Wed 30 Aug

We had our network meeting in NUS this time round, and it was to return to our roots. We went praying at four venues - Engin Bridge, the Admin Block, and the architecture side, before ending up at the forum. It was quite nostalgic, considering that we were walking through places that I have not stepped on since about 3 years ago. The whole place has changed a lot. (I can see where my school fees went to.) Interestingly enough, I bumped into four of my students from the previous batch around the place, and they look so different now. Somehow, I think girls just learn to dress up more once they get into university.

Thu 31 Aug

Today was Teachers' Day celebrations (renamed to Staff Day to include all admin staff as well), and I think it was enjoyable. The item put up by the new teachers was very amusing, and some items that certain students or groups of students volunteered were sincere, and lends a personal touch to the whole event.

I received only 3 cards and one small gift today, and it affected my mood. I have always mentioned that students do not understand how much the little that they say even in a card could mean to a teacher, and the converse is true. The lack of it too means a lot. I was feeling a bit moody when God spoke to me about a couple of things, which set things right again.

He asked me if the affirmation from people was so important to me to affect my mood. He also asked me which was more important - what He thinks of what I have been doing, or what other people think. He reminded me that I have been placed where I am for a purpose, and not to lose sight of the fact that I am accomplishing His will above all else. God then reminded me about the story of the ten lepers, where Jesus had healed ten men of leprosy, and after they had left, only one man returned to thank Him. The Lord asked me, "Who do you think mattered more? The nine men who went away, or the one man who returned?" It was then that I understood, because in those 3 cards that I received were sincere words about the impact I have made on the givers, amidst other personal sentiments. I don't know if I had impacted my other students, but at least I know that I made a difference for a few, and that alone is worth treasuring.

I spent the afternoon and evening at the Expo. Because I was one of the 'privileged' 7000 to be at the Teachers' Day Rally, I figured I might as well go down earlier and check out Comex, since it is also at Expo. My gf and I both made some purchases, but the best deal I guess was recontracting Maxonline with Starhub. Unfortunately, I am eligible for recontracting only next month and onwards, so I couldn't get that XBox 360! However, my gf can, so that XBox 360 will be on a (permanent? hehe...) loan. Yeah! The food at the reception for the rally was not bad, although a bit cold for the food at some counters. We got to sit at the last row of the B block, and the Prime Minister and the Minister of Education walked right past us. Well, since we had to be there, I suppose getting to see them up close is sort of a bonus. Actually that was more of an attempt at self-consolation. I think the most important thing we all heard from PM Lee's address was the hint that there may be good news announced next week, probably about the pay revision that was announced (strategically) before the elections.

Mon 28 Aug

I happened to be talking to my gf about the things I do for recreation especially during examinations and deadlines when I become extremely creative, and I recalled a project I started when I was in NIE, which was to devise a pugilistic game system to be played with paper, pen and dice like in the good old days with my blood brudders. I rode on the existing Dungeons and Dragons system, and I was 70% done with it, but I got stuck at the details of the various martial arts and all because I wasn't well-read enough, and the operation was put on hold. It wasn't easy to type a 100 page game manual all by myself, you know. I suddenly remembered that my colleague, ZH, reads pugilistic novels avidly, and I went to consult him. True enough, he gave me enough information to complete the project, I think, which I slated for this coming one week term break. In any case, he is a walking 武侠小说 encyclopedia. Just based on three sets of novels by 金庸, he mapped out a huge concept map worth of information. I think if they ever have a Masters' of 武侠小说, he will get it effortlessly.

Anyway, in case anyone was challenged enough to think about the 4 fours puzzle, I've uploaded my solutions here.

Tue 29 Aug

I finally watched V for Vendetta on VCD just now. Sadly, this was yet another show I wanted to catch when it was on the big screen, but somehow failed to. I really like it. It's rather deep and thought-provoking, with an embedded political and social commentary. It's one of those movies where the protagonist is an anti-hero of sorts, rather than the usual all-American hero. I think it's creditable also because it was adapted from DC Vertigo, a label which had brought forth many series that I really enjoyed when I was still into collecting comics. It's a grim portrayal of a future society where a despotic government rules the country with an iron fist, enforcing compliance. Although the movie seems to be about terrorism that is meant to spark off revolution, I think the essence of it is about empowerment of the individual to stand up and fight for what he believes in, rather than meekly complying, despite knowing there is something very wrong with the world at large. A provoking movie indeed, with enough action to make it not preachy or boring when it delivers its political message.

I realize one aspect of how I am efficient. While many colleagues I know are referring to ten year series and past year papers for questions to adapt and set for the examinations, I simply churn my brain juices while I am on the bus travelling, and create something new. By the time I reach home, I only need to type out the questions and solutions. That is one of my many ways of 'reclaiming' time. I guess this can be considered as proper time management.

This was supposed to be three separate posts, but because of blogger.com problems the last two nights, here's a 3-day post again.

Fri 25 Aug

I spent the time helping to run the elective, and finishing up a whole lot of admin. During lunch we went out to the Kiliney's Kopitiam at Siglap side to eat. I had laksa, some toast and half boiled eggs. A hearty lunch indeed. The laksa tasted pretty good, despite not having cockles. I resumed the TLLM tutorial using socratic questioning, and there was a handful of students who prefer this style of teaching, so I guess that's a positive sign. After that was the actual SPA, and right away, I had to rush down to Meridian JC for the Masters' course tutorial.

