Urbanisation – da notes

The RJ Urban Geog note package is occasionally repetitive, repetitive, and clumsily expressed. Its important sections are limited to a few pages. In these pages, the formatting is an abomination. The mish-mash of Garamond, Arial, Times; the bad Powerpoint lecture slide formatting is just… painful.

But what right do I have to complain? The Urban Geog teacher is, in reality, a really nice guy. The thick booklet attests to the significant accumulated effort  which one should not so frivolously dismiss. Clearly the problem lies with the notes, not the teacher.

To show to myself that I’m not like one of those complaining coffee shop uncles, and to qualify this rant, it is only fair that I have my own notes, and make sure they’re better. So all complaints are backed-up with a clear template of what notes can be, instead of empty rants complaining about the world. These are based on notes from the package, condensed into a neat 40 pages, 10% of the original 400. This is meant to be a complete replacement of the A level geography syllabus.

Most facts are checked; while no accuracy is guaranteed, I’m sure it won’t list “free clinic for homeless” as a long term solution for homelessness, or worse: recommend “open markets and eradicate barriers” to create more jobs for slum-dwellers in Bombay.

Tags: A levels, cities, Geography, notes, study notes, urban, urbanisation, urbanization

Singapore’s divorce rates

Just yesterday, I honestly didn’t think it too polite to interrupt my EXCO’s discussions to rotate them 6 times around just to ensure everyone got a nice window view at some time throughout the meeting. I didn’t bother in the end. Eventually I instructed my vice-chair to remove the labels on the chairs when I realised that they were pasted behind the chairs (and no, I don’t have to tell you it’s a pun). What particularly grossed me out was the text and background colours: pink camouflaged too well into the purple background. But I must say that although I didn’t see any entirely black ones, I found the white text on green background quite refreshing.

The meeting ended and I went to the library because I was waiting for my friend to finish his training before we went to J8 for a movie. I remember wanting to borrow 8 SAT books on all the SAT (II) subjects, 3 encyclopaedias and 3 DVDs. I knew those were reference materials and therefore borrowing it would be illegal. I knew I had to make a run for it – and thankfully I managed to hurry out in time before the librarians caught me. They were arranging themselves on newly-arrived swivel chairs in the admin booth, trying to find the chair with the colour and design which they felt expressed their true identity.

We were catching the film (500) Days of Summer starring Joseph Levitt and Zooey Deschanel – brilliant stuff. But we noticed this family of three – a mother and her two young kids – sitting the side. Ever so often, a GV manager would go up to the row they were sitting on, use a loud hailer to tell the row to rearrange themselves, and switched people around while they were doing so. The worst part was when two of them refused to sit together because one of them stepped on the other’s toes. The manager could only look on helplessly as they argued across at least 1 person.

By the time it ended it was around 10, so we went home. I took the train from Bishan to Clementi, and as I waited for it, I noticed 3 married couples (all wearing their wedding gowns) standing at the same door. The moment the train doors opened, they rushed in. The brides sat spaced out on one row, while their grooms sat opposite them. As the train began to move, they began to swap around seats: it was at about Novena that I observed no man would want to sit next to his wife. The entire train carriage could only look at a stunned atmosphere of silence enveloped on the train.

For some reason this reminded me that I would arrange the letters of the word THERMOMETER at the height of the SARS crisis, then when there previously wasn’t one, I was made to arrange the cards bearing the letters EXAMINATION. Or help coaches choose athletes for the school team – the last time I checked, coaches knew their ability rather well. I wasn’t too sure if I should help, so I offered a few suggestions (9450, to be exact), most of which were turned down anyway (9449). Why two people would refuse to sit together at a theatre I can understand, but why three married couples would enter a train compartment, and not choose – there and then – to sit on the same row as their spouses, I simply cannot fathom.

Little wonder, I thought, as I exited the train, why Singapore’s divorce rates have been accelerating.

I love bridge.

