I think I could count all the stars of fall.

Y4S1 Reflections

"Last semester, best semester," they said.

And indeed, it is really my best semester. I think I have surpassed all the expectations that I have put on myself, and I am quite satisfied with everything thus far. There is still a tinge of regret of me not being able to get my first-class honours, but ohwell everything happens for a reason and I am glad that I went with what I truly want, instead of choosing the thesis route like what majority of the students did. :D

NM4883F Financial Journalism

(NM4883F Financial Journalism)

I remembered myself scrolling very hard through the entire module list because I have no modules to take. There are very little PR modules available, and I have no interest in game design and media studies, so I took quite a long time to finally decide that I will plunge into the world of writing and pray hard that I will stay afloat.

I took financial journalism in the end. I remembered myself being very worried about it, because yours truly has never been good in her writing. I also consulted Belle multiple times to ask about the module, because she was the only person I know who took it before. LOL, I sound like some kanchiong spider. T.T

I don't regret taking the class. Weiyi has been a great mentor and lecturer, who is quite dedicated in his work. Even though he might be harsh at times (considering he once sent me an entire email in CAPS because my writing is so horrible), he is quite patient in his teaching (I also once received another email from him full of compliments hehehes, but he also sent me a whole list of feedback on how to further improve my piece luh).

Overall I did pretty decent in the module, all thanks to his training. I really think I learnt a lot from him, and I really encourage anyone who is interested in writing to take the module under him! :D

(Last lesson: we relieved our Korea days by having army stew!)

(Featuring Regine, my Korea exchange housemate)

I don't feel sorry for 'psycho-ing' Regine to join me in this module LOL! I made her join me for the first lesson, and I really think my persuasion skills are so brilliant that I managed to convince her to take the module with me in the end. :D HAHAHA. Thank goodness for her, if not I think I will have die a horrible death from the project work.

NM4102 Research Methods

It was chaotic right from the start, because some idiots in the class made a fuss about wanting to form groups with their friends. Come'on, we are already university students, do we really need to create so much trouble by arguing with the professor throughout the entire lesson just so we can be with our friends?

Long story short, I ended up changing my groups twice. But ohwell, I am quite okay with my final group. Thank goodness for Clara, she is really the pillar for holding the entire group down :D It wasn't the smoothest group project that I have worked on, but at least my group mates did not go missing-in-action nearing the deadlines. For that, I still feel thankful.

GEH1070 Traditional Chinese Medicine

The two of us did a five-man project work. Perhaps we were both Year 4s, and we know how the entire thing works. We worked really well together - I think we only met up twice to discuss and work on the project before submission. The professor was so shocked that we actually finished the project two weeks before the deadline LOLOL. Thanks Chu Ning. I love our efficiency and group dynamics. :D

Conclusion

This is really the end of my journey as a student. I am glad that my last semester ended with a bang, but I hope that everything will go on smoothly with me embarking on the new path as a working adult. :D Cheers everyone, I wish you all the best if you are still studying!

A part of maturity is learning to
love some people from a distance.
To keep their well-being in your
prayers but take a path,
away from them.

Leaves have fallen to the ground, and now there's no one else around to hear the cry.

SMU Local Exchange

I am super blessed this semester. I finally fulfilled my dream by getting the opportunity to embark on a local exchange. :D

(Mandatory shot)

Thanks Michael for the photo.

I still remember my first day at SMU clearly. I walked into the wrong class and sat there for quite long, until the Professor started his lesson and I sensed that something was wrong. LOL, it doesn't sound like the course that I registered for?! After checking with my table mates, I hurried out to find the correct classroom. Super embarrassing!

In a blink of an eye, I have graduated from SMU. Received my results last month and geez, I must say that the school is very competitive. Hmm, but no regrets because beyond grades (thankgawd my grades are on a pass/fail basis), I really enjoyed myself there. The teachers, the friends, and the environment are all very different from NUS. And I understand now why my NUS professor decided to go back SMU to teach!

SMU only have seminars, unlike the lecture-tutorial style over at NUS. The seminars lasted as long as 3h 15mins, and sometimes the professors even overshot. However, I haven't dozed off once during lessons. LOL, unfortunately yes, I slept a lot during classes at NUS. It was more participative in SMU (which also explains the competitiveness and my grades), but I'm glad that it trained me to speak up more.

(Matchy matchy with Fatiha)

The first friend that I made in SMU! Also the friend who crazily loves pink like me. LOL! Coincidentally, we took 2 modules together (out of my 3 modules in SMU). So I see her practically on all the days I head to SMU. Thanks for being so friendly and being my aunt agony, and for bringing me around to explore SMU - we headed to the IT center, the SMU Labs, the Li Ka Shing library and the law library. (:

(Pizza Party Part 1)

On the last day of lessons, Professor Roh from my COMM302 Psychology of Strategic Communications class, decided to host a pizza party! I like Pizzahut, but I only grabbed a slice of pizza and a drumlet because I paiseh to take more LOL! I like Professor Roh, he is like some fatherly figure who always take care of students' needs. I had a consultation with him once for my individual assignment, and he chatted with me for quite a bit. A simple consultation ended up to be 30 minutes long hahaha. The best part? He actually remembers my name and my identity as a NUS student! He was telling me that it was 'fate' that we met, because he was meant to teach at NUS, but eventually chose SMU instead. Just nice my consultation slot was an hour before the last lesson, so he was saying how he really enjoy teaching our classes, and he also asked me about my career aspirations and all. He ended with wishing me the best of luck. I was teary-eyed by the time I left his office omg.