The tutorial is slated to be from 4 pm to 7 pm, and we had a teachers' day dinner celebration starting about 7 pm at Altivo Bar, Mount Faber. I went to tell the professor in charge of the tutorial to ask to leave early, and here was how the conversation went:

Me: "Prof B**, we have a college function at 7 pm later."

Prof B**: "Ok no prob. I'll release you punctually at 7 pm then."

Me (pissed): "Ok sure. I guess we'll just fly there."

Prof B**: "In that case, you may leave 5 min earlier."

She has a reputation for ending late, and sometimes not giving a break throughout the 3 hours. The reputation seems based on solid facts apparently. Come on, it is obvious she expects all 4 of us to be late for our college function than to miss one bit of her class. Even if she misunderstood 'college function' to mean that we are having it in TJC campus, still, we need a good 15-20 min to get back there even if it's from Pasir Ris. Bleah. Fortunately, she at least is a good tutor, so the time spent on the tutorial discussions was fruitful. Else it would be a double whammy.

After fighting gruelling traffic, and some upslope walking, we finally got to Altivo Bar, only to find that there were no seats left. A colleague helped ask a waiter whether he can get us some chairs, and the waiter's reply was, "Sorry, there are no more chairs." My jaw dropped. Um...isn't it his job to try to find some? Apparently, he is omniscient and is powerfully aware that the whole Altivo Bar has no spare chairs. I decided to live by my motto "Self service is the best service", and went to look around.

I found two spare chairs just round the corner, next to the drinks counter. That was bad-service-encounter 1. Then I went to the food counter to get food. Guess what? No plates. I asked the nearby waitress where I can find the plates. Her reply, "Sorry, we have no more plates." Wow. I think the waiters and waitresses who work there all went through the exact same training - even their answers sound identical. Before I could say, "Sure, I'll just eat out of my hands" which had formed in my mind, a colleague asked her if they have any plates at all, and she dug out some dessert plates. So I made do with that, and dismissed my barbed comment, even though getting me to eat from a dessert plate is like asking Moses Lim to eat a kids' meal. A hungry man is an angry man. No doubt about the saying. I guess the two of them managed to spoil my already rushed and shortlived evening even further.

Actually, the worse thing is that by the time we got there, there were only scraps left. And cold scraps at that. But at least they did one thing right for service, and they brought out some newly cooked dishes (which was not previously on the menu) - stuffed chicken wings, and some fish fillet, both of which tasted pretty good.

Sat 26 Aug

I went to East Coast Park with my gf, and her cell group plus other affliates. The kids (my gf's cell member and another two girls from my gf's spiritual sister's cell) planned a surprise for us, which I guessed almost correctly, and accidentally spoiled part of the surprise. I figured out that they prepared a cake, but I thought it was for some birthday, when in actual fact, it was a cake for the teachers for Teachers' Day (there were 5 teachers among us, incidentally). My gf and I volunteered to stay and look after the things while the rest went cycling, because of one big guitar that we couldn't bring along if we all went, and that I didn't want to cycle on a Saturday because I think I'll possibly knock down some skaters. Yep, I'm that lousy with a bike. I can even cycle fast, but I need big, wide, empty roads. It's a psychological thing, I think.

We went to East Coast Seafood Centre for dinner. I can't remember the name of the restaurant we stopped at, but one waiter was odd. When we asked him about the portion of the medium plate, he claimed that it can serve up to 4, and that the small can serve up to 2. I found that highly dubious, and ordered medium anyway to share with my gf. When I asked another waiter, he told us that the medium portion serves about 2, maybe 3. Anyway, even if the portion turned out to be as big as the first waiter claimed, I know I can still finish it. In the end, when it came, the medium portion I could have finished on my own, and still eat more. Bleah. But the food was good. My beef kway teow tasted excellent, and the beef was rightly tender. And the uncle who touted and brought us into the restaurant really did give us a 15% discount as he promised. Eventually the bill worked out to be under $5 per person, which was pretty decent.

I waited an hour for a cab with my gf. But it wasn't because there were no cabs; on the contrary, the cabs that were coming in were endless. Actually, we were accompanying two of the kids who were waiting for their family members to fetch them (my gf was worried about leaving them alone), and they took that long to reach. While we were waiting there, I noted that about 7 in 10 of the people who took cabs from that taxi stand were foreigners, and about 4 in 10 were Caucasians. I guess the statistician in me surfaced amidst the boredom.

Sun 27 Aug

I was on my way to church, and was getting off at Tanah Merah to change train, only to meet a barricade. Literally, the people dying to get in formed a human wall, and I decided not to trample a little girl who blocked my way with the rest of her family, put my hand on the shoulder of this guy slightly to my right, and shoved him aside. He turned to glare at me, but I walked on, because if I had stopped, I would have said "好狗不挡路" (a good dog doesn't block the way). I can't understand the mentality of commuters. If they don't step aside and let the passengers out, how on earth can they move in fast? I can easily see why in the Readers' Digest survey recently we were fourth last in courtesy. All the talk I hear about the test being unfair because our culture is different and blah blah blah is just excuses for the loser. We blotched the test, so let's just admit it. As a people, we are not polite, and I see instances of that everywhere. I don't even dare to claim to be above that in all aspects, but at least I know I always step aside behind the yellow line at the MRT stations.

Be forewarned. This is a long blog post...

