lot of faith in me, perhaps too much. it's become quite obvious now that they are really expecting me, even counting on me, to earn them the ever-important academic glory which they so crave, and im not sure if i can handle it. after all, i was never a prominent figure or high achiever in cat high, and all of a sudden im being pushed into the limelight; one might even venture to say that to some extent im fighting for the school.

i think no matter what, im already willingly committed to taking 2 H3s, but right in the near future lies a more pressing question: should i retake my chinese A levels? the school is of the opinion that having straight As will greatly boost my scholarship chances, but my mom thinks that a B is good enough for normal uni entry. i guess for me it's an internal struggle between aspiration and realism; should i shoot for the stars, or tread safely on the ground? i dont know... i might become photophobic if the limelight keeps glaring down on me like this.

mr irwan pointed out the complete lack of class bonding in my class during pe today. i've always been aware that the class experiences some degree of segregation between the guys and the girls, and i've always been telling myself that it's perfectly normal and that i am just over-reacting (coming from a boy's school and all), but what he said today really hit the nail on the head. we've been in the same class for over a year now, but the way we act seems to suggest that we just met a few hours ago. the word i am looking for is "ridiculous": it is absolutely ridiculous that a class can be so divided after an entire year that a teacher, and not even our personal mentor at that, can see the severity of the situation and has to step in to slap some sense into us. now that everyone's attention has been directed to this problem, maybe we can finally start working towards a solution.

match against IJC tmr. let's do it, guys.

The extinction of the blog

Blogs are more or less an extinct species.
they were first discovered when i was in secondary school i think, maybe around sec 2? yes, that was the time when people all jumped on the bandwagon and started their own blog, "cos everyone else is doing it".
and then, inevitably, the craze factor faded, and people simply forgot. blogs died, one after the other, as blogging "alternatives" opened up. facebook, twitter, et cetera - the post disappeared, replaced by the status update; the tweet. and of the blogs which did survive, most became warped beyond recognition.
what were once meaningful thoughts and cherished anecdotes became short spurts of text to keep the blog alive, or simply just apologies for the lack of updates. nobody has time anymore - no time to think or synthesise or express, only enough time to document the occasional raw, basic, perhaps even unconscious response to external stimuli.
if we do not have enough time to think, does it not imply that whatever we are doing is done without thought?
food for thought.
i like puns :)
and irony, which is why this post shall be kept short.

The battle is over, but the war has barely begun

We lost the match today. we were actually doing quite well in the first half and managed to maintain a goalless draw up till the first half was over, but they scored early in the second half, which really broke down our morale. afterwards it was goal after goal, and we lost 4-0. and not only that, we now have one man down, due to a horrific accident during a last-minute defensive PC. dammit, i feel like im somehow involved in it; if i managed to score during our PC and equalised the score, then maybe VJC would have been demoralised and not earned that PC... argh, i hate thinking about "what-ifs", but this thought keeps running around in my head. in any case, now we need to win our other two matches against IJC and TPJC to advance to the next round. come on guys, we'll do it for him; he'll definitely be able to play again if we make it to the quarters.

went back to NJC after the match to collect chinese A level results, but all the teachers already went home. in any case, jacob smsed me and said that i got a B, which is quite good i guess. honestly, i dont give a damn about chinese in light of what else happened today. i guess the normal thing to say would be that im glad that i dont have to take chinese anymore, but all this just seems so insignificant and inconsequential compared to the A divs.

went back to NJC and played around with a few other hockey guys while sort of listening in on the girls' training. a mini-revelation sort of came to me: team bonding just has to start early, and soon it becomes second nature. maybe we can ride on their initiative to solve our own problems.

random: talking with haikal is always a depressing yet humbling experience; whether it's normal school or H3 math or hockey or even just life in general, you always get a feeling of "been there, done that, and did it better than you", and yet he is still friendly and approachable. maybe i should come back to NJC to teach, at least part-time next year before NS.

completely by coincidence, i met wuhong and aditi at the NJC bus stop after training, and they persuaded me to go for the OG outing (i didnt even know it was still on). dinner at plaza sing kopitiam, then talking cock at some random public spot with aditi, wuhong, lionel, cass tan and josephine. OG outings are always fun, but i always leave with a sense of nostalgia for Genesis, which is a sentiment apparently shared by the SH2s but no the SH1s. maybe you only cherish orientation after going through an entire year without it. i am yet again reminded of how grateful i am to have become and OGL.

next match is on next wednesday against IJC. let's do our best, guys.

A year of training boils down to this moment

The buzzword this week was hockey. it seems that the A divs have become the primary focus of my life. im still puzzled as to why the A divs have been shifted forward so much this year (it was mid-april last year), but now that our first match is tmr i guess whining now is a bit late and useless...

but chronological order first! wednesday was the girls' team's first match, and it was against TPJC. i was quite worried for the girls at first, but you could say the circumstances balanced out and i guess it worked out ok in the end (though the definition of "ok" is up for debate here...); i shan't delve into details here. in any case, it was a 0-0 draw, so the girls are still in the running! :D

and now back to my original point: hockey is seriously taking over my life now (and i dont say that with the slightest tinge of bitterness). every few minutes i have a fleeting thought about how i would play in a certain situation, or how i should position myself when im calling for the ball. even when i fall asleep during lectures (which happens a lot more often nowadays - something i attribute partly to hockey but mostly to increasingly boring lectures) i dream about hockey, which i would find really freaky under normal circumstances but just seems so natural now. what we've been preparing the whole year for starts tmr with our opening match against VJC. watch this space tmr evening for match results; i hope to bring good news :X

amidst the rising war frenzy in preparation for tmr's game, the fact that tmr is also the release of A level results barely clings on to the back of my mind. honestly, right now i couldnt give a damn about my chinese results in light of a more pressing issue, but i guess i should wish all the seniors and fellow H1 chinese guys good luck tmr :)

random: i was slacking in the band room with victor, chin and rayson today and i discovered that i have no drumming talent whatsoever. oh well, i guess that's another daydream down the drain T_T

guys, just focus tmr. they may be good, but they need to capitalise on our mistakes to break through. remain calm, dont panic, and keep the passes timely and accurate. but most importantly, give it everything we've got and no matter what, we will leave with our heads held high.