(Fatiha, Professor Roh and me)

Nobody tell me that my hair is super messy LOL. But I wanted to say that this module was super hard to score? I aced all the other components, but class participation was worth 20% and I flunked that and ended up with a super bad grade T.T

(Pizza Party Part 2)

On the same day, during my night class, Professor Clarence from my COMM360 Investor Relations class, also decided to treat us to pizza, and it is from Pizzahut too. LOL omg, I had an overdose of pizza within a day luh T.T But no complains because free food hehe, and this time round I grabbed two slices of pizza instead. It tasted so delicious! Why SMU professors so nice!! I don't recall any of my NUS professors treating us to food, so I got culture shock once again hmmm....

(Moroccan groupmate, Zaineb)

My groupmate from Morocco! How cool is that hahaha, she is actually a Masters student and I found her a little initimidating initially. But nope, she doesn't bite and is quite friendly!

(Presenting in style with my Investor Relations groupmates)

Spot my professor in the photo! We are so cute! This is the first time that I was ever asked to theme for a presentation, and it feels superb because the dress code makes me feel a sense of identity to my group! (: Things we learn in psychology hehes. Our theme is black and white, but hahaha omg in the photo there seemed to be a visible line separating the white and black forces LOL.

Initially regretted this module 'Investor Relations' after the first lesson, but it ended up to be fine. LOL, I'm just thankful that I didn't fail anything because I went into the class with zero finance/investment knowledge, so I was legit just a blur sotong. Most of my classmates already have basics, so it really doubles my stress x.x

But I'm thankful to have these nice groupmates with me. Thanks for adopting me even though I'm a local exchange student, you guys are really the best! I miss all our late nights together sighs. Oh yeahs guys, in case you think 6-9pm classes at NUS are super late, try SMU's 7pm to 10pm classes. I was brain dead by the end of the lesson. LOL. But given the chance, I will retake this module again.

(This is how we roll)

(Before I burst out into laughter)

(And everyone was being stupidly funny and the photo was ruined)

Cheers to my Investor Relations teammates Max, Jaspreet, Jingwen, Adam and Zaineb for the wonferful times. Special mentions to the first three for tanking most of the project, and for talking nonsense with me everything during lessons so at least I would not fall asleep. (:

(Crisis Communications)

COMM246 Crisis communications is never a module I thought that I would enjoy. I actually wanted to take it because I think it will be useful, yet I want to avoid taking in NUS under a particular professor. As a last resort, I applied for the course in SMU and thankfully I got it! (:

(This is pretty candid)

And yes, we coordinated our clothes for the presentation as well! Why on Earth do we choose green? Hahaha that's the color of our client company. #dedicated LOL. I really, really enjoyed myself with this bunch of kids. We suffered so much together, but also grew so much together. Thanks for being my motivation to attend lessons even though I'm on exchange LOL. P. S. I didn't skip any lessons because my professor Augustine Pang, together with my groupmates, definitely made the lessons so much more interesting!! 

How I wish you were here.
We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl.
Year after year, running over the same ground.
What have we found? The same old fears.

Look forward with hope, not backwards with regret.

Take 3, Fight HPV Campaign

Really so much love for these babes! :D We have come so far together, having plenty of sleepless nights working our ass off for this 'Take 3, Fight HPV' campaign. Everything wouldn't be so successful without these dear ladies! :D

A few months back, I am still contemplating between writing a thesis and executing a campaign. I decided to go ahead with the campaign despite the various objections. Is it worth it? I would answer yes without hesitation or regret. I really feel a sense of pride and satisfaction seeing our campaign takes flight, especially so when people around me, be it friends, acquaintances or even strangers, walking up to us and telling us that it was a job well done. They really like our collaterals and campaign, and it was their words that kept us going.

(The Three Musketeers)

We initially started out as a team of five, which comprises Evelyn, Belle, Bernice, Cassandra and myself. We planned for a campaign under the the supervision of Prof Aaron for a module. Last December, we made the decision to also execute the campaign. Sadly, Evelyn and Belle were unable to join us for they had graduated, so we continued the implementation as a trio.

After we settled most of the administrative procedures with the school, we approached our partner organisation again for a discussion. Much to our surprise, they decided not to fund us. It came as a shock because we already planned the campaign using the budget they provided us. T.T This meant that we had to rework the campaign, this time with zero funding.

It was awesome that we managed to find our external source of funding eventually. We had to make a pitch and convince the organisers that our campaign is very meaningful such that they will be willing to fund us. It was a period of mental hell as we were stressing over the money matters. Thankfully everything went well in the end.

