A Space of My Own 我的空间

It was 6 something in the morning and it was just so delightful when I took a walk to Cheers when everything was quiet and peaceful in Raffles Hall. Most residents were still asleep and the atmosphere of a sleeping NUS around the YIH area was so serene. But a few hours after that there will be noise and queues, the buses will start operating and a life of intense mugging will start.


I realize that the main reason why I can actually start enjoying this morning when I'm not Wing Mei or any other 'nature-loving' person but it is that I don't have exams today. Pathetic reason, I know. But when I have a stressful papers coming up in just a few hours, daybreak after mugging through the night is really not very welcome because it means I have less time to cover whatever I need to cover. And it's the time I start feeling really tired.

My exams are not over yet. One paper down, three more to go next Monday, Wednesday and Thursday. Then Tirza told me yesterday, that Simon told her Wayne's going back to Hong Kong on the 30th (next Monday). He asked me and the other campus people out for dinner last night quite a number of days before but I turned down the invitation because I had very limited time to mug for exams, and I didn't know he was going back HK for good so soon! Fortunately I got the news early enough and actually took quite long to decide whether to go or not because my revision progress was terribly slow and anything might potentially make me go a letter grade down or more in exams. In the end I decided to go, and went. In fact I felt terrible even considering not going even after knowing that I won't be seeing Wayne again (till someone get's married, he promised to come back to Singapore if any one of us got married). What in the world has exams turned me into, even considering not saying farewell to a friend (and Yeh Yeh!) for the last time! Horrible.

It was a fun night out and Simon and Jiun Ming were very kind because Simon fetched us to Sakae Sushi in Marina Bay for that farewell dinner, and JM fetched us back. :D They are always generous with their time and petrol! Pictures of the farewell dinner will be up after exams. In fact I didn't take too many because I saw Wayne brought his own camera and I got lazy. I wish he didn't have to go back HK though because I miss him already! Maybe it's because I know I won't be seeing him again (till someone gets married) and also we're both from the Lee family (although his is 'Li' in Chinese it's the same) and I call him Yeh Yeh, and I still owe him ice-cream for his birthday! Wayne, if you're reading this I'll treat you ice-cream if you come for Friday BS before going home. Or after you come back to Singapore again one day.

I was in JM's car on the way home and was so tired I was nodding away on the way back. Still as we passed by the city area I saw all the lights and then again thought that Singapore would be such a lovely place if it was not all about meritocracy and stress. The daybreak today was so nice, the environment so peaceful and green, the city was clean and beautiful. It would be so perfect, as it even seems now when I'm a student and not yet exposed to the stress in the working world. Even taking exams as a student has distorted me so much. How much more will I change after I work?

Somehow my thoughts remind me about this all-famous story about peace:

Years ago a major art gallery sponsored a competition for painters. They were offering prizes for the best painting on the subject of "Peace." As attenders browsed through the entries, most had decided that a one certain painting was almost sure to win. It portrayed this lush green pasture under a vivid blue sky, with the cows grazing lazily and a little boy walking through the grass with his fishing pole over his shoulder. It really made you feel peaceful. But it came in second. The painting that won was a real surprise. The scene was the ocean in a violent storm. The sky was ominous, the lightning was cutting across the sky, and the waves were crashing into the rock walls of the cliffs by the shore. No peace. But you had to look twice to understand what was going on. There, about halfway up the cliff, was a birds' nest, tucked into a tiny hollow in the rock. A mother bird was sitting on that nest - with her little babies, tucked underneath her, sleeping soundly. That was peace!

True peace - is not walking under the daybreak sunlight knowing that there are no exams today. Real peace is walking into the exam hall knowing that I've done all I could and God is holding my hand. Real peace is not fretting over results when exams are over, not fretting over job search after I graduate, knowing I've done all I can and God takes care of my future, only providing the best for me. Peace is knowing that even in Singapore, I can take time to enjoy daybreaks and sunsets, because each today is a gift, and tomorrow is well taken-care of and provided for.