I started the day with department photo taking right after assembly, and on my way to conduct the elective, a colleague from maths department threw me an oddball challenge, which I took up immediately. I guess there is a secret reason why I'm sitting right smack in the middle of the maths department. The challenge is to form any number from 1 to 100 using only four '4's in an expression, and any mathematical operator to link them. For example, to get 15, one might choose 4 x 4 - (4/4). He knows I love a puzzle, and doomed me he did. I was processing this whole thing in my head almost the whole day. Today we launched our first TLLM session with two classes, and I think it went rather well. As it turned out, my class would do anything not to have to do the regular tutorials. Sigh. Anyway, I love being fast and efficient at what I do. I did data entry on every MCQ response each student gave for a 16-question pretest, for a total of about 120 students, and programmed the Excel spreadsheet to compute whether the answer (in alphabet form) is right or not, tally the total score per student, convert to percentages, take a class mean, breakdown to total responses per class for each option (A to D) for each question for all 6 classes, and a master analysis sheet to analyze the result of the whole population of 6 classes.

In an hour plus. I love being me.

For lunch, four of us went down to Laguna Park to eat. I never knew that there was a restaurant inside the estate, and I didn't know visitors can go in just like that. It is called Kim Moh restaurant, and apparently, it is quite famous. I saw many newspaper clippings about it pinned up on the walls as accolades, and as my colleague eagerly recommended, the beef noodle was excellent. The gravy was tasty, though a little too thick, but the beef was succulently tender, and the soup was so rich it tasted like tonic. It was quite expensive though, at $6.50 per bowl, but my level head generously footed the bill. Or maybe he was guilty for disappearing for a total of 3 weeks this term and leaving us to hold the fort for him. Heh.

Later in the afternoon, I went shopping with my gf at Parkway Parade. I dub today as Subsidized Shopping Day, and us two as the Voucher Vultures. We had many vouchers that we decided to use today. Colleague ZH had an Espirit $10 off voucher that can only be used in conjunction with a Citibank credit card (which he didn't have), and he passed it to me since I have the said card. My gf and I each bought one top, so at least that was fruitful. We then went to Isetan to shop, because my gf received $50 worth of Isetan vouchers for her birthday from our colleagues. She found a nice pair of shoes (I picked them!), but that didn't use up the vouchers, so I went looking for a pair of leather shoes for work. On paying, we realized that they were giving out pearls for every $20 spent, and 2 scratch & win cards for every $50 spent. We went to collect our pearls, and it turned out that they dig the pearls right out of the oysters in front of us. I've never seen that done before, but I pity the oysters which were farmed just for that purpose. Here's a shot of the pearls.

















I went to redeem my 2 scratch & win cards, and took out my special 'coin' which had a picture of praying hands and a bible verse on it to scratch the cards. It's a gift from my gf. Haha God actually blessed me, and I got two $5 vouchers! The lady at the counter commented that I was really lucky to get a $5 voucher to begin with, and two at that. Then my savvy gf realized that we still had two more receipts that we can pool together to get another 2 scratch & win cards, and we did, but those two were fruitless. Maybe God stopped blessing once we turned greedy. Heh. We spent the two vouchers on some snacks from Marks & Spencer.

We then headed down to Marina Square. Originally we intended to catch a movie (my gf had vouchers again!), but there wasn't anything we were dying to watch, and the showtimes didn't leave us much room for dinner, so we skipped the movie. We went to have dinner at Billy Bombers, because we had two vouchers that would give us $11 off per $22 spent, and in such restaurants, chalking up $22 per person is quite effortless. I had a Route 66 burger, which had beef patty, lettuce, melted cheese and grilled mushrooms (and I added a sunny side up), and it was fantastic. Right now, I can't decide if Carl's Jr is better anymore...but it's a close fight. In the end I spent about $25 for two of us. Not bad at all. The most fascinating thing about today is that we spent quite a fair bit without actually spending that much cash, and that all the vouchers were given to us by other people somehow along the way. And my gf still didn't manage to use up all her vouchers. So blessed~

I just finished Initial D Fourth Stage! The anime was engaging right from the very start, but I guess one needs to like the first Initial D probably before he gets hooked on this one. Basically, the story continues with Takumi, the main character joining Project D, in which he teams up with Ryosuke and Keisuke Takahashi, and they go around different areas to challenge the local drivers so that they can defeat new tough opponents on unfamiliar grounds and rewrite their track records. Frankly, I don't quite understand why I like this anime, since I don't have a car, and haven't learnt how to drive. However, it is exciting to watch every race, and if I were better off financially, I think I would have been so tempted to buy a car. There is not much development in plot except for a romantic encounter for Keisuke, but otherwise, the 24 episodes revolve mainly around the racing.

Hmmm...what should I watch next? By the way, the podcast on MrBrown.com about the PM's National Day Rally speech is a brilliant use of sound editing software, and is hilarious.

Ironically, right after I mentioned my amazement at the power of the subconscious mind in yesterday's post, today I overslept and missed my stop by two bus stops, and reached Bugis. Bleah.

I heard on the news that scientists analyzed the ozone layer, and found that it is repairing itself, predicting that it will be restored in a few years' time. God sure is amazing...God is a chemist, amongst other professions. My take on it though: not gonna happen if we go into a second round of Hungry Ghost Festival tomorrow. Heh.

