Monday, October 09, 2006: Officially... end of hiatus!
Yes, it's the end of the hiatus. And also... Happy Birthday, Karen!!
All of my tags will be deleted, except for a few I find meaningful. Birthday shoutouts will also stay on the tagboard (until I lose them due to an overwhelming number of tags). Now, let's look at MY tags and see what happened during this hiatus...
September 13: One weird thing I did today: Rolling crumbled croquette into sushi (Home Econs).
--> OH THAT! That was the day we were doing Japanese cuisine. We were all tasked to do sushi, with some of us doing croquettes and the others doing the okonomiyaki (hope I got the spelling right!). In the end there was so much sushi rice that my partner and I had left over, as well as some crumbled croquette, so... I rolled it into sushi (with seaweed outside of course)!
September 15: Mrs Foo rocks. Or so I think, after what I witnessed today.
--> Well, there was a Literature dramatisation of Animal Farm (and speaking of dramatisations, to think that I spoke of... forget it, I'm blushing) that was to be included in the CA2 this year, and a group of eight happened not to have done it, so they had '0's staring back at them in the Literature section of the progress report, and so they complained about it to our form teacher. Mrs Foo came in to hear what the situation was about and to give them an extra chance, but she also scolded the members. Nonetheless, I could feel that she cared for them.
September 20: Vous, pourquoi est-ce que c'est vous qui est entré dans notre salle de classe hier? On ne povait pas vous dire de vous en aller. On peut voir que vous êtes un loupe. +
September 25: Vous êtes entré dans notre classe aujourd'hui, M. Loupe. Et je vous hais.
--> Oh, I'd much rather not talk about this here, thank you very much.
September 20: Today... tea brewing was the highlight! But I didn't quite get the procedure of washing down pat. But I learnt in the end. The tea was nice, and so was the 茶叶蛋. And the test went well, really.
--> We went to Tea Chapter for our Learning Journey that day. It's a nice, cosy place, at Neil Road, near Chinatown. (Chinatown in Singapore, OK, not anywhere else in the world.) I learnt a few things about tea: Green tea is NOT oxidised or 'fermented' at all. Beat that! And there are six types of Chinese tea, which, in Chinese, are known as 绿茶, 黄茶, 青茶, 黑茶, 白茶 and 红茶. (NOTE: Though 红茶 translates directly to "red tea", it's actually the English "Black Tea", which in turn translates directly into Chinese as 黑茶. Confusing eh?) The brewing is very elaborate. It's so elaborate that I still can't remember it. Chek Seen, I need another refresher!!
By the way, I don't care for the Japanese version, it's an adaptation of the Chinese one.
And speaking of Japanese and Chinese, the National Geographic magazine once mentioned that the Jap word for 'ant' is made up of the words for 'bug' and 'loyalty'. EXCUSE ME. WITHOUT CHINESE, THE JAPS WOULDN'T HAVE THEIR KANJI ANYWAY.
I didn't abuse caps here. I'm really indignant about it.
And I don't remember what the test was.
September 21: The oral... uh, only the dirt added at the end was my saving grace. I totally forgot my vocab. Brr. Got to brush up.
--> It was the day of the French oral. The dialogue was about "You don't want to go to school. Your parent will try to coax you into going." At first I was just "sassing" as Mildred Taylor put it in her book Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry: "Ain't gonna 'pologize to no nigger! [Lillian Jean Simms] sassed." Really, they were just flimsy excuses like "There're lots of projects at school and they're so difficult!" at first, but then, just in the nick of time, I said, hesitatingly, that the Math teacher was sick in the mind, and the examiner seemed satisfied with that, ending the dialogue with something like, "All right, I'll go and talk to your teacher. But right now, you have to promise me that you'll go to school, OK?"
Really, I consider that 'dirt'. But if not for it, I don't think I'd have been able to get out of it with the examiner showing so much care. Monsieur Gilbert rocks!
September 21: I'm starting to love and live! And all of you, thank you so much for the reciprocative luck messages! It's really heartwarming.
--> Erm, that's between them and me.
September 22: English paper: HARD.
--> Self-explanatory, right?
September 28: Yesterday, Kaho Mizuki showed me her bell. Really, she did. It has given me new hope and courage.