(Open Mic Session whereby we had to make a pitch)

Due to limited funds, we tried our best to get sponsorships as well. I was the person-in-charge for sponsorships, and to be honest, I felt quite lost when I didn't get any response from any company after the first round of sending sponsorship requests. I thought that I was so useless that no company bother replying me. However, this experience trained me to be tougher and also creatively search for different ways of approaching them to interest the different companies into funding my campaign.

(Off to collecting our sponsored goods)

Also because of the lack of funds, we did not want to hire any trucks to collect our sponsored products. We eventually decided to grab, and thankfully the grab driver was quite understanding and he even helped us with the moving of the goods! I am touched by the society's kindness really. Now that I think back, it was quite hilarious because we were so noob that we wanted to transport the goods down seven storeys ourselves (when we can actually ask for help - they have this crane-looking machinery that can help to transport LOL). I bet the entire company was laughing at our stupidity. LOLOL. You can read more of our story here.

(Bubbletea collateral)

We also launched our bubbletea collaterals in the midst of the campaign. We partnered with NUS Gongcha, as well as the various drink stall vendors across the campus. It was my favourite out of all the collaterals from our campaign. Hehes! :D I'm glad that it really reached out to so many students! Check out the above collage that I made - many of our friends posted on Instastory/sent the photos to us telling us that 'hey this is quite cool!' I sincerely hope that the campaign really achieved its objectives of raising awareness of what HPV is. :D

(Campaign)

We also did roadshows in NUS Utown and at various faculties. It was tiring having to stand there, distribute coffee/tea and talk to people for ~9 hours straight, but yet again it was rewarding to see many people being interested in our cause. Does this mean that our campaign is damn successful?? :D I also want to once again thank Amanda and Christel especially for helping out, even though it does not benefit y'all. LOL. 谢谢你们够朋友! ♥

(Random Blends Exhibition)

As part of our assignment, we had an exhibition as well to further showcase our campaign efforts and reach out to even more people. To entice people to come to our exhibition space, we decided to distribute free coffee and tea as well.

(Bernice interacting with some NUS students)

It was quite exhausting yet rewarding because we managed to attract huge crowds. We gave the remaining beverages to the cleaning uncles and aunties, and they kept thanking us profusely. It really touched our hearts.

(Filling the coffee in a recyclable mug)

After the campaign, we managed to get some collaboration requests. Unfortunately, Bernice and Cassandra will be graduating soon, so we were unable to accede to some of the opportunities (I don't think I can handle it myself LOL). I am very sorry. However, I still want to give thanks to all of them because the recognition that they had given us showed that our campaign was really quite successful. It was really an achievement unlocked. I walked out of my comfort zone, and even tried my hands at being an event organiser. It felt rewarding.

I am grateful to be given such an opportunity, and would like to thank everyone for being a part of this - my family and friends, my supervisor and the school staff, the sponsorship companies and the participants. :D I want to especially thank my campaign team mates, Bernice and Cassandra, for travelling down this path with me. We took the road less traveled by (there were not many people who organized such big-scale campaigns in school), but that has made all the difference.

When your heart stays out all night

but rises early in the morning.

Laughing, crying and good stories to

tell about how love tastes at

different hours.

The most powerful thing is realizing you've healed. The most beautiful thing is realizing you've grown.

(Open Mic Session)

Picture taken after our open mic session :D We went for a pitching session in order to get some funds for our campaign (because we were poor as hell, and we needed to get funding somewhere). LOL, but good news, we managed to get some funding!! I am really grateful for everything.

The open mic session also allowed us to interact with the other participants, and to my dismay, I realized that majority of them were from secondary school! :O These kids were so young yet they were also planning to execute campaigns. To be honest, some of their projects were nationwide scale and mine was only at the university-level). T.T

What was I doing during those days? I guess just playing and fooling around, T.T I'm really super impressed by them. They were mature, and truly possess the young change maker mindset. :D Keep up the good work! I'm really looking forward to see their work take flight!

(Kimchi Fried Rice)

Throwback to dinner at Masizzim Restaurant with Vivian Ng two weeks ago. It was a Korean restaurant, and I'm so excited to relieve those memories from my Korea exchange! :D

Their fried rice taste different from the normal fried rice, but it is really delicious! Besides, they offer free flow of side dishes and they taste great as well! We kept asking for refills x.x Such greedy pigs, tsktsk.

(Bibim naengmyeon)

Give this dish a pass. It was super not worth it. The only good thing about it is that it was not super spicy, so I could still take it. LOL! But next time, I think I might give their pancakes a try! The table next to mine ordered it, and it looks legit hehes!

(Egg roll)

Egg roll recommended by Vivian was indeed tasty! (: There was cheese inside the egg roll, and coupled with honey mustard sauce, the dish was really to die-for. But it gets jelat after a while, so best is to share it!

Some days, I can conquer
the world; other days,
it takes me three hours to
convince myself to bathe.

In a world that is open to you, you need not always keep the content of your heart.

Article from our Take 3 Fight HPV campaign site

The following article was written by my groupmate, and it is too memorable not to share. (: It really documents our noob experience working on campaigns; but I guess they serve as memories in the future.

Behind-The-Scenes: An Unwitting Trip to the Warehouse.