My friend was commenting that people are really burning money away, since they are spending real money to buy paper money to burn as offerings. To me, it's more like people are offering money not to the spirits but to the people who produce joss paper and incense. I noticed something even years ago before I became a Christian - the silver and gold painted onto the centre of each piece of joss paper has become thinner and smaller in size as the years went by. And that observation was made by me when I was in secondary school, so that's about a decade ago. Wonder if it's now reduced to only a dot or something.

I am seriously wondering though if my blocked nose has something to do with all the incense and joss paper burning than flu itself, since I do have a nose that is sensitive to smoke.

Mon 21 Aug

It's elective week for the TA students, and I am helping out in offering the Video Editing elective. Both my colleagues who are in the elective with me were supposed to be lecturing chemistry, so I was left alone to settle all the administrative tasks such as moving the good computers from other labs to the one we were assigned, and so on. Other than a couple of minor hiccups, it went well. I think this elective will be interesting for me, because the software my colleagues are teaching is Ulead Media Studios, which I actually haven't used before; my familiarity is with Adobe Premiere, so I'm curious as to what the differences are.

I noticed that the news these days on TV are splashed with Subutex. I think for the past week, everyday there is some news, big or small, about Subutex. In fact, I think they have been recycling some of the footage they have a gazillion times. I keep seeing the scene where some drug (might not even be Subutex, come to think of it) was placed in a spoon, heated, and a needle goes in to take up the melted compound. There's another scene of two men looking high and zonked out. And the third highly-recycled scene is the one where they were filming the back of some shady looking clinic, and several equally shady looking men went in and came out with the controlled drug. Yawn...too much repetition is boring.

Tue 22 Aug

I fled from school rather early today, determined to get some rest because I was feeling the incoming flu. Or is it the flu that didn't really go away...? Anyway, I met up with J for lunch at Parkway Parade because he happened to be in the area to meet a client, and he contacted me at the opportune moment when I was looking for lunch kakis to no avail. Coincidentally, I bumped into a whole group of my TA students in the food court, and J was asking me if I wanted to sit further away from them. That was a funny remark, considering the fact that the thought had never occured to me before, and that I see no good reason why I need to avoid my students when I'm out of school. Other than the fact perhaps that they would address me as Mr Low, and anyone who overhears will know my occupation straightaway.

After lunch, we went to play an hour plus of pool before he went to meet his client. As usual, he still beats me in most of the games, but he pointed out something interesting to me, and it is to return to the basics - not to use fancy spins, but learn how to place by controlling strength. I guess I'll try that for a while.

My nose is still blocked, and I realized that cold aircon makes it worse. Anyway, as I was heading home, I passed by POSB bank, so I thought that since I was early, I might as well go change my atm card, which is badly cracked. I took a number and saw that I was 8 persons away in the queue, and that both counters were open. I thought, 'It shouldn't take that long, right?'

Wrong. It took one hour before I got my turn. It's an economics idea why I would wait one hour. By 20+ min, I thought that the opportunity cost was already too great, and to forgo that 20+ min waiting time by walking away was too costly. Which is technically a silly idea, and that is usually what comes to mind when I wait for a certain bus number for a long time, for instance, and a cab comes along, and I would think that if I take the cab, I would have wasted the time spent waiting. Something like that. Anyway, I don't think it's the fault of the bank people that it took so long. They weren't exactly slow, but then again, they weren't in a hurry either. It seems to just take that much time to settle all the paperwork and documentation per customer. The only good thing is that it was an extremely hot day, and I napped inside the bank comfortably in the aircon while waiting, waking up right smack before my number despite me being plugged into music. Sometimes I wonder how powerful our subconscious mind is, especially every time I wake up just before I reach my bus stop.

I've just updated my metamorphosis website with two new devotionals. Inspiration hit me when I was on the way home to write a new article for the website regarding evolution versus creationism, but I figure that it would be a long work in progress because I would have to dig up quite a lot of information off research.

Otherwise, this was a peacefully spent and restful weekend. Possibly because I forgot to bring my handphone out with me to church today. Again. This is the second time it has happened, and again, it's merely because I went for my wallet first. That is the problem of routine. Once you break it, you may easily miss the earlier parts of the routine. Usually I take my handphone first, then my wallet. Ah well. Maybe I am getting old.

Nah.

Anyway, I don't understand it, but my nose is either blocked or runny today, and I'm getting a sore throat. I find it hard to imagine that I have not recovered from the previous flu, or that I have just gotten hit with a new flu bug. Argh.

Thu 17 Aug

I bought a couple of DVDs and a VCD to watch with my gf. Among the titles was one that I originally wanted to catch when it was on the big screen, but I can't remember why and how I missed it - Shallow Hal. So since this is a backdated review of sorts, I can talk about the plot without it being a spoiler!

The show centres around Hal, who goes for outer appearances in a woman. He meets guru Tony Robbins, who hypnotizes him such that he can only see the inner beauty in people, so eventually he meets this huge woman but sees only Gwyneth Paltrow, i.e. the woman's got a really good heart. At one point, Hal's best friend managed to break the hypnotism, and suddenly Hal sees everything normally again, and Hal couldn't face reality. He wanted to search for Robbins and get hypnotized again because he didn't care if the rest of the world saw a fat woman while he saw a slim beauty. That was the point in time I was most concerned if the movie would turn out well, because had Hal done that, I think the entire premise of the movie would fall through, because even though Hal was seeing the inner beauty of someone, he still saw it in the form of an attractive woman. Of course, the show had the good plot I was hoping for, and in the end, he loved the woman the way she looks in reality.

