Sunday, January 28, 2007

Photos/Songs

Well, I know that my last post was on a rather controversial topic, and I did had a sort of debating match on msn within about 15 minutes of me posting the post...
But that's quite beside the point, and the argument was pretty long-winded anyway, and hopefully the situation will resolve, although I partially do not agree with sitting there and eating everything that they are throwing at you...
So ya...

Anyway, someone mentioned to me about uploading all the photos that I have taken during our orientation. Reason being that it would allow us to remember everything that had happened should we separate into different classes, get transferred out or get kicked out...

I had uploaded all the photos, and really simply by looking at them, I start remembering some of the more things that had happened in our class since the first day we meet. The photos that I had added are mostly concentrated on the day of the external hunt.

Of course, I realised that it isn't just photos that will make you remember stuff, music also reminds you of a lot of things. Seriously, when I hear songs like "A public affair", "we're all in this together", "summer nights" and even "upside down", my mind start bringing up images associated with hall and full of people dancing. It also reminds me of the whole class learning mass dance and me getting sabotaged by the OGLs...

Its a really great feeling to know that there is so many ways for you to remember something that is close to your heart, like your class people that you have school with for the first three months in a JC...

But then, we all hope that the friendships that we would had built up by the end of the first three months would stay strong? right?
I hope it will... Life is so much more bearable with friends...

Discmon

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

Cold-heartedness? Singaporean?

Sometimes I wonder to myself whether or not the public has a life or not...
I mean, seriously consider it, how many of us had suffered the brunt of a complaint letter that had been directed to your school/college/group/organisations? I am sure that many of us had to go through all this sort of things and treat it as a "learning process", as quite a lot of people had been saying to me...

But suddenly, I realised and figured out something that I had been wondering for some time. The exact reason why people say that we, Singaporeans are cold and heartless, unwilling to stop for a moment and help other people who might be in trouble and are unable to laugh at any jokes, no matter how good... and the entire list of "cold-heartedness" will go on and on and on...
That is because there is always new revelations of cold-heartedness in Singapore...

Lets begin by looking at the people of other countries. Maybe we'll start with Australia. When we were at Australia some time back, we had stayed in a B&B (Bed & Breakfast). It is a form of accomodation where a person rents part of his house to you to stay for a short period of time and also provides you with breakfast in the morning before you, presumably, leave the accomodation for the next part of your journey.

While I was staying there, I was touched by the hospitality of the owners. We stayed there for Christmas and I'll never forget that day where we survived on canned food and instant noodles. No shops are opened in Australia during the days proceeding to Christmas. The owners kindly allowed us to use their kitchen to cook our dinner and had continuously offered us some of their dinner lest we starve. Their hospitality was excellent and I never forgot how their food had contributed to our "survival" over christmas in a foreign country.

The people we met in that country was also quite ok with jokes and blunders. They do not flinch at the sight of a joke that might have been played on them, but instead take it in their strides and continue doing their business...

Here, in sunny Singapore, however, things are not the same. For one thing, jokes are not tolerated. I heard stories about a "candid camera" in Singapore that collapsed because people "attacked" the producers of the show for commiting the joke on them... Unable to handle a joke, that sounds possible...

Secondly, I also realised that somehow, the older aged people in Singapore do not have any childhood memories, or even teenage memories. All of us have been children and teenagers before, why start writing complain letters to organisations that we may represent, criticising the actions that we have taken that may have affected you in the most minor and slightest way? Here comes the gist of why, we, are heartless and cold:
We are unable and are unwilling to tolerate any actions that infringe upon our own space...

No wonder people are so cold. Someone sits down on the table that you are seating and attempt to strike a conversation with you so that the eating time won't be so boring. A common Singaporean would snub the person, thinking the person is a "busybody" and ask him to mind his own business. It seems as though everyone in this place is wrapped in their own cocoon of thoughts and are unwilling to show any signs of warmth to people around them...

What has contributed to all this? Is it the high standard of living, of trying to maintain your life in Singapore? It seems highly likely, especially when you are god-damn familiar with the phrase "You can die, but you can't get sick". All of us are wrapped up in our own cocoon of problems and in the end, we forget the idea of being young and having fun. Our society is cold as everyone is working and working and working... Busy as bees would be good expression, but do we need to also take up the feelings of being protective of our own "hives"? Just like the bees?

We, as teenagers, have bits of fun once in a while. Sure, the public who has already lost their childhood can continue writing in things about our "bad" behaviour that reflects the bad name of the group we may belong to. But what good does it do? I feel that in the end, it just makes the society we are in even more colder and more heartless.

As young people, we are conditioned not to have fun, not to act as teenagers, but to act as cold, heartless Singaporean, who finds joy in giving a happy face on the surface, and then proceed to write complain letters after complain letters on the smallest thing that affects your very life...

