hakuna matata

yay home! i was SO thankful for SQ when i was on the way back... 11 hour flights are torturous. although i wasn't that enchanted by SQ's movie selection this time, sadly. and yay for free wireless @ Seoul airport.

the most amazing/hilarious thing happened - so i got home at 1am+, slept at 2am, when i woke up it was dark and i saw "7" on my watch but couldn't tell whether it was AM/PM, so i assumed it was AM, although i was quite puzzled as to how come I was feeling so rested if I'd only slept for 5 hrs - you have to remember that i'd slept 3 hrs for the past two nights before i left, and probably even less on the plane... anyway i decided that i had to go back to sleep if it'd only been 5 hrs, but 1/2hr later my brother thunders into the room and insists that i get up. and i'm like wat?! no i'm going back to sleep! and then he said it was dinnertime and i was like OH, i thought it was morning. haha. i was very happy :) 18 hrs without getting up! apparently my mom came in at 7 to check if i was awake, which woke me up.

anyway, other random thoughts on the way home and when i got home:
when at the airport, staring at the blue sky, somehow i just realized how my good friends are graduating and i'm sad. that they won't be around to go out with, cook with (rarely, and i don't do the cooking :p) and share experiences with, basically. so now i know why jon and cs were complaining that 3 years is too short.

and when i got home, i realized i missed my parents. like having friends is great (i remember reading somewhere that friends are family that you choose), but having family to take care of you is good too. heh.

another thing when i got home (in general) is that singapore has changed, and the less often i come back (or the longer i stay in the US), the more used i get to being in the US and singapore starts getting more foreign, which is a little sad...

so once again, i think mommy was right in telling me NOT to TA this stupid class.. it has brought me nothing but trouble since the start of the quarter... but then again i really thought God was leading me to it. maybe i was just blinded by the idea that i was going to earn $ (not really, anymore, given circumstances >.<) and that TAing is like a prestige thing cos it actually means i'm competent (which really, i've questioned the entire quarter)

okay yes i'm in a rather bad mood at the moment... there're just some things you wish you could turn back time and erase, but it can never happen. wish i was home and could forget about all this crap. WHY did this have to happen.. okay i still need to study for a final tomorrow.

tired! !!! tired of so many things. at least my creativity presentation is done, phew :) and i'm rather ashamed i was so insistent that my cable was the correct one when it clearly wasn't, i guess stress was running a little high but still.. sigh. i guess i've just been a little frustrated with the team in general for the whole quarter so it builds up. such a terrible person :(

and last night i did something i haven't done in a very very long while.. falling asleep without an alarm [which was really an honest mistake, i suppose i didn't press the 'save' button or something.. -_- anyway thank God that i still got up in time to be writing my negotiation journal now.

but yes, tired of my classes, of going to class, of doing the homework. and it's not like the classes aren't cool but it's just a feeling. 'just a feeling'... anyway yesterday i got bored while painting [has happened quite a few times b4 actually, frustrating when it isn't looking the way i want it to], i don't feel like going to class/...

i think it was a mistake to TA now. how weird. but i really shouldn't complain cos i'm getting paid. but i also feel like i'm not working enough to justify the pay but again who ever does... >< prof is so hard to deal with (or at least, i always feel like it's a game of fencing with him or something. maybe cos i see how many different 'faces' he has and i'm afraid. it is really kind of weird and i don't know what it is. i thought God led me to this job but i really don't know anymore. but it is kind of cool to see how stuff works. it seems that my mom is always right. haha.

700th post!

I think this is something I struggle with sometimes:

fr C.S. Lewis [in Tim Keller's Reason for God book]:

Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket of coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket - safe, dark, motionless, airless - it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation.

i figured this is the best place to write it if any, before i forget. midterm critique for my painting class was yesterday, and it was so interesting. well, actually only mine was really interesting to me, even though i did find it curious that people have such different perspectives. anyhow, i found it interesting because one of my classmates thought that my nature painting reminded her of candy. and i think it was another classmate/my teacher/both who said that my music abstract painting gave the impression of playfulness/being a little whimsical or something to that effect.

anyway, when anna said "candy", i was very startled as to how someone could see that in my painting cos frankly i just thought it was a bunch of flowers and leaves! anyway, somehow "candy" made me think back to thanksgiving when we were in islands of adventure and daryl said he thought i would like dr seuss land - which i really did, cos it had pastel colors and cute kiddy characters. and then i started wondering about how personality gets reflected in painting... or art. very curious. i must ask other people what they see...