The first thought I had was that the movie seems like a reverse Beauty and the Beast. In the fairy tale, Belle got to know the Beast and eventually fall in love with him, despite his physical appearance, and then when they finally end up together, he takes on his real form, which is that of a charming prince. Unfortunately, this is also why I never really liked the way this fairy tale ended, because the fairy tale happy ending still had to make the beast into prince charming, which to me was saying 'now that Belle had proven herself unshallow, let's give her the real good thing', then it kinda knocks down the inner beauty moral of the story, since ending up with a handsome prince was meant to be a happier ending. That is then why I love Shrek as a movie, because it aptly addressed this particular gripe of mine by having "love's true form" end up as the princess turning into an ogress rather than Shrek turning into a prince. Apparently, I'm not the only one with the gripe.

I digress. Anyway, I think Shallow Hal's central message was great. When Hal's friend confronted Robbins and accused him of brainwashing Hal with hypnosis, Robbins defended himself by saying that he actually de-hypnotized Hal, because everyone is brainwashed and programed by all the movies, TV shows, magazines and media into thinking what constitutes beauty and what does not. I think he's right. It's a cool meaningful romantic comedy.

Then again, if I were a good-looking hunk instead, maybe all this wouldn't bother me one bit, since the 'brainwashing' would actually favour me then. Hmm. Food for thought.

Fri 18 Aug

I dub today 'Mad Rush Day'. I was desperately trying to churn out a test instrument for the TLLM by today, which took up all my free periods. Then I realized a potential problem, and tried to sort it out, and ended up having to fix it by myself. A colleague had made assumptions (without verifying them) that we had certain equipment and software to run our upcoming course on Mon's first period, and I checked things out only to find that we actually don't. There I was, trying to handle both urgent matters, within a really limited time because I still had 4 periods of lessons to go, and right after my lesson, I had to go straight for my Masters' tutorial, so I couldn't even stay back to settle the issue if I wanted to. When I can feel hard-pressed for time despite my efficiency, it means that it is really serious.

The only relief was that the tutorial, like every other before it, proved once again that it was unnecessary to even prepare for it. This time round, I didn't prepare beforehand like I usually do because I really couldn't find the time to do so; actually, to be fair, it wasn't even clearly stated so far what exactly we need to prepare beforehand. Except next week's tutorial where the professor in charge is one tough cookie, which we all know she is, because she has taught us in NIE before, and she listed out what we had to do 2 weeks in advance. Today's professor was an interesting guy. He was funny every time he tried to be humourous, which was great. However, he pauses often when he talks about the serious stuff, i.e. the content he was covering, so when he wasn't kidding around, well, let's just say that it was by sheer force of adamant will that I did not doze off at all.

I learnt something that I didn't previously know until I read the report on the dead baby found in a locker in NTUC Bishan - a person can get up to life imprisonment for killing a baby. The more pertinent thought would then be: it is legal to kill a baby while it is still in the womb (through abortion), but you can get a life sentence to kill a baby once it is out. Then I wonder: if a person gets imprisoned for killing his/her baby, would he or she regret the act of killing an innocent, or that he or she didn't do it sooner, i.e. abortion?

Cell group today was held in NUS, on Engin bridge. Man, it has been ages since I last was there. Back in NUS days, we had weekly cell group there, but after most of us graduated, we moved to more central locations to make it more convenient for everyone. This week, however, somehow our cell didn't get the room we booked, so we went for an alternative venue that didn't need booking, and ended up in NUS. That place is still as hot and windless as ever. Today, it was quite lively because of some big Christian group apparently having some first meeting there, so I suspect either Varsity Christian Fellowship or Navigators, since school term has officially only just begun.

The saddening thing to realize was that it was at most nostalgic for my cell leader and me, because everyone else had left cell or church already.

Today was supposed to be a long day, full of relief (the irony of the word) periods because my comrades teaching TA are away serving the college or the nation. At one point I had two TA classes combined in the same room when their lessons overlapped, and I could barely manage. For a normal JC class, combining classes would not be an issue because it's still largely teacher-talk. For the TA class, it's group discussions and I have to facilitate and guide them along, and hence with nine groups moving at different paces presenting to me, or asking questions, it's utter chaos.

I was supposed to take over another TA class in the afternoon, but fortunately my colleague returned in time, so I was relieved (pun intended). I spent the whole afternoon working on the TLLM thing, and it looks like it will cost me a lot more time. What did I get myself into? Argh.

I saw something interesting just now outside Bedok library at night when I was on my way home. There was this couple, in their late 30s I think, dancing in the big open area in front of the library, without music. It looks odd, but romantic somehow. I would have thought people only do such things in TV serials or movies.

Sun 13 Aug

Planet Shakers were there for service, and they played essentially the same songs as last night. In any case, they rock. I went to service feeling more or less recovered, but by halfway through the sermon, my nose was severely blocked again. I suspect the cold air conditioning was a direct cause. One of my boys brought a couple of girls to church, so instead of having our regular cell group, we had a combined session with my gf's cell after service, so that the two new girls will feel more at ease. Anyway, it felt kind of awkward, since we had never tried combining cell groups before, and everyone was stranger to one another. More or less.

I went back home after that, took medicine and concussed. This flu is taking a long time to disappear from my system. Argh.

