'07 Exams - Part 2 : Temporary freedom from academic imprisonment

Holidays...somehow it does not feel very different from the exam period. I guess this means I could (and should) have studied harder. Whatever. It's too late now.

PBF was not quite up to expectations. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for that all-important 'A'. Then again, it's not quite realistic to keep my fingers crossed for the next few months. Perhaps I should find some four-leaf clovers.

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There was a fire in a flat in the opposite block on Sunday. I was not aware of it even though my room was facing that flat. Somehow I managed to smell the smoke only when my mum alerted me to it - a case of delayed reaction? Rushing to the windows, I saw that a crowd had gathered below, looking up at the billowing smoke. Some were taking photos - perhaps to send to STomp? I took shots with my phone's camera, but they were rather blur. Too bad, no pictures for this kay poh...

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Was at AMK Central today. AMK Hub was so different from the last time I went there, when occupancy was barely 50%. Now it seems like a fusion of J8 and TPY bus interchange.

The other areas of AMK Central was much quieter than my last visit, which was not at all surprising. The inexorable invasion of malls into the heartlands is undeniably detrimental to the neighbourhood shops, but there can only be sympathy for these legacies from a period of lower population. The space crunch and the general(younger) population's preference for a 'all-in-one' concept will eventually result in the decimation of most neighbourhood shops - or at least those in town centre... (I'm not quite sure where this is heading, so let's change the topic)

Anyway, I met quite a few old friends today: Yin Lin, Shawn, and of course, Peng Fei. I met Peng Fei at the bus interchange while waiting for the same bus. Apparently, he was having nights off, and was going back to camp after buying a $5 pillow. Good investment I suppose, but not absolutely necessary. Afterall, I spent many months with mouldy pillows in the army, and my head's fine! Other than the occasional itch, but I doubt it has anything to do with the pillows. I believe they are usable as long as you wash the cover regularly. Besides, he's only got 5 more months to go.

I found out he is in my former camp, but different unit. Chatting with him about camp brought back so many memories of that quaint settlement of British legacy - an ancient civilisation sheltered by lush greenery from towering HDB flats a few kilometres away. An interesting milieu indeed!

Oh, I also met Mediacorp actress, Carole Lin. Looks pretty much the same in real life...

'07 Exams - Part 1

During the exams...

Econs and Stats were terrible. Thanks to a serving of contaminated curry, I was plagued by diarrhoea throughout the two days. I ended up in the toilet for 10mins on each day, during my exam. I did not manage to finish either paper, although the toilet trip was not the main reason. I was too slow in a relatively easy Econs paper, while the Stats paper was truly a monster. The most of the supposely easy questions require either lots of critical thinking or tedious workings, while the tougher questions were allocated huge chunks of marks. It did not help that Section A was a real killer, and following the examiner's advice of doing Section A first(she said we should do it first because it is easier), I was depleted of time and energy by the time I reached the relatively easier Section B. She probably found it funny to award four measly marks to the calculation of mean, median, range and interquartile range of 12 numbers! In my opinion, the interquartile range alone is worth four marks.

Maths was better, but not as good as I had hoped for. Given my poor performance for Stats, I figured I would need at least 90 for Maths to achieve an A for Maths/Stats (they have to be combined as each is a half-unit). No joy there, unfortunately. Still, I should get A for Maths...


Outside the exam hall...

I met Alvin outside Expo MRT after my Econs paper, and he almost did not recognise me. He is working for Kaplan, and was giving out brochures for ACCA courses, specifically targeted at UOL students. I was not interested in the courses, but the free pen was good. Haha..

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Last Saturday was a warm day. I was trying hard to keep my eyes open while reading the papers when I received a dreaded call.

"...You have been mobilised..."

It sparked a flurry of calls and SMSes to friends to find out what I was supposed to bring when reporting. No one knew. There was also no relevant information on the NS website, and no one answered the phone at the admin centre. I even made a call to BMTC School 1 by accident.

Turns out we only had to report in our uniform. Thankfully, with advice from my father, I did not bring too much unnecessary stuff, unlike some of my friends. It was nice to meet up with friends and catch up with one another, if not for the fact I was in the midst of my exam...

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On Monday afternoon, I watched Spiderman 3 with Kang, after my Maths paper. I thought it was pretty good, though there were too many elements in the show. Sam Raimi tried to do too much, which resulted in the movie flitting from one scene to another. There were also some minor inaccuracies that Spiderman fans would not be too thrilled about. Nonetheless, I enjoyed the spectacular fighting scenes and the touching moments, especially the one near the end where Harry and Peter became friends again and fought Venom and Sandman to save Mary Jane.