I missed school and all my friends. For an entire period of 2 weeks, I completely missed school – first, I was ill, then there was AYC. That obviously means that I have to blog.

The Asean Youth Convention was an inaugural event, involving students from 4 countries in the ASEAN+3. As a Facil (facilitator), my job was to facilitate group discussions and bond the group together. Robyn helped me out as my admirable co-facil, and we were in charge of Group 5 and Vietnam Hai (2). It was quite an experience – seeing people from different worlds and so on.

But this post isn’t about that. It’s about the bonding that the facils – and especially the ones from A13A – had. I would dollop a little doubt that AYC would have been even half as fun without Lisa (Boy-lovin’ bitch), Sally (Korean ah-mah!), Robyn (9-inch what?), Matthias (energiser bunny), Claire (my “closest” friend), Jingyi (makes a loud huh noise during math lecture), Nghi (give me a neck and tie now).

A little shout-out here to all the facils too – Lyn, Charm, Yi Tong, Joyce, Hong Yan, Weng Keong, Linxi, Kai Li, Zi Le, Jess, Glendon, Zan, Phoebe, Zheng Kai. And our cute, pretty SLOs – Jaren and Joelle (uh… respectively). Oh and Zhong Ming, Clarence, and those people who made it a great experience for us.

But still.

We stayed over at YMCA Metro in the basement bunks till about 2.30 am. The Monopoly game was quite hectic, and we were joined by Zhong Ming, the alternative chair, who was quite fussed over by the girls for his oh-so-unique concoction of geeky intellect and boyish charms. Clarence also came, and he got similar treatment, but more for his Aussie accent. The monopoly game began to devolve into senseless chaos until I valiantly (and admittedly, quite brilliantly) negotiated deals with the players on the board. Alas! My invocations toward a more playable game were crushed when they decided to play a mix of truth or dare.

“Let’s go in the next round, okay? Guys?”

I was quite bored (those around the table apparently weren’t, given Lisa’s impressive ability to invent truths and dares you wouldn’t realise could even exist in a somewhat decent mind), until we decided to play Bridge. The game is quite, quite intriguing and I found I had a very decent appetite for risk. The obsession with Bridge lasted throughout the convention – occasionally we would slip out of lectures and play it on the tables besides the theatrette. Robyn memorably commented on the addict-like nature with which we played the game. Then we would sneak back in just in time for Q&A. The Organising Comm obviously wasn’t too pleased and they made that known, after which we the decent facils sat through the entire lecture.

Another time we played at J8 before that night’s performance. For some reason we had 4 folds in a row. Statistically speaking, we reduced the chances of another group of 4 bridge players getting that. Oh! The sacrifices I make to make this world a better, happier place!

Stayover #2

Stayovers always excite me. There’s something magical about not returning home to do something – a project, a movie marathon, or just plain cards. But I simply don’t dig the immense enthusiasm where bathing and brushing teeth are concerned especially during camps. People just can’t wait to go and take a brush (cool) or take a bath (even cooler) and it’s almost like an uncontrollable urge. I’m going to hypothesise that it’s a communal thing that deepens the sense of community.

But we stayed over at Lisa aunt’s house! It was wonderful stuff. Before that we had the closing party, in which we performed a very phail version of the batch dance, which ended at 10:30. By the time we reached her house it was midnight, and we stayed till 5:30 with gaga gossip and blessed bridge. It was très cool. The entire convention experience was wrapped up very nicely like that, and at 6 the “next morning” we headed back to YMCA metro for breakfast.

My most important takeaway from AYC?

I love bridge.

And now it’s back to reality for me. It’s going to be a real hectic 2 weeks for me – planning and executing a tournament, finishing an overdue PW report draft, catching up on 2 weeeks of Geog, GP and Lit. If you see me down the corridor, ask me how I’m doing.

