even though it's nearing 12 and i haven't touched my case study yet, i shall blog cos today has just been such a wonderful day =)

thank you my dear friends from a13b and softball and from at large for the bday wishes and presents. i'd expected a quiet birthday but haha, guess God wanted me to be happy since promos are coming >,<

birthdays are kinda weird days. they can pass in joy and fun but then when it all quietens down it suddenly hits you that you've grown another year. or you can pass it in solitude and wish for that very celebration that prevents one from contemplation of the implications of your birthday. lol you can tell it just hit me that i'm like oldddddd now and best thing is i don't feel my age! i feel youngerr x) and less mature than i think someone of my age should be. what's more, the big 18 and the big 21 are dawning closer and closer and somehow, i dont want them to come so fast.

adulthood is scary. period.

time to go back to my case study (=

this is really funny. i was just scrolling through economist.com's Style Guide, which is given to all the journalists at the Economist. one of the rules is never to use jargon when you can substitute with a simpler word, and an example was "gubernatorial". i just saw it on MSN.com's Top Headlines: "Jakarta votes in first direct gubernatorial elections". Heehee.

okay maybe it wasn't that funny. but i'm currently trying to avoid long-windedness in my writing and speech. unfortunately it is something i find hard to get rid of, and consequently i suffer. i read about George Orwell's six rules of writing, here they are, theyre pretty useful:

1. Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.

3. If it is possible to cut out a word, always cut it out.

4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.

5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

i don't really understand the last one though. what constitutes barbarism? if it's something like being racist or ageist etc, isn't that relative? what is considered barbaric today might not have been in the past. some certainly might become less of a taboo in today's more liberal world. but of course, publications live in the short run - what is breaking news today is old tomorrow, and so, journalists write in whatever style is acceptable at the time.

right. my eyes are behaving like walter's habitually do. goodnight, before i forget.

today was quite a blehh day. except that i attended a talk about US universities at around 5 to 7, which was quite interesting! Grads from UMich, UIUC, UVA and Harvard came to talk to us. i took notes, so below is a summary of whatever they presented:

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC)

• not really applicable cos they're strong in accounting and engineering
• quite cheap fees
• weather is extreme: winter can be as cold as -20 to -30 degrees!

University of Michigan

• biggest soccer stadium in US
• a lot of distinguished alumni! eg Larry Page (Google) and the founders of Borders Books
• Their Ross School of Business ranked 1st in US by Wall Street Journal
• according the powerpoint, their liberal arts college is not too bad as well
• one of the largest singaporean communities in US unis
• http://admissions.umich.edu

University of Virginia (UVA)

• Business Week Online rankings: 2nd
• founded by Thomas Jefferson in 1819 (random comment: the same year Raffles landed on SIngapore)
• #2 public uni in US
• -5 degrees is lowest temp so quite good weather
• full tuition scholarships like the Jefferson Undergrad Scholarship available, but hard to get
• strong in accounting, finance
• commerce school is very popular
• summer school, where you get to go some other country to pursue somehing related to your major (eg this guy went to Tibet to assess its impact on China, he's doing politicla science or something)
• "honour code" you actually get to bring finals exams back home and hand it up at the end of the week!!!!!
• sororities and fraternities, secret societies oO

Harvard

• quite extreme weather as well
• oldest US uni
• more grads than undergrads (12000 to 6750)
• undergrad liberal arts college is Harvard College
• cross-classes with MIT
• 8-10% int'l students (avg 2-3 frm S'pore each year)
• need-blind admissions, need-based aid
• house life is good

Yale

• very liberal
• biggest LGBT population in US unis (LGBT meaning lesbian, gay, bi- and trans-sexual, for the uninitiated)

yep thats about all the relevant stuff i have. for more info eg SATs please check the uni webbies.

tomorrow is a school-declared holiday, by virtue of the 20+ golds and several silvers and bronzes we've won in this year's inter-school season.

the cambridge people are flying off on tuesday. sigh it's sad that not enough people can make it for the originally planned class party tmr, cos then the class can make our final goodbyes to you all... dunno if we're going to pon math lecture to send you all off, but i think it's not feasible so yeah. sad.

to cambridge people: do enjoy yourselves and study hard as well! come back and teach us all you've learnt about othello and PnP =) and be sure to take lots of pictures. that i know geri will take care of haha.

walter will be back tmr! so at least our class will not be that sad. there's still 14 people in class, unlike 1b which will only have like 8 people left xD

was just talking to a church friend who's currently sec 4 in rg about her options. one major sticking point for her not coming to rj was the "pressure". i mentioned to her about a letter in today's forum page - a JC student wrote in to say that "JC Life is one hard slog". so its not just rj - its everywhere.

i was in her position last year as well - seriously assessing my own interests, what i wanted to study in uni, appropriate scholarships, and my career choices. toyed with a lot of fanciful ideas, including applying to UWC, and studying TSD. in the end, i still made a pretty radical choice - vaulted from triple science to triple humanities. and im glad to say that so far, i havent regretted it.

only thing i regret since the dawn of this year was our moving house. i prefer the homeliness of our previous estate, the nearness of the amenities and me having my bed, study desk and books all in one room, instead of the current arrangement where bedroom and study room are separate. of course, and the fact that boonlay is so freaking far from anywhere except tuas.

i seriously don't know if i'm going to turn out like one of those success stories that rj churns out every year at the announcement of a level results or one of those forgotten ones who happened not to do as well. having a thousand plus other batchmates, of course, doesnt help much.

of course there's always those fortunate ones who seem to have everything: brains, the latest phone, laptop, mp3 player, home that is so near, and a personality that earns the approbation of the general population and teachers.

but i am reminded here that there are also those who don't have even some of those listed above. and so i stand corrected.

i need to stop thinking so much. i think i can go mad.

lots of stuff are happening this week and the next. i sometimes feel like a car speeding at first gear - ultimate destruction. why i am here blogging when i should be starting on tutorial 5b is a mystery (or maybe not). but anyhow, the workload is beginning to get to me, and heyho, its only week 3!

now juggling several things at once - softball league, Asean quiz, starting CIP and of course, homework. in the meantime i have neglected my walk with God, having skipped TF sessions and church services for the softball league these few weeks and the next few will not be any different. Stress has had a debilitating effect on me and my will has consequently weakened. i feel terrible but things are coming one after another.

and i blame myself for my social ineptitude. why doesnt the world accept loners??
maybe cos the world is superficial and unwilling to look inside themselves. they're afraid of what they might find there.


back to reality.