March 1, 2018

Running a campaign is not the easiest thing to do, especially if it involves only 3 people working in the team. Being first-time executors of our campaign, it also gave us some new experiences to enjoy, and one of those was a rather interesting trip to DKSH warehouse, situated in a rather unknown part of West Singapore. Our order was due for collection, and since they were unable to provide delivery to school, we decided to make a trip firsthand to collect the packages ourselves!

Not knowing what to expect, we decided to head there with no plans, other than the fact that we had the transaction number of our order. With little insight as to what to do or prepare, we went ahead blind.

Navigation

The 3 of us decided to navigate there on public transport, and we saw rather unfamiliar sights, as the scenes changed, where the bus drove into an industrial area. Basically, it felt like we were in the middle of nowhere. “This is so ulu,” we had declared, as we disembarked from the bus stop, and walked under the heavy afternoon sun, trying to find the warehouse that stored some of our goodies. There was nothing but vans and large trucks weaving in and out of the vicinity, and Pandan reservoir situated opposite us. We passed by a building that looked like a carpark, and to our surprise, it was the address that we were supposed to head towards.

After checking in on the 1st floor, the security guards ushered us up to the 7th floor, whereby we saw nothing but open space, tons of boxes, and men sitting upon forklifts, driving and weaving their way around immensely large, spacious roads. We felt incredibly small standing in the midst of the wide roads, and the high ceilings.

There was a guardhouse situated on the 7th floor as well, and there we had to surrender our ICs, and don a rather strange looking vest, that looked almost like a climbing harness. It was a mandatory procedure for anyone who was to walk in further into the storehouse area, as the place was chock full of vans, forklifts and trucks.

“Yes girls, put this on! It’s for your safety,” laughed the old security guard at the entrance. After that, we were directed to walk onward to the middle of the floor, where the main administrative office was situated. It was a rather strange sight, to be just about the only women that we had seen so far on the floor, and we were probably the youngest as well. While the other staff were don in helmets and full gear, we were clad in t-shirts, ripped jeans and shorts, which fit much better at the university campus, as opposed to an industrial storehouse.

All set and ready with our safety harness.

Confusion

Being slightly lost at what to do, we waited for a long while (maybe a good 20 minutes) for the administrative office to tend to us. The person at the counter, an elderly man of few words, had took our student pass, and did the paperwork on our behalf, before ushering us into the storeroom area. It was like a scene from the movies, and I have not seen a place quite like it is.

If I had to give you an analogy, it would remind you of the Department of Mysteries, in Harry Potter, or the Storage Facility in the scene of Monsters Inc. There were tons of boxes stacked up upon these shelves, and the only way to retrieve them were the forklifts.

Taken from: https://artofspying.net/2014/10/14/answers-the-department-of-mysteries/

It was a rather systematic process. Upon passing our receipt to the man-in-charge, another was sent on a forklift to retrieve our package. There were forklifts of many sizes, which looked rather fun to drive and manoeuvre around. Eventually, we witnessed one of them driving in our cargo (25 boxes to be exact), and were instantly relieved that the package wasn’t too big for us to manage. Upon signing off our package, they instructed us to arrange transport to drive up to the 7th floor, which we were rather worried about, considering it would be hard to get a Grab or an Uber, to come all the way to an industrial estate and to drive up 7 floors to pick us up with heavy cargo.

We requested for a trolley to transport the cargo downstairs, but due to security concerns, we could not borrow any trolley from them. They placed our cargo at the side of the road, telling us to call for a vehicle to drive up, in which the staff would help us unload the boxes into the vehicle. The elderly man at the admin office said, “I thought you students would have come prepared with a vehicle!”, to which we laughed and said that it was only 3 of us who were doing this project.

Since none of us had a car for the day, we had to call in for a Grab. Amazingly, within 2-3 minutes of keying in our request on Grab, someone had responded and was actually willing to pick up the offer, despite our clear indication of “7th floor of warehouse. Pickup with cargo”. Amused and yet happy, we decided to try and move our boxes to the guard house, such that it was easier for our Grab driver to find us.

Transporting Cargo

The forklift drivers – all rather old, seasoned uncles, watched us with bewilderment as we tried to singlehandedly carry the boxes over with our bare hands. We carried the first batch of boxes to the guard house without anyone’s aid, yet, as we returned for the second round, we saw a forklift driver whisk by with all our cargo, dropping the rest of the boxes at the guardhouse like we had intended. We witnessed the security guards and the cargo men smiling, somewhat amused at our attempts to move our cargo and arrange for transport, and we realised that we must have looked really inexperienced, which could have caused them to garner so much assistance to help us. It was a slightly embarrassing, but also funny sight.

Eventually, the Grab driver appeared, and he was nice enough to reverse his car into a more suitable position for us to place most of the boxes into the boot. We travelled back to school, hot and sweaty from our efforts to carry the cargo, but also relief, that we managed to find transport at all.

Yan Qi and Cassandra at the backseat with the remaining cargo. Look at how relieved we were!