this negotiation class is a little bit tough... no actually both this and the creativity class are hard to apply. as in, i can theoretically understand how the concepts work and all that, but putting it into practice is so SO difficult. and analyzing my behavior (for negotiation)... augh! maybe i'm just being lazy though.

but at the same point it is so funny how i've done so much similar stuff in SEALNet. or at least, the professional mentors talked to us about active listening, using "I feel.. " instead of "you are (doing something to me)" because you can't refute the first one but you can for the second... there are just so many things it's so weird! and then i also found out that kevin used this game that my creativity prof came up with. anyway, it's just so interesting, the overlap.

i'm just so ridiculously excited i had to post!

so i took an MS&E class last quarter, and i thought the prof had very unorthodox ways of doing things. and is also very invested in his students. so i figured, since my two advisors weren't particularly helpful (they're very academic), i should go ask him for help. so i met him once on wed and was supposed to meet him today to talk about this... in which i was sitting around trying to figure out what other class i could take to fit in my schedule and get to a full workload (i have decided that i can't slack cos if i do i'll just totally slack off, last quarter was a disaster).

and then i see the TA for that class waiting for the prof too. so i said hi and everything... and then we're waiting for him and i'm trying to find classes. so prof finally arrives (1/2hr late, i might add) and he talks to the TA first. apparently the class is too big and they need a third TA. so... after a bit he comes over and is like "what're you doing?" and decides i'm a candidate for the job. haha.

so i have an offer to be a quarter-time course assistant. i don't think i could handle 1/2time. anyway.. yup. and i came back and was telling CS online and then he informed me i needed to have >180 units and i promptly freaked out! and then i checked my unofficial transcript.. praise God, I have -drumroll- ... 181 units! isn't that crazy???? first, i'm trying to find something to fill my time and i get a job (which pays, i hope they pay me well :p). and then i have JUST enough units to allow me to do this. God is amazing.

also, side note of praise report: i'm taking 4 main classes this quarter, 3 of which have restricted enrollment and which I got into!!! by His grace, of course :) it's really crazy. i already love my classes this quarter. haha. creativity, negotiation (according to kevin, is the "mother of all classes"), painting and econ of education. and at the same time i'm still wondering if this CA thing will go through. but I have faith.

oh, and i applied for my OPT anyway. dewen said that takes a lot of faith. acting before i know for sure that i have a job. i'm sure he phrased it differently but well, you get the point. i was kinda surprised cos i was thinking more like i'm covering all my bases... we'll see.

yay i finished one final! i thought it was slightly disastrous though. it was kinda funny actually cos i was sitting behind this girl i know from class and she was just writing pages and pages and pages! whereas i had enough stuff to fill three pages and that was it. granted, her handwriting was bigger. but still... anyway, so after the exam she was like oh i wrote the outline at like 2:30pm today (the final was at 7pm). me: -gape-. haha.

anyway this whole thing about jobs and blah is getting to me again. why why why does this scenario have to repeat itself... didn't i already go through this last year. why is it so difficult? yeah i'm just whining. and then i also realized i'm not really leading stuff this year. just cos i don't want to. why do i have to do things cos i think other people want to see it on my resume? or at least that's what it feels like. i feel like i have to lead something to put on my resume. but then i also don't want to be leading this year anyhow. and i've already done the latter so i suppose the former didn't actually matter that much. -shrug- weird moods.

i really want to believe Jer 29:11-14. which is incidentally from a rather interesting source... but when there's nothing in sight and just a bunch of worries it's so hard! anyhow here's the verse:
11 "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile."
it's such a beautiful promise. but i have to admit i am lacking faith at this point. for a bit. not that i'm doing anything about it on my own either. aiyah. so messed up!

amazing healing experience. !!!

i think i was almost delirious last night man. so... i was quite sleep deprived as it was, and then wasn't feeling so great, had dinner @ Lindsey's (I think I reaelly shouldn't have had brownie/curry) and then came back and I was like okay... i need a Jamba Juice. my psychological crutch for getting well. Coldbuster w antioxidant boost! Anyhow it didn't really help, ate an orange and gargled some warm salt water (i had a scratchy throat since the morning)

was trying to do my econ problem set but just wasn't really functioning so decided to go to bed (it's 1am+). at this point i'm really desperate cos i have a presentation at 8am and the pset due at 3pm (well, 1pm if i was going to go for class) and really can't afford to be sick. so i wake up at 4.45am (after tossing and turning and having nightmares about my presentation - really! i wasn't even going to be the one presenting, don't know why i was so stressed out about it) and i'm feeling terribly hot and feverish. so wet towel, wipe myself. at 6am i wake up and the fever's gone! Praise God. I was like this is a frickin miracle. although granted I still had a headache at some points today...