Hopefully we’ll get to catch up – unless I give a hurried smile and rush down the corridor, buried in my busy little existence.

the last day of school

The last day of school always holds some special significance. In A13A, it meant that a quarter of our JC life had finished. That held some form of significance. I hope A13A gets to bond more. It’s going to be a pity if a bunch of nice, genuine, and thinking people are trapped by divisions.

In any case, here’s a peak into an extraordinary day into my life (otherwise I wouldn’t have posted it here, would I?). I waited for about 2 hours for debates. I didn’t get to debate, i.e. I’m not selected into the ACJC I/C debates team. I am beginning to be quite immune to such disappointments, especially in debates. It’s hardly new – because you are lacking, therefore you should not enter the team. Because you do not enter the team, you are lacking. Because you are lacking, therefore you should not enter the team. Because… ad infinitum

But the purpose of this post is not for such banal things like competitions and selections – people who aren’t selected for anything, get over it! If people think you don’t matter, don’t make yourself matter to them. Be someone else altogether to someone else. You don’t need to be good for causes or people which demean you as a person. Don’t degrade yourself. So what if you aren’t good in that field? Don’t encourage yourself with the “you weren’t selected because the team requires synergy.” It’s only hasty, oops-i-can-think-of-anything-else-to-say-therefore-i’ll-say-this-feel-good-crap dialogue your ears should hardly bother about. Coaches use that often. It means i’m-sorry-but-you-suck. (Haha don’t you even think of labelling me a cynic, because you are thinking just that too. Own up to it – you aren’t good, so do something else. Be someone to who really matters.)

After being mildly worn out during debates of not doing anything, I deliberated, then went to AstroNight. The stars weren’t important; the people there were. I met wenjie, who went out with me for dinner. (teehehee, wenjie. better hope someone doesn’t read this!) I realised they – aaron, renyong and him – were going to aaron’s house for a competition the day after. So I decided to tag along for a stayover, with everyone else – after all, it was the last day of school.

It was 11:30 when they ended the Night officially, and packed up. So the four of us went to his house. The attic was large, and comprised two rooms. (For those who haven’t been there, it’s quite a treat. There’s childhood toys, music CDs, X Boxes, and even a drum set.) They were having a little trouble captioning their photos, so I started playing videos on Youtube. Music, Live performances, Vlogs. It was entertaining, though I admit I was initially quite a distraction.

Later aaron collapsed in fatigue, so wenjie and I stayed up with the Mac. We started to listen and sing pop songs – mainly the divas – and began about two hours worth of singing. Obviously only the divas featured in our playlist – Celine, Leona, Mariah (a pity no Whitney this time) – I’m positive that only they can sing, and sing well. Wenjie has perfect pitch, but he occasionally “over-estimates” the vocal latitude of the singer. So he is consistently about a semitone away from the note. (This is a problem which consistently plagues a good deal of guys when singing songs sung by ladies. The pitch goes high, the notes waver, the voice lacks punch. Transposing the song an octave or another lower is less of a sin than losing the power and tone, I realised. )

So anyway renyong joins us and it’s about half an hour before we sleep. I couldn’t go down and retrive my bottle, so I was left thirsty in the attic. It was really because of Snowball, aaron’s dog, who barked incessantly at the sound of our voices and footsteps down the stairs. It’s not wise to wake your host’s family up, but it is especially foolish to do so at 2:30 in the morning.

So we wake up at 8 the next day. They do their rehearsals and mock-ups. (They used a very considerable amount of effort and time – that much was evident.) I do my youtube. A little more singing resumes. But the mood is serious. We have brunch at 10. They leave for their competition, and I leave for home.

much ado about nothing

The government’s being protective, and that’s a good thing.

Better to “err on the side of convention”. Or as Singaporean hokkien vernacular would have it, “Kiasu better than kiasi“. MOE’ recently introduced sweeping directives for schools nationwide, ever since Singapore raised its pandemic alert level to orange. I am a firm believer in mitigation measures like these. They ensure we remain prepared and resilient against pandemic threats – and I do hope my reasoning appeals to the Cynic, who might just want to change his/her mind. That would be the greatest compliment.

