Hi...I'm writing again. Basically I've had a long, arduous day so I’ll keep this post short and sweet for the sake of my sanity.

The first period of the day was PE. The first 10 people were called up to do the high jump. The rest of us played floorball and hockey while waiting. I played floorball and at first, my team fared well as we beat two other teams, but, from that point, everything went downhill. Our performance became worse and we were comprehensively defeated (a nicer way of saying we got owned) time and time again. But I don’t think it was my fault. I nearly scored a magnificent goal but the ball got deflected. What a pity. Anyway towards the end of the period we were called up for the high jump. By then I felt like vomiting, but I had no choice but to grit my teeth and attempt to jump. The passing mark was 1 metre. Each of us had three tries. I nearly passed on my first try, but my hand knocked down the pole. My second try was no better. This time my leg hit the blasted pole. I was feeling pretty frustrated and down. I felt somewhat resigned to the fact that I could not and would not pass, but I decided to give it my best shot. On my last try, I sprinted towards the pole and jumped as high as I could. Somehow, I managed to clear the mark! I was ecstatic and overjoyed. I grinned from ear to ear, pleased by what I had achieved. However, my joy was short-lived. Next up was the second test, in which I failed miserably. However, some of my classmates fared worse than I did-some crashed into the poles or fell onto the poles. One even head-butted the pole!

We had Chinese class after PE (nothing interesting, but we got a lot of homework) Mr. Chia, the discipline master, loitered outside our class % minutes before recess. I felt a bit unsettled. Upon greeting our teacher at the end of the class, Mr. Chia poked his head into the classroom and hollered

“Eh boys! Everyone out in 10 seconds! Hurry up!” There was a flurry of frantic activity as we rushed out of the classroom. He chased us down (not literally) and when we started talking, he yelled at us to stop talking. Some of us felt that this was a bit too much and started grumbling. I felt that while Mr. Chia was just doing his job, he could have been less harsh and brusque with us.

Well That’s all. Thank you and Nil Sine Labore

Yours truly,
Joel

What a day!

Today was a very eventful day. The day started off as usual with assembly and English period. Nothing unusual happened, so I won’t go into details. During science we had to go to the lab to do some experiment, and we had to bring our practical books along with us. I assumed that my book was in the locker and ran to get it. Meanwhile the monitor, Caleb, locked up the class. Upon reaching the locker I realized that I had left my book in my bag as it was not in the locker. I had no choice but to climb up to the sixth floor (where the science lab is), collect the key, run down again, unlock the class, take out my book and run up again. I tried to do this as quickly as possible to avoid missing the lesson and as a result felt quite tired and irritated with myself. What’s more, I managed to miss about 5 minutes of the lesson and ended up getting paired up with another guy (normally I pair up with my science lab partner Kavin) who I didn’t know well. Also, as a result, I missed the experiment briefing and could not fully grasp the lesson what I was supposed to do. Oh well. It served me right for being so careless. The morals of this story are: Don’t assume and don’t be careless. Oh, by the way, we did an experiment on osmosis using potato strips. I think one person actually ate a bit of raw potato.

Anyway, we had recess after science, followed by Chinese. Our Chinese teacher set up this group system in which the group with the least points has to write THREE essays during the holidays and the second last group has to write one essay (with the exception of the group leaders) I think that my group might be the second last. We might be able to catch up with the third last group though. However the last group is lagging and they have about negative 5 points, so I think the chances of us becoming last are quite slim. Anyway even if my group does have to write essays, I will be exempted as I am the group leader.

After Chinese class we had history. Our history teacher is Mr. Thiru. He’s quite funny and usually shows us some videos and other stuff after his lessons, but today he briefed us on our history project and showed us a video on the battle of Somme (FYI it was a major battle in the first world war between the French and the British. The latter suffered heavy losses due to the incompetence of the commanding officers. ) (FYI means for your information) By the way, did you notice that I have added a youtube viewer at the bottom of my blog? I suggest you search this: the man with no arms and no legs. It is extremely touching and inspiring.

After lunch, we had RSP (regional studies program) today was the secondary one orientation, and we were supposed to plan the whole thing. There were supposed to be a group of leaders, but due to communication error, lack of proper planning and teamwork, the whole thing nearly fell apart and was disorganized (or, as we as students like to call it, ‘screwed up’) I bear no ill intent nor harbour grudges against them, nor am I criticising them. I was not told what to do and ended up helping Wayne in the traditional music station.