At the rate things are going in Singapore, we will never ever fulfill what the Government is going on about creating a more caring society. If the public is unable to take a joke, to remember their childhood and their "fun" during the days and, instead, spend half their life writing letters to organisations complaining about their youths behaviour in public which we will assume, for discussion sake here and also for clarity sake, is a minor problem, I doubt the younger generation will ever, in their whole life, understand what is meant by a more "caring society" thanks to the example set by what is so-called the "general public". Which result in the continuation of the "heartless Singaporean"...

Of course, not all the public have forgotten about their childhood and are quite tolerant of our actions. There are also warm-hearted people in Singapore, the group of people who helped the people around them in the smallest way...
Then again, this people are considered by the rest of the people out there as people who are made use of...

Why live life like that, harbouring this sort of protectionist point of view, when life is hard enough...?
Go spread the seeds of happiness, as what choco love told us when he first appeared in the shaman king anime...

Discmon

Sunday, January 21, 2007

Short films, long impacts...

Its been a pretty eventful week. Yup, and I got no idea why, but I've been kinda running out of ideas to write on my blog. Its pretty much due to the fact that my 2 major sources of inspiration for blog post is gone... I remember the days when I was in the student council and in RV, there really was a lot of things to write then...

Of course, the reason why I am writing this isn't because I am lamenting that my 2 major sources of inspiration are gone, but its rather because I really want to type something down. I've been casting my mind around and moving them around all over the place trying to get an idea and I managed to get something, or I wouldn't be here anyway...

So, have any of you ever watched a short film or play before?
My first exposure to short film and play was in my secondary 1 life. A long long time ago before I had even set up this blog and write out stuffs. There was a CLDDS (chinese literary drama and debating society) in RV. As the long title suggests, what they do is that they are interested in chinese language type of drama and debating...

Anyway, when I was in sec 1, they had a public performance called 学艺新声 (xue yi xin sheng). It was basically a "short story project". They had 2 short stories and 1 slighlty longer story. I wasn't an avid audience of short plays then, seeing that I had not yet been exposed to them until then. But after watching the three short shows, I told myself that I would watch their next year performance no matter what happens.

What really gripped me about short films is that it really impacts you as you watch it. The message that the show send to you as you are sitting down and watching it is very strong. The characters only appear for a short amount of time, they don't do much, they don't talk much, but you feel for them. It is this strong message that is sent that kept me watching short films and plays. The message, the events that happens in the play keep you on the edge of your seat. There isn't any chance for laid-back-ness (this word does not exist). Things just keep on progressing on in a short play, and this is what makes it nice. It is because of all the short length and such that makes the message that the play tries to send to you very strong and very easy to pick up.

To me, short films and plays are the medias that has the easiest time sending tears into your eyes, or a hollow feeling in your heart, but it is also the easiest for you to feel happy and excited about the things that happen, so much so that you are hanging on to the edge of your seat.

It is also one of the reason why I don't really watch drama serials. To me, drama serials are not able to send a really strong message at you (although there are a few that break out of this and are really really good) but most of them aren't really up to standard. What happens in the end is that drama serials feel like they are trying to satisfy fans who adores seeing their idol up there. Besides that, drama serials have a nasty habit of dragging events, espeically korean serials (da chang jin comes to mind pretty easily). What happens after they drag? The message that they were trying to send is kinda lost or reduced in strength...

Also, I'm not sure if this is a problem in Singapore, but due to the large amounts of serial being produced here, I'm starting to be able to predict what may or may not happen in the serial. It also gets a bit boring when you see directors reuse the same idea over and over again. I'm really glad that they had abandoned the idea of a loony in their serials for the time being...

What happens is that I don't really get anything out of the drama serials other then laugh at their stupidity and occasionally pitying their horrible condition of life. There isn't those message that tells you things that makes you wonder what is friendship and so on and so forth...It is pure enjoyment when you watch this serials, but I feel that plays and films aren't just there to bring in money, it is also to show, as what arts central says, the meaning of life.

The short films that I managed to watch so far really touches your heart, your mind and your soul. The short films focuses on normal everyday stuff, and it is this normal everyday stuff that is closest to your heart that leaves you hanging on the edge of your seat as the message comes sinking in...

The greatest thing about short films is just that, its short, sweet, but it leaves you with a lasting thought.
Of course, only the good short films and plays out there can do that...
Which so far, has been quite plentiful.

Discmon

Monday, January 15, 2007

Crap mode...

It's been some time since I last posted anything on the blog. Duh, you can check the dates...
I've not really got much to write about, but I feel like writing something, its just this gut feeling inside me that I want to do something on my blog. I'll be updating the links section later with more people's blog once I find the time to do it. I realised that my link section is shrinking thanks to the whole bunch of people who has decided that they want to delete their blogs.