--> I found both main language papers hard this year, and was upset by it. I told Elizabeth about it, and then about a conversation I had heard between two Sec 4 seniors (one of whom was Karen). During this conversation, I had heard the senior who WASN'T Karen say that a failure in English equated to a transfer to the Normal (Academic) stream, and therefore, a transfer out. Liz disproved it. Just a small part of the information: "You'd only be transferred to Express."
Like the bell of Kaho Mizuki or Layla Mckenzie in Cardcaptor Sakura, a second chance, in case I did fail.
September 28: Today... French exam! Facile, sauf... (Easy, but...)
--> Again, self-explanatory.
September 30: Biennale Shoutout: Miho-san! You were a great guide! Arigato gozaimasu!
--> I went with Ophanimon, then-Seraphimon and Mr. Sagittarius to the Biennale tour that started at the new SMU campus (with its Hanging Gardens!) and this Japanese woman (was she an immigrant? Because she said she's been living here with her parents...) was our guide. She was really good in her English pronunciation. It shocked me when I found out that she's a Japanese (Ophanimon had asked me to guess what her nationality was, and my guess had been that she's a Japanese, because of the accent), but I think she was even more shocked than I when, after she revealed that she's Shintoist, I managed to name the kami or Shinto deities of the Sun, the Moon and Storms.
Once more, arigato gozaimasu, Miho-san!
September 30: Turned in a single-sheeter today at writing class. But I'm happy with it. The last double-page essay I turned in at that class has 700+ words in it. DON"T ARGUE. I used school (Cedar) foolscap.
--> Yes, I was satisfied with it. And now that I've recounted the words in that double-page essay submitted the lesson before, I think there're 600+, not 700+. Sorry for the error.
October 1: I am going to be in trouble come July 2007. The then-Sec4s will be leaving and... (switch languages) je serai toute seule, sans d'amies vraies.
--> I am not translating the French section of that tag, you hear me? Or read my blog, for that matter?
October 1: You Jin was her children's "rants box". I'm sure all perents can learn from that, abolish the age-based hierachy and build another one in its place. Old things need improvements, eternally. Everything needs improvement.
--> OOPS. I meant "parents".
Yeah. I'm all for it. I'm going to be a rants box to my children next time.
But if I do marry, it doesn't mean being subservient to the hubby.
By the way, just these few days, someone contributed a very sexist article to the TODAY newspaper about his views on married couples. The emphasis is on "his". Really. He simply told the womenfolk to just accept the traditional, archaic role of good housewife and mother. Indignation in the highest. A married couple are PARTNERS, not MASTER AND SLAVE. The latter mentality has lingered in this world for time immemorial, which is time immemorial too long.
October 3: Diarrhoea! That's the only thing that sullied the day. Thanks to the teachers' grace however, I could do the whole History paper with full time! My causal is so dead. But otherwise, I find that I did pretty fine. And Elizabeth's neighbours finally stopped the drilling! Yay for her and me.
--> Yes, the Sec 2s had History that day, and Liz's neighbours finally stopped drilling! The day before, they were drilling as part of renovation works (as she told me). I'll bet you she joined Sharon that day at the library because of the noise.
October 3: I'm going to enjoy my fantastic fifteenth year of existence. The Sec 3s should be experiencing their sixteenth. I want a digital cam for the culmination of my fifteenth year so as to snap shots of myself with the then-Sec4s. But should I take that or the DELF A2? But back to today, I took the exam in the Family Centre, and the AS2 was nearby... I drew the strength to continue from its presence. It's where the Choir practises, and Choir is my continual romance.
--> I took it there because of my diarrhoea, but I'm much better now, thank you very much. In fact, I was fully recovered the next day, and it hasn't happened again this year (whew!). Choir, my continual romance? Indeed. And I am going to enjoy my fifteenth year of existence, my fourteenth year of age, while it lasts, because by the time I gain my fifteenth year of age, my sixteenth year of existence shall be a void.
October 3: Finality's in the air, and I cannot help but cry inside as I cherish this time. It will be the last. It really will.
--> Yes, it is. Next year, it will be their big year, and I cannot, no longer. To quote a tag that followed this one: "And I bleed inside, where the truth is a blade; and my heart falls, when the truth cruelly rips away my wings of hope; and my heart is empty, where the truth is a flesh-eating parasite."
October 4: Denyse deserves it! She deserves the award all right. In fact she deserves the highest. I'm not saying it because I'm a fan or friend, I'm saying it because it's true. Denyse, laudo te!
--> But, in fact, she deserves "laudo te" everyday, because her character warrants it. Yes, that was a character award, and she doesn't just deserve a Merit award, she deserves the highest.