Ahh! I have so much to learn! I need more faith. Open my eyes and let me see, Lord. Let me see and acknowledge there's the sun behind the clouds and the Lord behind the nature I behold penerates and guides over every little detail of my life for His glory.

I updated my status message in Facebook: When Diligence and Determination do not work, Desperation must. One of my quotable quotes. =p

Simon commented and asked me not to forget Dependence. Wonderful reminder! Thank God for desperation for it drives us to turn to Him. Sometimes I worry and think about too many things and lose the joy in God because I forget to depend on Him.

And it's not just my studies, it's more than that. It's seeking sufficiency from Him in advancing first and foremost the glory of His kingdom.

The song below is very meaningful and I think besides being a reminder that God's grace is sufficient for us to meet our daily needs, it also causes us to think of the reasons why we seek God's grace. Not just to meet the needs of self, but to glory God's name in reaching out to others.

This is the time of the year where all the frantic mugging starts. My project life ended yesterday (Friday), and the last project report will be handed in on Monday. With all these projects and presentations, during reading week, I actually feel glad to be able to start mugging at last, and catch up with some of my webcasts. Sigh - I'm actually glad to start mugging! I feel terribly left behind.

The project and lab presentations were OK. We had some mistake in our report for the Separations project, but the professor was quite nice about it. I heard that some groups had some rather 'violent' reactions, and though I wish our answers were correct, at least it didn't go too badly, and I'd rather not think about it again now.

Lab presentation was the best. The professor who listened to us was very encouraging and positive, and was not intimidating at all. He even invited us to sit down during our presentations, only my group members were more at ease with standing up and pointing to the screen. In fact, he was so nice, that we took a little extra time in presenting. In the end, he seemed to be hardly listening to what I was saying (I had the last section of the presentation), and kept on agreeing and nodding instead. I suppose he wanted to speed up the presentation so that the next lab group could come in on time. I wish all professors were like him. LOL.

Hmm. I suddenly ran out of content on what to blog about. My life is so confined to my studies, there's not much breathing space already.

Yesterday during Bible Study we had a short discussion, on whether when it shows when a person is living a life for the glory of God. I still think it shows, despite people being unpredictable and all that. There's some people who are burning with this warmth and it is all very transparent in their character. Of course not all people. I'm not very sure about most of my brethren, but those I'm sure about, I know :) You just feel it. And I wish I had that very same warmth and light emitting through me. It's not easy to have that. There's a lot of sacrifices, and a lot of time to be put in. I wish that I would have enough faith and love to put in all those time and effort, and enough faith not to be discouraged as I always am.

My sleep time-table has gone haywire again.

I'll be having two presentations tomorrow. One for project and another for lab. This is the worst time for presentations ever. All of us want to start studying for finals but can't really do so because we have to prepare for our presentations. There's the slides, the speech and the ever challenging effort of sticking to the time allocated when you have this vast amount of slides to finish. Then after today's presentations there will be a mid=terms test for HYSYS on Friday.

I managed to squeeze both my presentations nicely within the time limit, but I do hope I am clear enough and coherent enough to be understood. Actually, after talking to some of my friends who have done their presentations, I realized that time isn't an all-important factor after all, but just a rough estimate by lecturers. They do chip in and ask questions half-way through.

The lab presentation's the worst. It's held like some 12 hours later and some of my lab partners are still editing slides. Mine are done but I don't fully understand what I'm presenting. Isn't that horrible or what. The professor in charge said the aim of this presentation is more to let us get a hang of what presentations are like. (Like we don't know that yet!) But still, the good point is we don't need to submit our lab reports. Hmm. I can't really decide which is worse.

Just got all my welfare packs for exams and the quality has deteriorated much since last year. I thought last year we should have goodie bags that are smaller because of the economic downturns, but looks like we're just coming the feel the effects this year! Still, I should be grateful for being able to have goodie bags during exam period at least. Having sourced for sponsorships myself I do know it's not easy to get them, although being able to advertise having product exposure to the whole of NUS helps.

Hmm that's all for today I guess. I've been drinking coffee daily lately :( Can't help it.

We just had an all-girls dinner! Oh well, with the exception of papa Phea, who was actually the main reason why we all went out. He felt weird being the only guy.