Mon 14 Aug

I started the day running to and fro, making sure there were enough question papers for the lecture test. Sigh. This looks set to be another busy week. I have already planned out all the tasks I need to complete in every free period I have. I spent the evening at home sleeping after medication. The nose remains blocked, but at least I don't sound so terribly nasal anymore.

Fri 11 Aug

I took my first MC of the year today. Not that I had not fallen sick before, but so far, it had been minor enough for me to recover without needing to see a doctor. At first I thought I could manage, but hearing my voice that sounds like I'm speaking from underwater, and feeling like my head weighs more than the rest of my body, I decided to just stay home and recuperate, missing even my Masters' course tutorial in the late afternoon.

I just slept and slept and slept. I think I slept enough to make up one month's worth of sleep deficit. The fact that I can sleep for so long shows that my body is still sick, otherwise I should be unable to fall asleep right after a nap.

Sat 12 Aug

Another day goes by without me touching any work. I don't know if it feels liberating or worrying, but that's the fourth day in a row without work. I think it is fortunate that usually I clear certain work way in advance when I feel inspired or free, so now it doesn't feel like I have deadlines choking my neck or something.

I slept for the greater part of the day, and recovered enough energy to make my way down to the Expo for Planet Shakers concert. I told God that regardless of whether He heals me or not, I shall give my all to praise and worship Him, so at least give me enough energy to do so. Apparently He did exactly that. I jumped, I danced, and I left with still the same blocked nose. Sigh. But the concert was solid. The best thing is that Planet Shakers will be playing for Youth service tomorrow! Woohoo!

I spent almost the whole day sleeping in. I went to see the doctor, and confirmed that I really am down with flu, and possibly a bacterial throat infection. Sigh.

During my waking moments, I managed to finish an anime series Samurai Champloo. The animation is quite solid, especially the samurai swordfights. The scenes are highly reminiscent of Cowboy Bebop's kungfu scenes, in the fluidity of the movements. In fact, one of the main characters Mugen reminds me of Spike of Cowboy Bebop to some extent as well. There are a few irreverent and irrelevant episodes in the whole series, covering subcultures such as graffiti, and breakbeat music, but there is a streak of weird humour throughout. The thing about the series is that what started out as a girl's quest to find her father opens out into a more complicated plot, although I think there could be more development of the overarching plot than the side stories. Overall, it's an enjoyable anime, but if it was more focused, it could have been really excellent.

I found a nice example that illustrates 'irony' perfectly. Subutex was meant to be medication that helps people break their dependence on drugs, but now it has become a banned substance, because people are abusing it as a drug. Now that is irony.

Tue 8 Aug

It's National Day celebrations in school today, so there are no lessons! Today's programme is different from previous years, and I found out that that is because the committee behind the planning is a different one. The comperes were really natural and amusing, and worked the crowd rather well. The performances were pretty standard, except for a National Day Idol competition and the Chinese Orchestra, which put up a superb percussion performance. I'm getting quite sick of the Idol thing that is way overused though. Principal and vice-principals all went up to sing a National Day song, and that really appealed to the students.

My ex-student came back for a visit, before he flies off to the States. It was a nice feeling seeing graduated students come back, and it would be even better to see them later on in life to see what they have become, and whether it is in line with what I thought they would become.

After that, a bunch of us went off to Sakae Sushi for lunch, and to Venezia for dessert. The ice cream is cheaper than Haagen Dazs, and of a different texture, and it's nice. Here's a shot of the triple scoop.

















In the evening, I went down to Indoor Stadium for a nation wide prayer meeting for Singapore called Day of His Power. Ps Lawrence has returned to the stage for this event, and we went to give him support. It was quite tiring though. I was standing most of the time during the event, and I was feeling unwell already. There was one point when everyone started waving their handphones with the backlight on, and it was quite a pretty sight. The photo didn't capture it too well though.


















Wed 9 Aug

Happy birthday Singapore!

I spent the whole day resting at home. After evading flu for a few months, the flu bug finally got me. Fortunately, my gf came over to keep me company, so it wasn't that miserable a day. Heh. The fireworks after National Day Parade felt like it lasted quite a short while only though.

Sun 6 Aug

After service, I met my blood brudders for dinner. They happened to be at Expo for the Popular sale, so I met them directly there, and we made our way to the airport for dinner. We were planning to go to Sakae Sushi, but the queue was so long, and blood brudder Yuren was in a hurry to receive his girlfriend at the arrival hall, so we went for somewhere without much of a queue, and I ended up eating first time at Soup Restaurant.

The food was good! I had quite a few friends who recommended the place to me, but somehow I just had no opportunity to eat there. There were 6 of us, and we ordered samsui ginger chicken (their speciality dish...not sure if I remembered the name right), fried venison, beggar bowl tofu, kai lan fried with dang gui, ribs, and fried mee sua to share. I think the standard is quite good, and I enjoyed the meal. It came up to about $22 per person, which I suppose was reasonable for the quality. I think I will definitely go again, but such food is best enjoyed with more people around. For variety's sake.

Mon 7 Aug

I had another busy day at school today. One major shock I received was knowing that the next module of my Masters' programme starts this coming Fri. We had just finished the previous module last Fri, and I thought we would have some breathing space, because tomorrow is the official online registration for the course. Apparently, my educated guess was very off. This module has no exams, but comes with 4 major assignments, and all require either presentations or reports. I've already sent a thick stack of readings I printed out to the photocopy shop to duplicate for my fellow coursemates, and I think thick is an understatement. It looks like it will be a challenging three years to complete the Masters' course while working. Hmmm...call me masochistic, but I think I relish the challenge.