Upon reaching the school, the next menial task was to transport all the unloaded cargo up to the Communications and New Media office, in which it involved us borrowing a trolley, and finding a suitable place for drop off. It took additional minutes of getting the appropriate access to the room and the trolley, before we could continue with this feat. Thankfully, there was a lift available that brought us to the correct floor, which made the transporting a lot easier. After 2 rounds of going up and down via the lift, we managed to move everything into the storage room that was intended.

To end it off, we all drank cups of cold milo in a celebration of successfully moving everything over, till we all laughed and realised we did not even open the boxes to figure out how big the individual cookie packs were. Well, another problem for another day. That’s how campaign events are I suppose.

The remaining half of the cargo.

It was a tiring, but rather interesting day, taken up by a lot of cluelessness, waiting and spontaneous reaction. While it was not the first time any of us had been to a warehouse, it was definitely the first time we tried to single-handedly transport everything by ourselves.

This is one of the many incidents that go on behind-the scenes as we lead up to our instalments in March. Planning a campaign definitely takes time and effort, and this is one of the many learning opportunities in the journey. It has been rewarding in more ways than one, and it has strengthened team solidarity, as well as injected fun and spontaneity into our event planning.

We are thankful for the helpful staff at DKSH, our faithful Grab driver, as well as the help of the CNM office in the process. Ah well, to more adventures with this team!

What’s Next?

Look out for our next event from 15-16 March (11am-6pm) at U-Town. Till next time folks! Looking forward to having you there.

A lot of people are afraid
to say what they want.
That's why they don't get
what they want.

Patience is key. Beautiful flowers take time to bloom.

Thoughts on Y3S1

Time flies, and in a blink of an eye, my fifth semester in school has ended. It has been the hell of a roller coaster ride this semester, and I have never felt so tired in my life before. I guess I am losing steam and all my fighting spirit. T.T

(Ripped from favim.com)

Started the semester on a bad note because I was forced to drop NM3230 after two weeks of lessons because there were insufficient tutorial slots for me to bid for. I had to go through so much trouble to drop the module and take up a replacement module. I 'reported' to the NM office every single day to request them to process the system quickly but they were still taking their own sweet time until I emailed my professor and tutor for help. The problem here was not because I kanchiong/kiasu, but the fact that I already missed two weeks of lessons for my replacement module (NM2201) and that there was no webcast available. I have to catch up rights? If not everything will just snowball.

From individual assignments to projects and exams, I screwed up every single component of assessment for the replacement module T.T The content for NM2201 is so heavy that I thought that it is a level 4000 module in disguise. I felt much regrets for not heeding Amanda's advice to drop this module, but then again, I also blame it on the NM office for forcing me to drop NM3230. Perhaps if I continued on with NM3230, I would have done better.

I guess I have a love-hate relationship with my professors.

I think I have generally nice professors and tutors. I purposely chose to take modules under Aaron because I really like him as my lecturer. He is so naggy, but he really helped us a lot for our project. I am really grateful to him.  Thank you. It's so annoying because he wouldn't be teaching next semester - he converted to full-time PhD student. :(

Secondly, I would like to thank Nick for being so nice and helping us so much with our videos and films. However, I just hope that he can give us honest feedback so that we can improve rather than just paying us compliments all the time then 'stabbing us in the back' (I had a shock after checking my gradebook).

Lastly, my psychology professor Nicholas is really a good lecturer. He really is. His explanations are very clear and well-explained. I think I learnt the most from this module out of all the other psychology modules that I have ever taken. But he scarred me for life because he always call me during tutorial LOL.

I'm proud of myself for surviving PL3233 with me, myself and I alone. I really hated the tutorials because my lecturer-cum-tutor will always pick on people to answer questions and his questions are all so chim that my bird brain is unable to provide me with answers (and he calls on me every week).

But then, I am glad to have two 'friends' whom I always sit with during tutorials. At least there are familiar faces that give me security whenever I go to tutorials to fight battles. I call them 'friends' because as I was typing this blogpost, I realized I didn't even ask them for their names LOL. Wth. My bird brain is at it again. But I guess we won't ever see each other again, because this is the very last psychology module that I will be taking. LOL. What a bittersweet feeling.

Sighs. No idea why everything seemed so much more difficult this semester. All my modules seemed to be much more taxing, much more difficult, and much more demanding. x.x

That sudden realization that my newly-made friends will soon revert back to being acquaintances. 

The biggest (and only) takeaway from NM2201 is Edmund. He is my project groupmate for NM2201, who also happens to be in the same tutorial class as me for NM2209. I'm grateful that we took two modules together - at least I have a friend to go to lessons with. However, just as we were starting to get closer, I feel bittersweet because we wouldn't take any modules together ever again. So I guess we are back to being acquaintances?

Jeanette as well. I attended NM2209 tutorial alone yet I'm thankful to have met a nice groupmate. Jeanette is so on-task and we quickly finished preparing our presentation slides in like three days? LOL. After five semesters in school, I really learnt to appreciate efficient groupmates much more. But again, I guess next semester is her graduating semester, so we probably wouldn't take the same modules ever again. Why are university friendships all so fleeting?

I also met new people whom I grow much much closer to, although I'm not sure how long this friendship will last.