alright bed time. oww.

sighh. i shouldn't have left my bag unattended cos the cap of my water bottle came off as i just left it on the couch and people were sitting on it or something.. anyhow my phone got drowned and i am desperately trying to save it [and it is SUCH bad timing too cos i was trying to figure out where Daryl was since he's leaving tmr]. at least it survived for a while.

so, according to google's many sources, i should try putting it in rice (desiccant) overnight. so my phone is right now sitting in rice and i REALLY hope it will work fine tmr. ack. this is a terrible time for a wonky phone...

and here's something quoteworthy:

"Tricks like leaving your phone in a bowl of dry rice will help to expedite moisture evaporation. They might also have side effects like getting rice in your phone."
==> http://dailyknowhow.wordpress.com/2007/06/13/save-a-wet-cell-phone/

isn't that priceless? at least i still can laugh. haha.

update:
oh dear me. my phone really does have rice in it. -horror- i can hear the grains rattling around inside! i wonder if having rice remnants is better than having water. i suppose so huh O.o [selected transcripts of my gchat conversation w jackie]

sigh. i don't even know what's wrong with me! i finished my paper (in the nick of time and wasn't that fantastic), went to cirque (which was fun, but somehow i was slightly preoccupied.. i guess it was somewhat because i was like aahh this is not a front view but a side view. but i loved the trickster's style. haha.) had dinner, came back and went to lisa's to worship and pray. and decided i would come back alone.

i really don't know what it is... so impatient and basically getting annoyed at everyone now. why the heck does everyone ask me if i'm smoking pot or something cos i had "puff the magic dragon" on my gchat?! it was just for fun cos it sounded amusing.. and it's a song isn't it. -_- don't know why i'm so touchy right now. aiyahh.

i suppose the prospect of the ENTIRE afternoon tomorrow devoted to GEM is not a particularly exciting one. esp when i need to settle so much other stuff.. or so it feels. bah.

anyway. bed.

i'm sitting here waiting for the silly SLAC bus to come. it's late! anyway, jackie needs help with her dress (which, in my opinion, is a rather scandalous dress) and so...

i'm so thankful that my STP grade (i.e. the 15 page paper that i didn't really start writing till the week it was due) was pretty good, considering. praise God! :) and apparently He also seems to be telling me that either 1. my resume is good but my interviewing skills suck cos i have not gotten any second rounds whatsoever [sigh] or 2. i should go find something other than consulting to do. oh, or 3. the job market is bad and it's nobody's fault. welllll. -_-

anyway i'm rethinking my MS&E coterm because these people are such intense competitive people [or so i assume?] and i'm just like i don't really care that much about beating the competition... and business stuff is such BS sometimes. this class is interesting (sometimes) but after talking to Daryl.. maybe i should just graduate early, save some money and do something else.

more to come later, attempting to go try to catch the bus. aha.

i guess the good coming out of this whole interviewing fiasco is i know i can act in some situations, at least. two of my interviewers said i had good energy. and if you know me, energy is not really a word you would use to characterize me most of the time. haha.

i don't even feel like complaining anymore. oh well. i was in a really bad mood in class though. as usual. i hate my classes so much of the time and just want to leave.. maybe this is just a bad week or something. i don't know. ohhhh i know. it's the horrible weather. rain and wind and cold... man.

wow. it's funny how little decisions can make such a difference. so after church lisa said they were going back to her place to pray. and then i was looking at my watch and thinking, i have so many meetings today and i need to prep for interviews and one of the later meetings, can i really afford the time? and then I thought about it and I decided time is given by God, if I don't give it to Him He could very well just take it away...

anyway, I found out so much about other people. everyone's having a hard time with various things, and I wouldn't have known otherwise. Anyway it was very comforting to pray with the rest, and Dewen gave us a lot of words. okay that sounds kinda silly. But I think it was really what I needed to hear, esp cos of the whole -why-aren't-i-more-comfortable-with-being-outspoken- crap I've been going through last week with the GEM class..

So here's the verse:
2 Cor 12:9 But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.