Zhi Jun had uploaded this picture on Facebook, and there was a long train of comments underneath by us who were inside. We decided that those of us in school should go out and eat. Haha. I just realized this photo in Phoenix was just taken by my camera.

Miss our year one times when we all always got together for dinners, celebrated birthdays, and frequently met up. Now all of us are so busy that we seldom eat together. So it was quite nice that Phea, Zhi Jun, Wen Qiao, Tirza, Lin Yan and I had dinner together tonight at Clementi. It was fried rice, and bee hoon with clams and it only cost us $3.50 each.

After dinner, we girls shopped like forever in Fair Price while Phea waited outside. He walked home, but we took the bus. Hope we can have get-togethers like this more often, with the rest around. Now I hardly see Alex and Li Wei, and both Swee Yee and Piang Piang are enjoying SEP overseas.

GLCC Campus celebrated Nick and Lydia's birthdays last Friday too. Photos in my Facebook album. I wish I had more time for campus too. Sometimes we really need to fork time out for people and relationships, but school work really drains me out now, and instead of that I have to fork time to sleep! I really need to reorganize myself. :(

Just corresponded with my teacher in Facebook, and somehow when studies where mentioned, I remarked that students should cherish the day when they reap what they sow, i.e. get good results if they study hard enough.

Suddenly I had this thought: If later in the working world, what you put in is not equal to what you get out, they why should we be trained, or even start to learn to think this way? Why should we work hard to get good results, when in the end, there will always be people better than you in the end?

I read someone else's comment on Facebook. It's not fair, he said, that he should put in more and still get nothing much out of it. Another friend who read the comment said simply, 'Life is fair'.

Yes, it's easy for someone to say life is fair when they are on the bell curve, when they are smarter, faster, and maybe have the ability to work harder. What is fair? Is the bell curve fair? Singaporean students are pushed to work and excel in every area. They are kiasu and hardy, they learn how to be competitive and strive for the things they want. But in the end, not all will end up at the top. Someone will always have to lose out. Does the perspective of 'fair' change according to what end of the bell curve you are at?

Why do we learn to be good and diligent and work hard, when in real life, reaping and sowing are two different things? Why is a student taught to chase after his dreams at whatever cost, only to be disheartened and forced to give it up?

I find myself trying to answer these questions as I type.

I guess it's like a farmer would always have to sow and reap no matter how his crop turns out. It's his livelihood. He can't control the rain or sun, or how the crop turns out. It's just something he has to do no matter what. From young the child is taught to plough and plant so that when he grows up he can survive. And as the complexity of life and circumstances increase as he grows, he realizes that the crop turnouts may not be fine. He can't change that, but he can change himself. He can't change the nature of the field and his crops, but he can be innovative and find creative ways to solve problems. He can also always be joyous and depend on God to provide.

It's just like us in Engineering learning how to use simple models to solve real life problems. In reality, the things we are calculating are much more complex, and the models we use are a mere estimate, just like the concept 'you reap what you sow', and may not be applicable in all circumstnaces. But the little basic model, far-fetched and useless it may seem in the long run, would prove to be valuable for the learning and derivation of more complex solutions to a problem.

Life cannot always be fair. This world is struck and marred so much that it is imperfect. Disasters strike, circumstances turn one topsy turvy. The guy whom you are envious of because of what he has and what he can achieve may lose what is most precious to him the next day. People who slog hard to earn a position and their possessions lose it all in a blink of an eye, just like the day when the World Trade Center crashed down.

There are many unfair things in this world, so much that we're numbed to those that do not concern ourselves. So much that we see the only unfair things are us working for that academic cert which might not last until goodness knows when. But one thing I know that is unfair: Christ cruficified for my sake, and all I do is focus on small little things like this when I should be concerned over bigger things for Him.

I didn't know that I had changed so much over less than two years in NUS. Myself.

Was reading this blog post because I dug it out when Simon and Tirza mentioned the song I posted once. That was around 1.5 years ago.