First off, we aren’t allowed to organise or participate in events which involve a substantial congregation of people, especially students. These include concerts which have not sold any tickets yet, holiday/bonding/farewell camps, and competitions. I was affected by a number of these – for one, RECAS June camp (our very first camp as a club) has quite effectively been cancelled, and now we cannot send school teams to SMU Hammers, an open debating competition that we did look forward to. We can’t have morning assembly either – not that we want to in the first place.

I firmly believe we should, and can, do more. For one, I say we ban lectures of any subject – be they science, humans, or math (especially). It is definitely wrong – and almost immoral as well, come to think of it – that we should allow potential incubi of viral plague to converge into an air-conditioned, enclosed lecture theatre. I don’t think it is right, as social responsible citizens, for us to hold congregations which carry high risks of spreading the virus that may reach our shores.

It is quite shocking that some concerts should even be allowed to continue. RProject, in my opinion, should also be cancelled. The organisers should withdraw immediately, and pupils should ask for refunds. It is inconceivable that the school allows these events to continue, and really quite hilarious to boot – our lives are under potentially grave threat, and here we are, sitting on chairs facing the runway, admiring some kind of fashion! The guy beside you might have caught a cold, or worse – the models, who will walk through the entire section of audiences, could have a whopping cough and a cold. Ultimately we should seek a balance – on one hand, we see the weeks of dedication, time, energy, sweat, tears that some of our promising friends put in; on the other, we stay safe at home, taking our temperatures twice daily as well. Any sane person – you and I – know for ourselves that we should protect ourselves from unnecessary harm.

I also support the MOE’s directive that no one should enter the side gates after 8 a.m. In my opinion, we should do away with the arbitrary time limit. All students should enter through the school’s main gate, regardless of what time they wake up or where they live. In these moments of darkness, that little inconvenience of walking a little to the main gates should be of less consequence than ensuring that all students are kept safe from this potential national threat. It is high time we band together in solidarity for our common good.

It is admirable that parents are not allowed to exit their cars when they drop their children off at school. Our parents could well be the next carriers of this potential pandemic; allowing them to get out of their cars might leave respiratory droplets which may affect other students in the entire school compound. The older generation should set us a good example as well; they should avoid getting out of their cars upon reaching their offices. It is only right that they practise what they preach – they should create office workspace in their cars, to minimise risks. Workplaces are notorious for the amount of bacteria that circulates in the stale air-con air; consequently, closing down offices should be one of our first steps to reduce the spread of this potential flu.

Factories should also stop production, at least for the next month if the flu has died down, or at least a few months until the pandemic drops in risk level. Just as our school in Bishan ensures that students reduce congregations as much as possible, so should the factories over at Jurong. It should be a nationwide effort involving all citizens against this potential pandemic.

On a national level, I also believe that the WHO should stop holding expert meetings involving scientists and researchers from all over the world. So far, they have held 3 of such meetings, and as far as the we are concerned, they are playing with fire.  And as we speak, top health officials from ASEAN+3 will be meeting to come up with a solution to battle this potential pandemic which may potentially ravage Asia. What’s worse – I see no reason why our Singapore Parliament should continue to convene. Our countries MPs and cabinet ministers are responsible for the proper functioning and well-being our small, vulnerable nation-state. Allowing our political leaders to meet in these enclosed settings is almost bordering on irresponsibility – and flu virus does not discriminate between gender, sex, political position, wealth, race, language, or religion. These people are our national assets, allowing the top brains of their country to be exposed to this pandemic is quite outrageous.

This should be true for other nations as well, especially those with confirmed cases. Ministers and bureaucrats should avoid contact with each other as much as possible. Congress, for instance, should hold their sessions and voting online, if any bill is to be passed. Obama should realise that these senators are the ones people voted into power; allowing them to meet might pose a threat to their health and ability to serve the country fully. Fundamental tenets of democracy may be breached if we continue adopting such nonchalant attitudes to a potential worldwide pandemic.