I am super glad that Regine is in this shit with me together. I am suddenly more grateful than ever to have embarked on the Korea Summer School programme. If I didn't agree to staying with strangers (LOL, I ended up sharing an accomodation with Vivian, her friend Jiashu, and Jiashu's friend Regine), I wouldn't have known Regine. And then I will be suffering alone for the rest of the semester, taking modules alone.

It was pure coincidence that Regine and I took three modules together, and we were even groupmates for one of the modules. I practically lunched with her everyday because I see her around four days a week? Thanks Regine for putting up with me and for being my friend. This was the first semester that I didn't feel so alone in school. LOL. We should meet up often with Jiashu and Vivian as well!!

And also, Belle. Fortunately, I had the opportunity to work with her for two projects. She is more than a project groupmate, I'm really appreciative because she often advises me on many things, be it school, work or life in general. She makes me see things from new perspectives, and I often get a lot of insights from her. She is ever so selfless, so willing to share her experiences. Simply talking to her often give me the impression that my thinking has matured. LOL!

I'm grateful to have met Lianjie on my Korea summer school exchange as well. He's an idiot, and I like annoying him, so he became my self-proclaimed best friend during the trip. LOL! On a side note, I was editing my Korea trip vlogs but the software kept crashing on me halp. T.T

Old is gold. I love the fact that I can be myself whenever I'm with my old friends who have known me for a few years. They keep me sane.

This semester, I dragged Yanlin and her friend, Koey, to attend CP2201 with me. It was an easy module, but the only thing that I found annoying is that lessons end at 9.30pm. It was really tiring, especially when I have a long day. But it helps that CP2201 lectures got more interesting towards the end. (: I'm grateful to have them with me because I was struggling to understand all those chim chim financial terms LOL. I suck.

For the first half of the semester, I was happy to have Vivian Phang as my lunch buddy in school. I'm sorry for pangseh-ing her for the rest of the semester because I forever am using whatever breaks I have to work on my video projects. But I'm glad that she is still there for me. She's one of the few secondary school friends whom I still stay in contact with actively. LOL. Feeling really blessed.

The friends who stood by me as always, thank you Amanda, HuiQi, Vivian Ng, JJ, Longyuan and Clement. Thanks for being the constants in my life, for encouraging me, for entertaining me, for making me feel that I'm not friendless after all. (:

Also a huge thank you to my NM friends, Dewei, Chermin, Jamie and Licheng, I'm sure that I had drifted away from y'all because we didn't take modules together. But thanks for thinking of me at times, remembering me and asking me out for badminton, for meals and trips. I might not be able to join y'all often, but I really appreciate y'all for asking :D

Life is never smooth-sailing. There are bound to be up-and-downs. 

Indeed, I too have my fair share of ups-and-downs. Sighs. I hope that things will get better in the next semester.

In a world filled with possibilities

From labels to judgements

From love to hate

Who will you choose to be

Or will you let society choose your me.

If you're a storm, let me be struck by lightning.

Face of the Day Campaign

Initiated by Mr Yang Derong, a well-known fashion and costume designer, this campaign hopes to raise awareness of the various issues in Singapore, be it social, political or historical issues. He will upload pictures of him dressed up as different characters on social media (Instagram), with links to further readings embedded in his captions. Do check it out, I think it's quite meaningful and inspiring!

And catch my proudest production so far! I'm quite happy with the audio and the footages (we did minimal color correcting). Hehehes, :D Last video project under NM4883D and I'm so happy that it ended on a high note! :D

We went back to school during the reading week for the final presentation and screening of our films. My professor took screening literally, so he got us popcorn and drinks LOLOL! And the best part is, he invited his wife and daughter to the showcase. The daughter is so intelligent and cute, she went around networking with people like some social butterfly LOLOL.

And at the end of the showcase, she even sang a song at the stage with the mic. HAHAHAHA. I cannot, damn cutesy luh?!? She's so confident lehs - when I was a kid, I just want to get away from the stage. LOL. (Even up till now, I still have stage fright).

I'm really grateful to Mr Yang for being so patient with us rookies. :D And thanks my groupmates for being so supportive, they are one of the best groups that I have ever gotten in my whole NUS life. (:

Let the rain wash away your tears,

for all your doings over the years.

Blood can be cleansed from your skin,

but your sins cannot be cleansed from your soul.

So many broken children living in grown bodies mimicking adult lives.

My first baby is up! 😊

Professional Gaming: A Viable Career Option?

In a pragmatic society like Singapore, gamers are often being stigmatized. However, the eSports industry in Singapore is slowing gaining recognition with the increasing support from the Government and various organizations, so we thought that it would be an interesting topic to cover.

Hahaha, we finally submitted this News Featurette last week after grueling hours in the editing room. This is only worth 15%, say what?!? Please watch it guys, we really spent a lot of effort on this. Our blood, sweat and tears. Hahaha!

Thanks for the wonderful group mates for being so proactive, hehehes :D Anyways, while editing this video, I am suddenly reminded of my half-edited summer school vlog. LOL, gosh. I should really stop procrastinating. How many months have it been already since I come back from summer school?!

I am insecure, raw, imperfect, yet strong.

I am all of these things thanks to the things

that broke me and the things that put me together.