His power is made perfect in my weakness. That is powerful..

i wish i didn't have to do anything... haha. that makes no sense whatsoever. no it does. i'm just lazy. homework, internship-interview prep, ECA stuff.. i'm just so tired! i don't want to do anything! why does everyone have to DO stuff here? jackie would probably resonate with me on this huh. maybe i've just wasted too much time shopping on my to-be-reimbursed stuff and blah... this is so stupid.

internship stuff is stressful when my roommate is going for the same jobs as i am. sometimes i can see it in perspective and sometimes i really can't. anyway it's just like i go for these session things and see a whole lot of people i know and i know they're also going to be the people i'm competing with for a JOB. ugh.

homework, i just don't feel like doing. and seriously, those two guys on my team talk SO much it's so difficult to get a word in edgewise. i wonder if L gets frustrated with them. it's not that they don't have good ideas, they definitely do. but other people have things to say too yeah... half the time it's like they're having their own private conversation so the rest of us will just talk about something else. but L is good at like organizing the entire group though, got to hand it to her. and S is interesting, sometimes he's just saying totally unrelated things (well, unrelated to what we're talking about). but maybe i do that sometimes and i just don't realize either.

ECA stuff... i don't know man. somehow when SEALNet emails come in i never feel like responding to them. oops. tu would probably kill me.

next week is going to be hell with all these interview things. i am just slightly terrified and my trust in God seems to have disappeared....

okay so since serene's complaining, i will blog. given that i am, as usual, procrastinating. i really don't understand this. i'm taking 3 academic classes and 1 dance class (and hardly doing the reading for the academic classes) and still not really coping as usual... this ms&e class is hard. and i feel like i'm not even contributing very much to my group cos the guys are so talkative and dominate everything. and also, i have not yet said anything in class, which is kind of a problem... ack.

oh! i must tell my XA retreat story. so i originally was considering not going, cos with my flooded (now newly renovated) room and all that, i could've used the weekend to buy all my replacement stuff... and do internship apps. it's thursday 3am+ and i'm still not decided (and i got back late cos i had a meeting, and then ended up hanging out at jh's and seihout's place w di and tu. anyway i ended up asking kevin if i should go. and listed like four reasons that i'd be better off sticking around here. and then i was telling him that it's charismatic (but clare recommended that i go anyway) and ... in the end i realized i forgot why i signed up early in the first place. and "retreats are supposed to be good for you". i don't know why that stuck. anyway i decided to go, and it was a terribly unproductive long weekend in terms of schoolwork (i had such great ambitions), but God-wise it was great!

the first night the pastor delivered this message about hosea and his unfaithful wife. likened to God and us, his people, turning away from him again and again. i never thought of it in that light.. anyway, lots of questions. but renewed God-focus, which hopefully I am able to keep. the XA Stanislaus/UC Merced worship team was pretty awesome, even if they had slightly weird songs ("i have the best dad in the whole world" and "heaven meets earth with a sloppy wet kiss"). haha. and all the XA pastors are so gifted in the art of speaking! and very humorous. i sat there thinking.. if the pastoring thing doesn't work out, they can all go be standup comedians.

here're some links for fun... he is now one of my favorite comedic people.
http://www.the-ormes.com/cat.htm
http://www.the-ormes.com/oxygen.htm

yeah, now i have to go find myself a good pillow tomorrow. and decide if i should return my current comforter and body pillow. both of which i'm pretty happy with but my mom is convinced i should get a better one. sighhh.

wonder if anyone still reads this. it's been a month! wow.

anyway, crazy europe trip! i didn't understand why cheukka only wanted to travel for a week or 10 days at most, but now i do. it is tiring to not have a real home for too long. and the irony of it all... while i'm thinking of a room to come back to, the storm is busy wrecking it. well, not exactly, since the storm happened like 5th jan or something, pretty near the end of my trip.

i'm glad i got to see so many places though! we had some hilarious times... i still need to type out those quotes. and i don't know if not bringing my macbook along was a good idea or not. i guess i'm glad i didn't have to carry it around cos it IS kind of heavy.. but i could've done my resume stuff and all that. maybe.

so.. london. it was cold. and i don't really remember what i thought of it. maybe big cities just don't have as well-defined characters? or maybe we didn't do enough walking around to get a sense... took a lot of tubes. haha. while poor tracy was trying to keep warm. anyhow, cheukka met us at the airport! phew:p and got to meet kahli one of the days, which was fun too.