We stand to risk much if we fail to follow mitigation measures – not just as a school, but as nation and as a world as well. Obeying directives should be our first step towards responsible citizenry.

Who’s with me?

a most interesting trend

The 10-Metre Rule:

All RJ girls from RG will meet, know, or greet a girl they know every 10 metres in the RJC compound, on average.

Just something I observed. Virtually every trip to or from any lecture theatre, seminar room or our homeroom has proven this theory correct.

(N.B.: the RI guys tend to meet, know or greet a fellow RI guy every 25 – 40 m, on average, although this is a rougher estimate.)

how’s life been?

Last week, I got (on average) as many as 2 queries daily from concerned buddies who ask me why I looked so “emo”. Of course, it seems that the most popular suggestion was that I should stop worrying about those people over “there”, in response to my previous post (with all the dreary news I post, it’s a wonder why people still visit this online repository of depression . WordPress stats tell me that readership rates have actually shifted upwards, which is somewhat surprising news.)

There is a reason, I reckon, as to why this blog seems to have survived for 3 years running, without dying out, and with a post at least every month. Blogging is a stamina sport, and it isn’t about regurgitating everything that happened that day with a few cutesy reflections to mark the occasions. That’s what I learned soon after a whole slew of my friends’ blogs died out at the start of this year – it is about putting some thought into each post, so it isn’t a shallow confession of the day past, but sustained intervals of quality stuff. Mine’s not all “quality”, though , it’s really more of a motley of random readings and reflections strung together.

Anyway. (what a junsean-esque way of beginning!)

How’s life been for me? GREAT. Really, not bad at all.

I haven’t reported the events since january began; nor do I plan to faithfully to do so. So here’s a nice little summary.

Orientation was good – my OG (O’ops I did it again!) and OGLs were wonderful people. It wasn’t the all-out-chiong sort of group, but we got to know each other really well, judging by the time we were put together. We have had a number of lunches so far, which were all pleasant affairs.

My class is 10A13A, a HELM-GELM-other combo class. It’s very diverse, and the people are, as most humans people are, outgoing and very friendly. RJC operates in a vacuum of group-work projects (in academic subjects besides PW), so there’s less breeding ground for conflict. Right now, everyone tends to stick to their invidual cliques, also divided along gender lines. (So much for faithful reporting.) Still, there have been promising signs of better class bonding, and more guy-girl interactions, so we’ll be great friends with each other at this rate.

Meanwhile, the lecturers and tutors seem to be reasonbly good, with some exceptional ones like Mrs Uma Chong and our expatriate teachers (Mr Reeves and Mrs Perry).

Right now, I’m also dabbling with poetry. It seems to have taken on a fresher meaning. Prose is still my favourite, though. Maybe I’ll compile some of my short stories (Short as in short, not rambling ones.) and post them here. You’ll need to ask me!

2008 in review

2008 was a very… different year.

As with all years.

But 2008 was different in a unique way.

It was more different.

(How’s that for a useless introduction?)

I didn’t really know where or when to begin, so I perused through my blog entries. It seems fascinating that a weblog can uncover a great deal hidden in your memory.

2008 began with a smashing post, “school has… um started?“, holding the record for the shortest post in this blog. Then I posted a quick message about being an intransigent, short for a stubborn and uncompromising individual, thereby justifying my bad impression of myself. March was possibly the most disappointing month, after not being selected for the BB AQ race in the school team, of reasons I still will not fathom. The day the selection results came out was undoubtedly the saddest day in my recent history, and permanantly altered my outlook towards BB. (*the post is not available for public viewing.)

March was also a month of renewed hopes. The World Scholars’ Cup Asian regional semi-finals were held in Singapore. This round of competition, to tell the truth, was lacking in organisation and rigour. Our team also had a poor performance, but, thanks to a random sponsorship, entered the Finals. Still, we did beyond expectations in the World Finals held in Seoul, clinching an 8th, which wasn’t really too bad. Two intellectual role-models, Gerald Sng and Andrew Tam, were brilliant in their own ways; the first seemed slack but won a number of individual prizes, the second had a natural capacity to ingest information smoothly.