It's all about taking a deep breath and telling yourself it'll be okay, because eventually, it will.

Thoughts on Y2S2

Gone in a blink of an eye. Things began to take flight, and it was my best semester thus far. I hope my lucky stars will continue to shine for me. I am really grateful for everything.

(Ripped from Tumblr)

Thank you for being my constants in life.

To Amanda, Huiqi, Vivian and JJ. Even though we do not take any/many modules together / different schools totally, thank you all for staying by and giving me moral and emotional support. Throughout the entire semester, I was bombarded with overwhelming workload, annoying projects and inefficient groupmates. On top of that, chasing after deadlines and dealing with high expectations of myself. I was constantly worrying about anything and everything. Thanks for lending me a listening ear and having to put up with my rants.

To Dewei, Chermin, Jamie and Licheng. The only thing that I do not regret taking NM2212 is meeting you guys. Thanks for making the unbearable module bearable. I guess ranting about McGee together brings everyone close. :D But nahs, I'm never taking his module again. Once bitten, twice shy. LOL! Thanks for treating me like the little sister you never had, for pampering me and giving me life advice. Even though you guys always bully me, but thanks for giving me the opportunity to learn to be strong. HAHAHAHA.

To my NM3215 project mates - Sarah, Elodie, Jakob and Chiuyi. I guess we all had a rough start (and rough end) LOL. But I guess despite all the mishaps faced, everything turned out to be fine in the end. I had heard a lot of horror stories about exchange students, but thankfully my groupmates were not like that. Thanks for being enthusiastic for our project work!

To myself. Congratulations on surviving this horrible semester. A terrible decision to overload again, but I guess I find joy in torturing myself. LOL. Glad to find back my inner extroverted self bit by bit - I guess I have been too suppressed over the past semesters because I have no friends to go crazy with. Hahaha! But yeahs, I believe my future will be even brighter than before!

It was a journey of self-discovery as well.

I decided to take a leap of faith and take a design module this semester and found the other side of me: I actually love designing! Maybe not design-design, but more of creating collaterals and coding for webpages. Hehes, it was tedious because I'm a beginner (noob), but it was fun so I enjoyed the process very much! Wouldn't mind doing all over again so long I get my hands on the softwares. Hahaha! (:

Grades weren't everything, but I'm glad that my hard work paid off.

I did better for this semester than expected, so I guess that was something for me to be proud of. But then again, it is not an excuse for me to slack. I need to continue working hard to even out the bad grades that I have gotten over the past few semesters. Hmm... Lesson learnt after four semesters in school: take modules that you enjoy rather than taking them because your friends are taking them or because you think that the modules are very beneficial! Oh and another thing, I am so glad that I finally broke the curse of getting super ridiculous grades for Psychology. LOL! Just as I was playing with the thought of giving up my minor, I guess I should continue to trust myself.

But of course, your teachers/professors play an important role as well.

For this semester, I am super glad to meet nice teachers along the way. Special thanks to Mr Aaron Ng, he is very detailed in his teaching and ever so willing to help. There was once I screwed up my coding for my website assignment, and he sat with me to go through it during the entire tutorial session. Thanks for fuelling my passion and interest in designing. (:

I'm grateful to Mr Kelvin Yeo as well. He really went out to the extra mile to help us in our project. With a vast experience working in the different fields, he is really knowledgeable. He gives us many tips and draws a lot on his personal experiences when he lectures, so I really gained and learnt a lot from taking his module. He is easy to talk to as well, which is no wonder why we don't feel ashamed for annoying him with many queries regarding our project. Thanks for being such a gem!

With vision, stardust and heartstrings,

bridge the gap between

dreams and reality.

We both know how this ends but sometimes madness is common sense.

Curent status: 7/18 chapters down for tomorrow's exam.

Geeez. T.T How in the world can I finish revision before tomorrow?! It took me three days to finish 7 chapters and I already gave up reading the textbook. Sighs. I'm so sick of studying. T.T But I guess I should still appreciate time spent with books LOL, because working life is never fun. Sighs.

Reasons why I prefer taking modules with tons of assignments... I just can't bring myself to study. Short attention span and lack of motivation. I wondered how I survived my Secondary and JC. LOL. T.T Life's tough.

(Sharing the good times with y'all)

I got a Pizza from Pizzahut Express @ IMM at a promotional price. The entire pizza for just $20. Good for dinner. Hehehehes. (:

(Just look at that size)

(And it tastes very yummy)

Got the barbequed chicken flavor which I didn't know is spicy, but it still tastes delicious so I just gobbled down a slice, accompanied by a few cups of water after that. LOLOL. I suck ah. I forgot the other flavor that I got, oops. Is it pepperoni? Heh.

Continue to fight through
those draining moments and
do not allow them to persist
any longer than they should.
You are in control. You got this.

Scars have the strange power to remind us that our past is real.

That moment when you are an Arts student but you suck at writing essays/reflections.

It has been such a long time since I felt so dejected over my studies. T.T For the past few months, I learnt to keep an open mind and I constantly reminded myself that results isn't everything. And my results weren't that bad luh; they were relatively so-so.

Until this semester...