Sometimes it is precisely challenging situations like this that forces me to re-evaluate my priorities and better manage my time. It feels more satisfying to complete a thousand and one things with limited time, and knowing I can actually accomplish it.

I managed to drag my gf with me to watch 龙虎门, literally Dragon Tiger Gate. It turned out though that she enjoyed the show, to my great surprise, so 'drag' is an inappropriate word to use. I remember having read the original comic book when I was in the army; one of my platoon mates was a chinese comic (the kind with colour and is thin like DC and Marvel kind of comic books) fan, and I borrowed from him to read when I was bored. I only read a few episodes though, so I was unfamiliar with the storyline. At first I was quite skeptical, because the previous couple of chinese comic to movie adaptations have been disappointing - I still cringe when I recall 中华英雄. At least this movie had a neatly tied up storyline, so the story seems complete within the run of the movie. Although the main villain remains an unexplained mystery in terms of origin, as well as the skilled eccentric man they sought help from. The later part of the movie seems somewhat accelerated unnaturally, and of the three heroes, only Donnie Yen seems useful in the 'boss fight'. It isn't a great movie, but it turned out much better than I expected. Anyway I was only there to see the action scenes, which actually weren't that many though quite cool; I was misled by a colleague who said that it was fighting all the way through the movie.

I managed to make it in time to catch the last episode of Desperate Housewives, fortunately. Nothing much worth watching on TV till the next season for me.

I went down to Orchard with my gf in the afternoon. I treated her to Crystal Jade La Mian and Xiao Long Bao, and we each had spring onion noodles (I helped her finish more than half her bowl), drunken chicken, fried nian gao, and xiao long bao, and mango pudding dessert. This meal should have been yesterday's, but we had no opportunity to celebrate her birthday properly then, so it's made up for today. I bought a couple of tops from Bossini - it's 50% off storewide! I stick by my usual statement - there's usually a better sale after GSS is over. Maybe it's to drop the price even lower to get rid of what the GSS couldn't sell off...hmm...

We went to catch Click at Cineleisure, and discovered a nifty toy there. There's this motion sensor at the first floor, and a projector that projects an image onto the floor. Because of the motion sensor, the image interacts. For instance, if the image is of a pond, your walking onto the floor where the image is with create ripples in the image of the water. It's really cool, and worth checking out for novelty's sake. I think this would be the technology of the future for gaming. Already the newest console controllers have built in motion sensors.

I enjoyed the movie a lot. Click is about an average Joe whose priorities are on work, and one day, he receives an universal remote controller that controls, as the name suggest, the universe (to some extent, that is). He is able to mute noisy animals/people, forward through moments in his life he does not want to bear, and so on. However, after a while, the controller picks up on his preferences and starts to forward through his life, even when he doesn't want it to anymore. The movie, for all its humour, had some sentimental moments which I felt was quite touching actually, but more importantly, a strong message about priorities - family, to be exact. I think the show is very apt in this era, where people literally slave their lives away in their job, believing they are providing for their families, not realizing out that they are missing the point and neglecting the most important thing, which is the very people they are slogging for.

The movie shares a similar premise with other predecessors like Bruce Almighty and Bedazzled. Ordinary man gets power as he wanted or desired, only to lead to disastrous consequences. What I do find interesting is that for such movies, there is always a spiritual side to it, weak or otherwise, apart from the moral message. God is always somehow pulled into the picture, even if represented not completely or absolutely accurately. Do catch the movie - it will make you laugh, and at the same time, jolt you a little to consider what is most important. Kate Beckinsale plays Sandler's wife in the movie, and she looks fabulous. And watch out for the dogs in the show. They all have the same interesting role throughout.

I went with my gf to visit her uncle in Tan Tock Seng hospital. He was recovering well from his operation, and we were talking at length about heart diseases and cholestrol. I always wonder if these ailments are a recent phenomenon due to our highly processed food and unhealthy diet, or that they have always been around through the centuries, but there was no technology available to recognize them. I saw an old man lying in a neighbouring bed, with tubes all over, and missing a forearm, and both legs below the knee. My guess is that it's diabetes, but the sight of the old man once again reminds me of the fact that we should live life well everyday, and do all that we want and need to, so that when we are old, frail and unable, we would not need to regret not being able to complete something. In all honesty, I think if I can live to a ripe old age, I'd rather perish quickly with a heart failure or something, than to go through cancer or amputation like that old man. It's a sad, sad way to go.

I also realized something about hospital food courts - the food generally sucks big time, and the prices are exhorbitant. I was still full from the massive lunch, so I ordered kaya toast and eggs set. The coffee was ultra dilute, despite it being served in a small ceramic cup, which is the trademark of strong coffee shop style coffee. The eggs were cool. Yep, not even lukewarm. The kaya toast had so little kaya and butter that I was disgusted. My gf took a photograph of the evidence, so maybe I'd upload it tomorrow or something. The other things that the rest ordered were pretty dismal too, except for one decent fish soup. Somebody in management should do something about this; just because the food court is located in a hospital doesn't mean the food should be substandard in taste.