May was a spectecular month – there was the Interhouse Humans Quiz, which boosted the image of Humanities in our school. I lost my computer due a rare virus, but thankfully resuscitated some data. There was also the introduction of geographic thought in the Geog RA syllabus, resulting in the True Growth Index. This eventually morphed to become my RE report, which entered the semis and wasn’t bad at all. It also marked the first of a string of nights where sleep was compromised. Of course May also saw my sudden awareness of Leona Lewis, winner of the 2006 (British) X-Factor. For the rest of the month, my ears heard nothing but her songs and her voice. (You cannot imagine.)

June marked another competition – NUS GeoTrail – but was a stunning disappointment. It also marked the stellar rise of Mariah Carey in my playlist count, because of her unparalleled brilliance at vocal control. The next month, July, was somewhat uneventful, save for the new term cewhlerobama to describe my favourite divas.

August wasn’t too exciting either. There was the Interhouse Debates, which was a beginning in my interest in formal debates. September was quite a different matter – it was the month where the US Presidential Elections started to heat up! The rivalry of McCain and Obama was spectecular (and so were the funds), but showed that democracy was still alive and kicking in America. That month gave birth to an impassioned post about a mallicious, overly popular video about a lame US veteran using the fallacy of emotions to appeal to abuse American’s emotions and create a logical black hole.

The beginning of October marked the EOYs – with unexpected performances in various subjects  – some unbelievably good, others quite the opposite. That month also saw the conversion of a science student to a humanities student, argued with a number of reasons coming into play. Despite plenty of iner turmoil and external surprise, I am now a fully-fledged humanities student.

Eventful? Yes. Meaningful? Yes. Fun? Not always. Easy? No.

There were people particularly relevant to the series of events which occured. Among these are my teachers – two of whom I owe particular debt to – Mr Yuen and Mr Wee, incidentally also both my RA teachers. Their dedication, experience and passion are rare qualities in the teaching sector nowadays, and they shone elegantly through both mentors. I believe both should be hallmarks of what the national teaching occupation should aim towards.

If you ask me, 2008 isn’t at all about those things that happened, as detailed above. It’s not just the personal experience, but it’s the people, the friends, the family which built a beautiful year.

This year, in review, was a wonderful experience.

freedom and the humanities

It seemed like the mood of our class was rather pensive, rather than liberated, after the HMT O-levels. No doubt our class had the greatest percentage of locals attending Chinese tuition, the celebratory mood for festivities and freedom just wasn’t… present. I believe that a great deal of the level didn’t really study much Chinese for the examinations, bringing into the exam hall the mentality that “language can’t be learned”.

Well, it can.

Last-minute cramming of good phrases (“好词好句”）will, in fact, get you further in Chinese. People in 4C don’t just memorise 250 idioms, they also memorise entire essays and 报章报道s if they have too – after all, 4 hours worth of exams might not seem reason enough for forking out so much money for the Os.

As Ren Yan commented (on the train while we were going to the class chalet), there is a great deal of meaning in the Chinese language. But the “value” of the language is not always determined by the cultural or lexiconic complexities that Chinese seems to grasp perfectly – instead, it is the viability, usage and application that determines the value.

I seem to be quite free after the ‘O’s. It’s a funny feeling. Many of my  leisurely pursuits seem to be ditched unconciously, and there’s this unwelcome but inexorable urge to wile your time away. I’ll draw up a schedule for the holidays, really I must.

The Humanities

I’ve chosen to take the Humanities in RJC.

It’s a big decision – possibly one of the most future-changing, life-altering important ones I’ve ever made.  I matriculated online and submitted my application for the HSP (humans scholarship programme) yesterday. And I’m going to justify my choice aloud.