It should be quite nice for all you people out there to read some new blogs, so I'll be getting to them later. We might also just be able to see some promotions from other blogs to blogs that you should read. But, that's going to be another story...

Orientation at NJC had finally ended!!

It had been a crazy one week for orientation, and it was very very tiring. It's not as bad as those major training camps, but I think its tiring enough for many of us. On the last few days, its almost like the standard "reach home and d-i-e" equation that most of the training camp equates for us...

Anyway, lets talk about my NEW og (orientation group), which I'll be treating as a joke session...

Our og has a total of 28 people... out of which only four people are boys...
Is it just me? or is it that NJC is turning into a girls school...?
Ahh, who cares about that point, NJ is also known as mini-rv to a certain extent, and since RV is turning into a girl's school as well, it shouldn't be surprising that NJ is turning into a girl's school as well...

Out of the 5 boys, only one of them is a pure local singaporean... ME!!!
Ahhhhhh!!! Come on, for the last two years at least it was 50/50... now its 1/5...

Out of all 28 people, only one of them is RV...
Remind me again, NJ had intake about 120++ RV pupils this year during PAE, so how many rv people are there in my class... ONE!!!!

Ok, I know I've taken an odd combination of subjects, but that's beside the point right?
Argh, I'm crapping...

Oh ya, lets not forget to congratulate the auto-ct rep...
And I'm seriously going to start throwing things at disco people who are in hc very soon...

Discmon

Sunday, January 07, 2007

Returning to the place I belong...

Well, it’s been about one week into the New Year, and I haven’t even posted a single post on my blog yet… That’s like so totally unlike me…
But I’m still myself, so I guessed I’ve been pretty lazy or something like that…

With the start of 2007, it marks the beginning of the third year of this blog. I’m very sure that from this year onwards this blog might be able to post something slightly different other then the usual joke, criticism on RV, joke, criticism on people in RV, joke, criticism on other things and more jokes. Ok, so we might be keeping the joke, but I think things on RV might drop a bit?

Anyway, for the last week or so, I’ve been stuck in what NJ should rename as “administration week”. For the whole of last week, we’ve been kinda stuck in NJ listening to talks, talks and more talks. NJ has used three days to ensure that our head is nicely packed with information, and they’re now squeezing the last bits into places which have a bit of breathing space left. Good news is that next week is finally going to be called “orientation week” and we’re finally going to have some fun…

I went back to RV on Friday after enduring three days of talks-torturing. The moment I entered RV, it felt as though I was back home. Entering RV, I found myself at ease although I am already no longer in there as a student, but as a graduate…

My first stop back was the SC room, because I was quite sure I would be able to find a place to drop my bag there. Judging from the amount of people present in the canteen and in the school, I will most likely not be able to find a space in the canteen to drop it. There, I met some friends who were in sc, and we spent some time relating to each other how things had been for the last few days.

Afterwards, I went wandering over to the scouts and saw their perfectly straight 8m tower (which I’m not applying any sarcasm here) Realised that I missed their company… and then after sticking myself in the canteen, I found almost all the rest of my friends in RV who aren’t in sec 4. Lots of all those good old friends came rushing up to say hi and I’m real glad that I am not really forgotten yet!!

And as they came rushing up, I feel myself relaxing and feeling very happy that I am back. Life was so happy back then with a lot of friends around from almost all the levels. I have to thank a lot of people in my class who kinda helped me to find so many friends from all the levels. That was mostly because they went to other classes to find friends, so I join in their “fun” and found some friends as well…

Being back also emphasised the feeling in me that I missed RV a lot. The environment, the friends, the teachers… I don’t think words will be able to bring the points across as usual, but I really miss them all. When I see friends that I’ve left behind, I get reminded of all those times we had spent together last time. Things like going to 1D in the morning to crap, early morning canteen milo/barley/soya bean milk session with 4D people and anyone who happened to know us and in the canteen at the same time, basketball session after school ended… and a lot of other stuff…

Some lame things did happen when I came back, but I don’t think I need to talk too much about it here right? Yup!! It’s got something to do with crowding around some people, but I don’t think it’s going to be interesting, so we’re keeping it like that here. :p

Anyway, I’m really missing RV now… sigh~
I didn’t really felt this sort of feeling when I did the blogging project back in December, but now… I kinda feel like organising another blogging project back to RV again…
Guess the feeling only really sink in when you realise that you’ve finally lost it…

It’s like what a lot of people say:
“You only really realise how precious something is when you lose it…”
And it’s the second time I’m using this quote…
Life seems to be full of losing things…

Discmon