October 4: Oh, and so does Priscilla. Laudo te!
--> Yes, Priscilla Lee from 2Purity 2006 also got it, as she did last year...
October 4: ... I was lonely today so I typed a poem. ...
--> It was cold and embittering. In fact, here's the poem:
~Piece after Lit~
Finally free,
and as I walk out briskly,
chill wind ruffles my hair,
makes it messy.
Amid fellow green-taggers
at me, no warmth, no staring daggers
feeling trapped with no release…
Where're the bumblebees?
I know
but wish I didn't, though;
they're still in the gloom
of the exam room.
And pay no mind to how hard I mine;
sapphires I will never find.
Icicles form on the trees
on their branches and their leaves.
Snow-covered,
as any other,
the bus comes
and it hums,
while ploughing through snowy dunes,
mocking tunes.
I freeze,
cold-seized,
remaining unseen,
and none will care,
among that sea of green
over there.
[Wrote a piece of Literature myself...]
October 5: Maths. *sigh* P(A1) = 1/38. That is so bad. Hate geometry. But then we'll be taking double maths next year. ...
--> It's true.
October 6: Et seulement deux de plus... mais je voudrais trois de plus. Comme elles!! Oh non, non. Demain, elles passeront Phy et Math Add, et lundi, l'Histoire. Ohh non... Je ne veux plus les passer.
--> That, when translated into English, means, "And only two more... but I'd like three more. Like them!! Oh no, no. Tomorrow, they'll be taking Physics and Additional Math, and Monday, History. Ohh no... I don't want to take them anymore."
October 6: Just one more for all of us! Oh, no, wait. Sec 3 people who're not taking O-level History are done already. I want Combination 4B!! I know my career choices already. 3 in Arts / Aesthetics, 2 in Sciences. I want to be a Healer of sorts.
--> They finished that day, because today was the Sec 3s' History exam. And my ambitious resloution stands.
October 6: Earth Cardinal, I cannot bring myself to do something anymore while keeping a fluffy, happy mood at the same time. It's all lost. Quit trying to push stuff to Ophanimon, we're not in the past anymore. And therefore, because we're no longer in the past, therefore don't force the archaic roles on us. If even a worm will turn, so will a pair of twins. So QUIT IT.
--> Seraphimon changed his name to Earth Cardinal. And I'm talking about the Star Sign here, not the rank of church official. I'm not elaborating on the rest.
October 8: Yippee!! I got permission, and a display of faith in me too! Watch out world... I'm gonna storm the literary!
--> *shakes head* Nope, no elaboration here.
All other self-tags have been skipped over; all other tags have been replied back at their owners' blogs.
And now... presenting... a short version of my profile in the sidebar, a few new links, and a new scroller, all to be added shortly after this post!
Today was the Geography exam, and the last paper of the year. I wanted to walk back home with Elizabeth, but couldn't because, firstly, the Sec 3 History paper ended earlier by 15mins, but this kind of thing can't be helped. Secondly, Mrs Lee wanted to see me. Not that that's bad, though; Mrs Lee is really nice. It was sad (for me) to hear that she's going to be posted away as a school counsellor.
I sang part of "If We Hold On Together" while walking past the primary school opposite our block cluster. And while singing it, I felt as if the 'ghost' of the old campus was singing along with me. My first three years of schooling were spent there, before the old campus was torn down and the new one built in its place. I wonder if Mrs Esther Ong still teaches there? She was the one who taught me this song in Primary 3.5. No kidding, the class was called "Primary 3.5", and it was the best class. Maybe I should find out when their next event is, then pop down and say hi to Mrs Ong. After all, she's the teacher who's most familiar with me because she was the Math teacher in P1 and P2, and the English-cum-Music teacher in Primary 3. I wonder if she'd still call my handwriting "atrocious".
Though Yun Min once told me that my second primary school was the one that gave me my crucial three years, I still love my first primary school better than my second. Those were the days that were not marked by childishly sexist arguments as to which pupil would be first in the exams (girls supporting girls, boys rooting for boys). Heard or read that, Yun Min?
I'm glad to be in an all-girls' school. There's no gender bias, so you can clearly see the good and bad in people.
OK, time to add the new stuff. If any, I'll update again later. See you around ;)
Singing off.
~Seraphine Chorister~ sang in The Butterfly Garden
[1:11 PM]