The decision initially was PGME – a cocktail of my RA subjects which I had scored respectably in, and the usual M-E combination which a significant proportion of RJC takes. But as I later learnt, this was a rojak two-sciences-two-humans combination, putting me in an arts class. Reputation doesn’t seem to favour this group of people from hearsay, but this is more of a generalisation than anything else.

Then I consulted my parents and some friends and asked for their opinion. It was PCME all the way. To them, the strategy was to join the many with 4As – for some, sacrificing their interests and for others, trodding down the academic-oriented pathway.

There is some truth to why the majority of people choose this combination. The most glaring reason is the common humans-phobia. It is often viewed as a combination with subjective assessment instead of the familiar objectivity of the sciences. “You can score well in one test and fail in the other” doesn’t hold much appeal as compared to “Confirmed, guaranteed 100% As”.

The second consideration is the relevance to future pathways of this batch of gifted students. The science pathway is known to produce not just researchers or doctors, but humanists and lawyers. Putting it more simply, the Sciences allow one to diversify into a plethora of future roadways, whereas the Humanities can’t. Joining the Humanities might prevent one from being an engineer – of which which many Singaporeans parents argue is the sole occupation from which many people branch out their later careers from.

And then the third case is interest. It isn’t hard to guess, especially in my environment, that a great deal of RI boys (and most probably RGS girls) take Science as a scoring subject. Two years in a Science class tells me that. The reason why so many classes are trip-science classes is some testament to the inability of the lower-secondary humanities programme to capture the hearts of the majority of this batch, and the general, intangible appeal of the sciences. There is something so… Singaporean about the Sciences.

But I am different. I seem to have a high inclination towards writing and thinking – not a line of information placed here to accentuate my ego, but rather, an observable phenomenon. My better 4.0s resided in the Humanities. Writing is not about telling the examiner that the RNAi-induced Silencing Complex molecule  wraps around the single-strand RNA or that the liberation of hydrogen gives you a “pop” sound if you insert a glowing splint into the test-tube. Writing is about construction and deconstruction. It gives and takes meaning. It nurtures and weakens souls. That is writing.

(Perhaps a science student reading this might consider this a somewhat extreme justification. Then again, perhaps some of the science students have written or read so little to even know that this is true. Not to say, of course, that all Science students fit this image. After all, a previous Science student is writing this, and many Science students even bothering to read this post don’t fit this image at all.)

Thinking isn’t just comparing charts and deriving the lens-maker’s equation to find the focal length of a lens. It’s not being uncertain about Heisenberg or spew out how sustainability can be reached in an exam (ok forgive the Heisenberg example). These do absolutely nothing to help oneself. I find it amusing, then, how people with high grades in Science can be considered to be logically superior or even in placed in an elevated status because they mug well.

Mind you, it’s not that I score too badly for Science either. I can grasp these concepts quite readily and score appreciably well, but I lack the interest. I’ve taken a mounting disinterest in the Sciences since secondary 3, because I find it so perfectly irrelevant to my future. If I am to orientate myself towards the financial or law sector in the future, I don’t see why I should study these subjects now. It barely engages me on a level that the Humanities are able to.

But while we have the short-term assurances of highly respected teachers and capable peers in our company, we also have the short-term period of doubt and uncertainty. It does take some courage to pursue this entirely different route. For me, the leap from Trip-Science to Trip-Humans is large.

Certainly, the Humanities students will be offered some advantages for their audacious – even valorous – decision. But these weigh minimally on the scale of importance and relevance that these Humans students seem to be able to appreciate. These students know where and what they want in life – a far better bunch of poeple in my regard. Engineering might not be our forte, but while it might be against “the convention” to pursue Humanities in the JC, we know it is our future we are focused on.

We don’t just want a stepping stone for good grades. We’ll get that. We want a bit of thinking and writing.

That makes us human.

More human at least, than those reciting that darned reactivity series.

school…um… has started?

Ok. Excellent. Bye!