Why did I take a writing module. T.T And it's history somemore. Geeez, and the assessment breakdown for the module is all just essay/reflections. Wtf. It seemed like I'm just suiciding.

And everytime I submitted an assignment for the module, I felt very positive, but everytime I got back the results, my hopes just plunged all the way down. How do I even get lower and lower with every assignment. Fml.

I just want to eat and sleep. T.T Throwback to last weekend's lunch at NTU with the family. The stupid Western stall auntie just kept giving me attitude. Sighs. 

(Beef Steak)

(Chargilled Chicken Chop)

And the food isn't even that nice. I should have just sticked back to my Mala Pot or Ayam Penyet. Sighs. Old is gold.

(Cheap version of Red Bean Pancakes)

I have always love red bean pancakes. This cost $3.80, and the Paradise Dynasty's $6.80. LOLOL and the portion for the former is way more than the latter. Sighs.

Is it if you cannot reach the top you have to settle for the bottom? Just like my results. T.T

Perhaps you told me

what you didn't mean.

And perhaps I just loved you

a love that was as deep as

your words. 

Kill me with a truth, but don't make me happy with a lie.

I am excited to say that week 12 the hell week is finally over! I can finally take a breather before chionging again for the rest of the submissions due in two weeks’ time. Sighs. Life of an undergraduate. But it is okay, because everyone is as busy as me. Suck it up. Hahaha, :D

Summary of the week:

(Ripped from pinterest)

Monday - submission of NM3215 Project

It was plain horrible. The group (3/5 attendance) met up in the morning to do last minute edits to the group report, and we managed to finish just one hour before the deadline. However, my professor required us to submit hardcopies, so everything was a mad rush for us. It was hilarious to see the rest of the groups rushing in and out of the library/bookshop to grab/buy the stationery required for submission. Hey, I didn't know NUS students were all so last minute. LOL!

We often have communication breakdowns among the team. It was not an easy process (could have been made easier if people can just give and take *hint hint*), but I was glad that we managed to pull it off. P.S. I have close to ten group meetings with this team, it was plain horrible because the meetings were so unproductive?! It was over, so yay finally!

Special thanks to Manda for staying back in school with me to do SPSS even though it was not her project, and her tutorial was cancelled so actually she could went home much earlier... Hehehes, larva you so much! ♥ You are so much more efficient than my groupmates T.T Sorry to say. Thanks for the llao llao date, it has been too long since we last had this. :D

(Ripped from Kraft)

Tuesday - NM2212 forum challenge, NM2212 discussion forum

Thankfully my professor decided to cancel lecture for today so I could stay home to rush out all my assignments and everything. I have so many things going on, that I actually didn't attend the NM2103 group meeting. But I trust that they could analyze the results themselves using the SPSS data I generated for them on Monday? Hehes. I'm just very happy that they do not have much of a problem with the analysis when I checked them later in the night. :D

(The Urban List)

Wednesday - NM2103 Presentation, NM3215 Presentation, NM3217 folder justification, GES1012 Term Paper

Back-to-back presentations and deadlines which was plain tiring. I'm glad that personally I didn't screw up for my own presentation part, however I'm quite pissed with some particular groupmate who exceeded the time presenting his part that he cut into my another groupmate's presentation time and she was cut by the professor T.T Sighs. I should have insisted on a rehearsal.

It was a long day and so, Amanda and I got ourselves Starbucks because there was the 1-for-1 promotions. I had the green tea frap whilst she got the chocolate chip frap. Hehes, I really love mine a lot! :D Camped in school to finish up my website and I finally submitted it. Omg, it was a nightmare. I enjoy doing the HTML and everything, because you really get the sense of achievement when you are done with it. However, perhaps it would be better if I am not so much in a rush. T.T For now, I just want to faster get it over and done with T.T

(Ripped from truelocal)

Thursday - NM2212 MCQ Quiz, NM2212 SAQ Quiz, NM2212 discussion forum

Stay-home Thursdays. Headed for tuition and ended up getting even more stressed because my tutee just cannot understand his things and exams were just round the corner. Nooooo.... Ms Angie will get you something nice if you pass your exam. Hahahaha! Bribery at its finest.

(Ripped from entitymag.com)

Friday - NM3217 Finals, NM3217 website, NM2212 Lecture Quiz, GES1012 forum

Screwed up the finals because I didn't exactly read my notes in depth due to lack of time. I was quite unsure most of the time and it was so nerve-wrecking because I wanted to score well for this module. Sighs. T.T When life gives you lemons, make lemonades. Decided to 'TGIF' by grabbing another cup of Starbucks again with the McGee mates, and I'm dying from all the calories inside. Zzz. Nonetheless, Starbucks is still nice. :D And yours truly here totally forgot about the existence of the forum until Amanda reminded me at 11pm plus. Geeez. I really suck. 

It was a super mundane week with me rushing all the deadlines and looking as shag as hell. At least the difficult times are over (for now). Went home with J on Friday, and we talked about a lot of things that made me realised how fortunate I am to have a family that I can count on anytime. Thank you.

There's a fire burning in your heart
and I would throw my bones in it to
keep it burning because my soul
is cold without it.