I knew there were quite a lot of things I didn't like about myself back then. But now when I looked back, I see I took some things for granted. I thought I would always be optimistic, and unaffected by the cares of this world. I thought I would always wholeheartedly rely on God to take care of me. I thought I would always hold true to the values I felt were to be held on to.

Apparently, too much concern over how I have been doing academically have been causing me to let go of things. And it is qutie painful to realize that I have allowed this rat race to shape me so much.

The race itself is not a bad thing. It opened up my mind to see how much I could learn and humbled me before others. If others moan about mediocrity, all I wanted to be was just 'another average student', instead of one trying to catch up with the average student. It made me see and feel how I never really felt before back in my younger days - inferior.

But the desire to catch up and pull myself back up had caused me to burn bridges, and burn myself too. I know my CAP is not worth all of this. But somehow I couldn't stop.

Somehow I wish I had the courage to love, serve, and have passion for other things again, rather than letting my CAP cast a shadow over everything I do in my university life. It is very sad.

I wish I would just be able to learn without thinking too much about the results. Play the piano as much as I want without thinking about how it eats up my study hours. Blog freely instead of moan about how hard I've been studying - it's so pointless doing so. And spend more time with my friends, and other people, instead of wondering how long each outing and each talk will take, and again, whether it will cut my study time short.

I know that there are expectations for me to work hard, but I wonder if they would even exist if they knew that I'd become someone like this. And worse of all, the highest and most pressing expectations come from myself.

I read so many blogs about studies nowadays and how burdened people are about them. And I don't want to become just another one of them. God has a plan for me out there. And I just need to take that step of faith to trust.

Right now I had just forced myself to sleep off the effects of caffeine wakefulness, and so that my tired eyes could get a rest after working overnight. I'm going to force myself to slog again through the night. It is the same routine, before and after this blog post.

But perhaps, I could add in some peace, with the reminder that God is taking care of me, and I'm not just another average Joe, riding against the waves of academic excellence, to find yet another 9-5 job. I'm supposed to live a life God has planned for me, and not live it after I graduate. I should live it out now. And I know that life is not being a slave to mugging, which I have already made myself to be.

“There is fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel’s veins;

And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.

Lose all their guilty stains, lose all their guilty stains.

And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.

The dying thief rejoiced to see that fountain in his day;

And there may I, though vile as he, wash all my sins away.

Wash all my sins away, wash all my sins away.

And there may I, though vile as he, wash all my sins away.

Dear dying Lamb, Thy precious blood shall never lose its power

’Til all the ransomed church of God be saved to sin no more.

Be saved to sin no more, be saved to sin no more.

’Til all the ransomed church of God be saved to sin no more.

E’er since, by faith, I saw the stream thy flowing wounds supply,

Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be ’til I die.

And shall be ’til I die, and shall be ’til I die.

Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be ’til I die.

When this poor lisping, stammering tongue lies silent in the grave,

Then in a nobler, sweeter song, I’ll sing Thy pow’r to save.

I’ll sing Thy pow’r to save, I’ll sing Thy pow’r to save.

Redeeming love has been my theme. Why should I bond myself in chains when I have already been set free.

Thank God for this reminder of freedom.

Today I did the last part of my Bazaar aux. And I still love bazaar auxes! The fact that it was going to be the 'my last aux for life!' made it even more exhilarating.

As expected, there were no vendors between 9-10 am. Rafflesians down in central forum were few too, as many had their time slots in Monday and Tuesday instead of Wednesday. I managed to study and slack for the first hour.

Around 10.30 am, we were asked to publicize the RH recruitment drive for RH Pub. Interested RHesidents-to-be were asked to fill in a form, and then, they would be able to get a packet of free goodies. There was a hoop game too to attract attention. If they threw the hoop round anything on the table, they'd be able to get whatever the hoop went over. Yew Hong got a can of Pringles! There were also other gimmicks like flyers and Halloween lucky draw vouchers, top prize being a camera! Sigh! Why don't they save these goodies for existing Rafflesians instead? I never knew RH Pub had such a high budget allowance. :( Or maybe they sourced for both the money and goodies themselves.