Wed 2 Aug

I finished typing one set of notes within today! I think my efficiency astounds me at times. I figured I'd better clear the lecture notes, powerpoint and tutorial by this weekend, since it was something unforeseen that suddenly popped up into my to-do list.

After school, I made my way down to Marine Parade where I was to attend a leaders' meeting. Today marks the closing of the Gateway Cities Youth Convention (GCYC), and at the end of it, Ps Eugene shared a resoundingly powerful Word from God in the book of Zechariah. I think he preaches very powerfully during all these Youthnet meetings, and sometimes less powerfully during mainstream sermons, but I think it may be because during services where he had to preach were usually sermons related to his role in Touch Community Services. Anyway, I felt God's presence strongly in the place.

My cell group hung out for a while for supper and had some satay. I think it's been a pretty long time since we last ate supper together, and hung out. We are all getting too busy in our lives.

Thu 3 Aug

I finished typing the tutorial questions and solutions in a day again. Hehe...I'm making good progress. For lunch, a colleague drove us out to Bedok View area where we had fish bee hoon soup. I found it quite tasty, but my gf has much higher standards apparently. I hung around school to tie up some loose ends at work, and chatted with some colleagues a while too. I realized that I haven't managed to find time to hang around some colleague's cubicle to chat for a long time, which is testament to my busyness this term. Argh. National Day holidays would be a more than welcome break. Except that I think I'd still be doing work over those three days. Sigh.

In the evening, we went to celebrate my cell leader's birthday. We lured him out of his hotel room, and JH sneaked up with the cake to his room, and, with my cell leader's wife in cahoots, surprised him when we brought him up. The burning question would likely be: why was my cell leader staying in a hotel room with his wife? Actually, he had been on course for two weeks at Swissotel, and the course includes lunch and dinner at places like Prego, and a hotel room to stay in. 2 weeks at Swissotel. Man, how cool is that? Oil companies are really rich. Why can't MOE make our teachers' courses like this? Heh. Oh yeah, the view from the 56th floor is quite awesome. I wonder what the top floor is like. We chilled out in his hotel room till about 11 plus before we left for home. At this point, it really doesn't seem like I'm someone who's going to take an exam the following day.

Fri 4 Aug

The day of reckoning has arrived. It also happens to be my gf's birthday, which doesn't bring her much cheer that she would be spending it in ulu NIE taking an exam.

My colleague brought the deck of cards I designed for organic chemistry to her class to test-play it, and the students loved it. According to her, they liked it so much they offered to plan an inter-CG competition for it. I'm really happy to hear such comments, of course. Now, the general trend is that there are two ways people handle action research. One way is to do the necessary, and get it over and done with, which ends up with ideas that aren't very original or enjoyable. The other way is to really do up something good, which is what I was aiming for. Essentially, I told myself I will not design something meant for engaged learning if I wouldn't play it myself, or enjoy it personally. A lot of effort went into brainstorming, designing, test-playing, and cutting the cards out nicely, but I think it is worth it. I think next year's TA can play with it when they reach the topic of organic chemistry; I suspect they would enjoy it even more.

I meant to do my revision today during my free periods, but then, of all things, the school server went down for a while, and no one could access the wired network. In the end, I spent hours going around helping colleagues configure their wireless network settings, and inbetween helped one other colleague design some template on Photoshop. Essentially, those couple of hours were spent on doing everything unrelated to what I planned and needed to do. Sometimes these contingencies can be very frustrating, if not tempered by the fact that I know I helped some people.

Hence, I went into the exam feeling insufficiently prepared. It didn't help that it was an open-book exam, and I didn't have the book. Not that I didn't want to, but I think NIE should have highlighted the fact that it would be an open-book exam, and the 'recommended' text would be necessary as a reference, during that one day of registration when the book was on sale. I borrowed one from my colleague who took the module before, only to find that it is a totally different textbook by a different author. The relief, if it can be called a relief, was that the paper was so challenging that I think it wouldn't have made a difference between someone who mugged for it, and someone who barely studied for it. It was full of almost purely application questions, and the worst thing was that the questions and options (for MCQ) were very vague, and I think everyone who talked about a certain question, for instance, had a different interpretation. I think I should be more realistic and expect perhaps a B to shatter my aim for straight A's for this Masters' programme. God, I wouldn't mind if You gave me an A for this, of course. Heh.

Yesterday's evening was spent at church for a youth conference. Today's evening was spent in NIE attending a Q & A session that essentially served no purpose. Tomorrow's evening will be spent in church for a leaders' meeting. Thu's night probably will have something on as well. Hmm...it doesn't sound like the schedule of someone who will take an exam on Fri. Sigh.

My level head just swapped my lecture topic with another colleague because I will be involved in the TLLM thing, which clashes with my slated slot. The swap puts me as the main lecturer, which means that I need to prepare the notes and the powerpoint slides. SPA script marking will start very soon, which is exceedingly time consuming. Exam setting for promotional exams will start next week probably. The TLLM thing will take up a lot of time to prepare some materials, documentation, and analysis. I have three remedial sessions to prepare for. I have to complete all of these before I go off for 2 weeks of In-Camp Training in mid September, amidst other things that are bound to creep up. And I don't know when exactly the next module will commence.

It is fortunate that I have cleared many other tasks on hand before this efficiently ahead of time. I think I can feel a bit of stress already, and I think that's good. I have been managing everything easily enough so far, and I think I need a challenge to stimulate me. But it does look like quite a heavy road ahead...