On a whole the secondary ones were well-behaved but there were a few black sheep. One student, when given an instrument to try, refused to play it (he stated this in a more colourful way than which I have just described) but according to the teacher he had some problems (for want of a better word-I cannot think of any nicer way to put this in) so I guess I’m okay with that. Another guy walked up to me and told me in an irritated voice that the whole thing was a screw-up. He said this in an impatient, irritated tone and glared at me, as though I was responsible for the whole thing. I was quite irritated with him and ignored him. While I agreed with him, I feel that he should not have been so direct and blunt. I wouldn’t mind listening to him if he had said it in a more respectful and less arrogant tone. Anyway, I was busy and he was not helping matters, so I ignored him. Some other secondary one students were quite obnoxious and arrogant (in my opinion) I wonder if my classmates and I were anything like these guys when we were in secondary one.

After the whole thing we were called together and told-off (nicely) by our RSP teachers. I think that we could have done this better had we bothered to invest more time and effort. I was sort of disappointed that we had left our juniors with a negative impression. Hopefully we will be able to make it up to them.

Anyway I’ve got to sign off now. I still haven’t studied for Chinese spelling tomorrow and it’s very late. I don’t know if I should still study or not. Sigh, what a day…..

Yours truly,
Joel.

Hi, I’m writing again. This is my third blog post and I want to talk about my day. Today was a Monday (in case you hadn’t noticed) and I woke up late in the morning. I had to rush to school (by the way I abhor and detest Mondays. Most people dislike Mondays too.) And I was feeling quite listless and lethargic by the time I got to school, probably because I did not get enough sleep. I did not have time to put my bag in class and as a result had to sit through assembly with it. We had to wear ties today and the hall was quite stuffy. Furthermore, the top button of my shirt, when buttoned, made me feel uncomfortable and half strangled most of the time. These only served to worsen my mood.

Anyway, after the assembly, we went back to class for a PSL lesson (peer student leaders) Our PSLs were secondary 4 students but seemed to be having a hard time keeping the class quiet and in their seats (Our class can be very noisy at times…well actually most of the time) Anyway we were so noisy that the DM (discipline master) Mr. Chia came into our class. Our class immediately fell silent. He strode into the room and glared at us. He put his hands on his hips and started to berate us. It went something like this:

“Eh boys, why are you guys so noisy? I could hear you from downstairs, you know.” Mr. Chia questioned in a stern voice. Nobody spoke.

“Who are the PSLs, monitors and prefects?” Mr. Chia asked loudly. The aforementioned people raised their hands meekly.

“Now, you boys better listen to these people and your seniors. Respect them and keep your noise level down. Understand?” everyone nodded. With one final, stern look at the class, he pivoted on his heels and strode out of the room. He had not been gone for more than 30 seconds before my classmates resumed their conversations, albeit their voices were slightly lower than before. That’s just typical of my class. My classmates are a nice bunch of people, but they have one vice-an obsessive compulsion to talk. But then again I too have this flaw.

We did some brainstorming for the president’s challenge project and my group came up with a bunch of ridiculous and unfeasible ideas (most of which were contributed by yours truly), like holding a mass night-time bicycle ride around Singapore. When I pointed out our lack of sponsors, manpower and the sheer scale of such a project, they advised me not to worry so much. Anyway, we submitted that proposal. I wonder what the teacher in charge will think of that proposal.

Next we had English lesson. Mr. Li got us to write down what each of us thought about when the word ‘marriage’ was mentioned. We had many weird answers. I refuse to elaborate any further.

Then, we had recess. Wayne brought a piece of cake and I ate some of the cream. As a form of payback he ate quite a bit of my hot-dog roll. (You could say that he had his cake and ate my food too. I hope you get it, because it’s quite lame. ) Oh well. You win some, you lose some.

Next up was science. Apart from somebody falling asleep in class and some of us endeavoring to rouse him from his slumber, nothing of interest happened. Nothing happened during literature either.

After our lunch we had our BI (Bahasa Indonesia) class. I’m learning to speak Indonesian. It’s very similar to Malay. Hopefully I will be able to speak Indonesian fluently and, in the case of Indonesia becoming a major Asian country with a large demand for foreign talent, I will be able to put these skills into good use. We have four periods of BI every week, and our teacher calculated that we had only 87 hours of BI class for the whole year. What’s more, the MOE (ministry of education) expects us to be as proficient in our third language as we are in our mother tongue. That is a rather high standard, given that we only have about 174 hours (counting last year) to accomplish this.

Anyway, I have had a rather eventful day and I’m feeling quite tired now. I’m quite sure I will have many things to blog about, but this is it for tonight.

RSP trip 2009

Our class went for the RSP trip to selangor last year during the June holidays. It took an 8 hour bus ride to get there. It was a good thing I had brought my nintendo DS, or I would have been bored to death. The bus driver thought we were bored and screened a Thai horror movie. I have no idea why he screened such a movie. I refused to watch. Caleb(my classmate and friend) hid under his seat. However some of the more daring people watched and I heard many of them, for some reason, could not sleep that night.

Upon arrival at the village, we were served lunch. We were introduced to the local custom of eating with our right hand. We found it unusual at first, but soon got use to it. It was very hard to eat rice that way.