There was another RH-Pub booth at the back of the forum too, showcasing photos taken for the New Beginnings photo competition. Sijia soon had this idea of asking all the vendors in Central forum to hang a balloon with the words Raffles Hall Hallwarming (10 Nov, 4 pm) on it, to attract attention to our poor little booth. Hence they blew up loads and loads of green balloons with a helium tank yesterday, and we were supposed to draw on the balloons.
This was when that I found that the guy giving us the balloons was in RH next year and was a junior of mine. I was rather appalled by the fact that I had a non-phantom junior in hall that I never got to know about.

Anyway, as I said on my facebook status, balloons self-destruct in my hands. I only held four. 1 flew away. Two burst when i was writing on them (and I did not exert that much force). Only the last balloon survived. :( Somehow wearing a green shirt, and writing on green balloons to promote hall suddenly made me feel that I'm very much a Rafflesian. This kind of feeling I don't get in hall despite the nice and exciting activities lined up for us this year. I remember when I last felt this... it was during IHG when then again all of us were wearing green and cheering for sports (either volleyball or handball, I forgot). And another time when we were supporting float.

Maybe I just feel that I belong when I'm in green, working with a bunch of people in green too, to showcase our hall to outsiders. And this is a funny time to feel all patriotric about hall, but yes, I like Raffles Hall a lot, after years of staying here. The way of life here is nice :) And yes, I do not really like how things are done in hall most of the time, but still there's something that pulls me back and makes me stay rooted to it.

At 12 pm I went back to hall, ending my very last aux in RH. And I still think bazaar auxes are the best aux to join :D

My body runs on grace now. And caffeine as well.

Week 11 is a happening week. The project deadline on Separations is crowding in, and we're meeting despite mid-terms preparations for next week. My own progress has been particularly slow, and my state of mind is getting more and more blurred by the day. I hope I didn't weigh down the group too much. Thank God for their understanding and patience.

RH bazaar, aka my Aux of the Year falls within this week. It's my favorite aux because a bazaar is interesting to be at in the first place. This year however, OSA has banned the selling of food that is cooked on-spot (think fire hazards and all that), so there were people complaining that they had no food to eat when their stomachs were growling for lunch. I split my 8 hours into 3 days. 2 hours on Monday, 3 on Tuesday and 3 on Wednesday.

The three hours yesterday was quite well-spent. I was there as early as 9 am and most of the vendors were not even there yet. Hence, there were many empty tables and chairs, so I pulled out my notes and started mugging. Obviously, I didn't manage to stay focused for long, but at least I covered a bit of my notes, which was better than nothing. The rest of the time was spent moaning to Jiun Tat (my junior) about how troublesome projects are and how they get into the way of studying, and how lucky he is to be able to escape projects after the revision of syllabus for his coming semester. There was this stall selling laptop skins and keyboard protectors with very interesting designs nearby, so I talked to some juniors about that too, and poked around the Biz Comm stall to see what they were selling. I wish I didn't have such a short attention span!

Since I mentioned caffeine earlier, it is interesting how I managed to survive these days. I took a long afternoon nap on Sunday (around 5 hours because I hardly slept the night before), and after that I didn't sleep till Monday night. I think I spent 5 hours sleeping on Monday night, another 5 today, and I feel strangely alert to stay up tonight as well. Thank God for his grace for my alertness despite so little sleep! Usually I must sleep around 8 hours a day in order to function properly. I haven't been overdosing on caffeine too... maybe just 1.5 cups a day? LOL. And somehow my body doesn't seem to need supper any more. I hope this doesn't mean I'll lose weight again.

There's a performance on Thursday night, meaning my night is gone. My group had finally managed to have a satisfactory practice though. It had been fun practicing with Jia Shen, Jerold, Shanqi and Chuanbo. I doubt that I'll have the chance to play with them again after this. Or play in any other cultural performance for the academic year for this matter. My industrial attachment is really going to take away all the time I have available for practices in hall. Fortunately I would still be able to contribute in Phoenix Times. I like writing for Phoenix, but now I realize that there's so many good writers in RH that I feel I have so much more to learn from them!

The seconds tick by, and the night goes on. Back to my notes I go.