After lunch we were introduced to our foster families. . Gabriel and Marcus shared the same foster family as I did. Our foster father did not have a car. But he had a couple of motorcycles. Riding on one past an endless ‘sea’ of rice plants, with the wind blowing against my face, was an exhilarating and memorable experience.

We had some difficulty communicating with them due to our weak grasp of the language, we endeavored to communicate with them using our limited vocabulary and at times when our words did not suffice we made do with sign language. Initially communicating with them felt awkward but after some time we felt much more comfortable in their presence. We managed to take some photos with them as well.(sadly I have no pictures with me now)

The next few days were a flurry of activities such as fishing, kite making, firefly-watching, and we went to a night market where i saw a group of boys my age riding motorcycles! Can you believe that?

Anyway, the end of our stay drew near. Early the next day, we woke up and had our last meal with the family. During the meal, they showed us photos of other tourists who had stayed with them previously. We tried our best to communicate to them that we were immensely grateful and thankful for their kind hospitality, and were saddened by the prospect of leaving. We packed our bags and were about to leave our room when our foster father knocked on the door. He gave us each a pen and I was touched by this simple yet meaningful gesture. We gave them some gifts in exchange and thanked them wholeheartedly once again. We rode on their motorcycles to the village hall and bade them farewell. As I watched them leave, my heart felt heavy. I watched as they rode away and became mere specks in the distance. I doubted if our paths would ever cross again.

Although I enjoyed myself thoroughly in this trip, I also became more aware of the world around me. Aside from learning and seeing new things and experiencing the culture and lifestyle there, this trip has taught me many things. I got to experience living in a kampong, something not many people of my generation have experienced. This trip has been a real eye-opener for me. I realized how fortunate I was, living in Singapore, with easily accessible, modern amenities. The villagers, though they have less modern amenities and do lack several luxuries that we take for granted, live no less happier lives than most of us do in Singapore. This came as a surprise to me. Though they may have less in terms of material possessions, they are not lacking in happiness. Indeed, they seemed to be much happier than some people in today’s society. I enjoyed and envied their simple and relaxed lifestyle, compared to the hectic lifestyles that most Singaporeans have. Thus, this trip has taught me something-material possessions do not equate to happiness, but rather happiness can be found in having a lifestyle you enjoy with the ones you love. Overall, this trip was a wonderful experience for me, and not only have I enjoyed myself; I have gained experience, seen new things, learnt new lessons, bonded with my friends, learnt to appreciate and respect others more and I have been given fresh new perspectives of and in life- These lessons, experiences and perspectives will be applied in my daily life. The RSP trip was a wonderful and memorable time for me and it marked a significant milestone in my life.

First Post

Hello and welcome to my blog.



This is my first time creating a blog, so any suggestions for improvements(via e-mail, at least until I set up a chat box) would be most welcome.



Firstly, I would like to tell you why I chose this name for my blog(this may be a bit boring). 'NoirAube' is french for 'black dawn'(my grammar may be wrong as I used google translator.)

I thought it sounded good, and there was a contrast between 'black' and 'dawn'



Also, this blog is not only for me to record the events that happened, what i did, feelings thoughts, etc. It is actually a platform for me to discuss interesting topics and bring up subjects such as incidents in society and global events. I want to be able to share my view with others and share other people's view and perspective on things.



I really should talk about my day now. Yesterday was a normal Saturday, so I do not have many things to talk about. However, I attended two classes(one math tuition and one chinese tuition) and was quite tired after both lessons. However, it occurred to me that my daily schedule is not that tight, compared to the schedules of some people I know. Do you happen to know of people whose schedules are so jam-packed with tuitions, classes, and CCAs (Co-curricular activities) that they can hardly take a breather? Are you one of those people?



I happen to know of a primary 1 boy named Peter(not his real name. I have no intention to mention people's names without prior consent) His schedule is jam-packed with tuitions for different subjects, piano classes, swimming classes and other random classes. I do not know how he copes. Maybe he takes it in his stride, or maybe he is slowly being crushed under the pressure of a really tight schedule. His parents, like every typical 'kiasu'(which means afraid to lose out) Singaporean parents, subject(for want of a better term to describe it ) him to these classes, in the hopes of seeing their son grow up to become a prominent member of society. Now, I have no issues with their ambitions. It is only natural that parents want their children to succeed in life, but I am slightly uncomfortable with their extravagant methods. they sign their children up for courses, workshops, and the works. This subjects the child to extra pressure and takes up a lot of time. Also, there are some other negative side effects such as discontent, which may foster rebellious behaviour.



In my opinion, some parents push their children too much. Children should be given the freedom and time to do their own things and enjoy their childhood. What do you think?



Well I think I've said enough. I've GTG(got to go) now. Hopefully there will be more things for me to talk about when i go back to school.

As always,
Joel
Date: 17 January 2010(Sunday)