rome. been there, it was fun going thru the market and i was so tempted to buy lychees/clementines! lychees reminded me a LOT of vietnam and PV07... and the discovery that we should google good places to eat instead of settling for crappy food wherever we happen to find it. i don't even know why food has become that important, it must be jackie's fault :p

florence. i don't know why but it looked like what i thought prague would look like! the architecture of the church and the dull colors... prague was so not like that. oh well. nice quaint little town. and when i say little, i mean little. i'm still wondering where the stanford in florence campus was. but i was always fascinated with the word "firenze" and am glad i finally found out it's florence. haha.

venice. always wanted to go see! sea-town always fascinated me. pity we arrived in crappy weather (cloudy and cold), but thankfully it cleared up (sunny but still cold). the idea of boats as "buses" is so novel (to me, anyway) and refreshingly different. it takes forever to get to places though, sometimes i just wish we had a speedboat. being near the sea is lovely though, always liked water. very peaceful.

paris. been there too, but now i actually knew where i was (navigating) and that's a nice feeling to have. as opposed to just following people around... and now i can speak! kind of. haha. and i love patisseries. although i think i unfortunately ate too many sweet things. ooh, met liangsi and yanghan and qinghan and kevin! that was fun. yanghan looks a little different from what i remembered from JC... and when i saw qinghan i was like hmm she looks slightly familiar. then when she introduced i was like oh! ... haha. cool. and kevin looks so much like jipson, i don't even know why. well ok maybe not THAT much, but somehow or other.

prague. yayyyy i finally got to meet ting after 2 years! maybe 3. hm. and her boyfriend. haha. they're so cute. we had a lot of fun times though, despite freezing. and i got to go shopping on my own for one day, which was nice... anyway it was a pity serene wasn't there, would've been even funnier i think.

back to london, where i try to figure out what i'm doing on 6 jan. so i was supposed to have lunch with tapiwa and then shop... but he gave me the wrong phone no. and so while i was trying to figure out wat his no. was, hk and jiahui persuaded me to go down to cambridge. i guess it was hk saying that it would be nice for me to come when people are there to show me around that clinched it. since my whole point of coming to europe this year was to see people before they graduate. pity i didn't manage to see aud/puee/yunlei. silly pple. anyway, cambridge is so pretty. i guess it's more landscaped than stanford... and i got to play a pipe organ! wish i knew more about how it worked.. and i should play piano more often. haiyah.

so... sat is my disaster night. when i realize i forgot to pay my credit card bill, and i see this email w subject "flood damage to room 211" and at first i'm like is that spam.. then i realized that IS my room number so i'd better read it. at first i'm like is this a joke... such a horror.

anyway the long and short of it is that there were huge storms in northern california on 5 jan (i think, or maybe 4th?) and water clogged up the drainage pipes on the 3rd floor balcony, which is directly above my room. so.. the water seeped through the ceiling, collected on the floor, and seeped through the carpet. thereby destroying all our bedding (which they sent to laundry but i am most certainly not accepting the laundered stuff) and various other things.

spent most of this week packing up and moving in, my boxes are still in such disarray and i've been so bad with emails and things. it's sad how i can't really get stuff done unless i have a to-do list. else i just get distracted and forget things and blah.

having hell deciding what to claim and all that... and buying stuff this weekend at heavenly.. man. such a pain that i almost hate snowboarding, which would be terribly sad since i now have a new board. but i hope stuff works out.

sigh maybe i should just take some medicine. my nose is so blocked and i sound like a frog! but i think i just need to sleep. which i can hardly afford given i took a 2-hr nap just now (it was supposed to be 1/2hr but i decided heck i'm too tired) and when i got up, it was so dark i thought it must be past 6 but it was 5:50pm.

so frustrating, why do these things happen to me? stupid soc class, 91 is A- and 92 is A. guess what i got -_- now i have to take that stupid final. i'm tempted to just let it go but it was SUPPOSED to be an easy A. i guess jackie's right, either we should've listened in class or done the reading. but seriously, lectures are so boring... whatever, i shouldn't have taken this class cos i'm going to fulfill the GER next quarter anyway, but that's too late...

psych study guide qns are hard. or at least, i can't do more than one at a time, which slightly screws up my crazy timetable... how to do 4 qns a day?! augh. it's so mentally taxing. maybe i'm just being lazy.

i wonder how europe will turn out. i hope it'll be good... and not TOO expensive. eek.

i hate time value of money.

somehow i was reminded of this verse (which I've read in one of the Anne of Green Gables books before, coincidentally. such a kiddy book but i don't care! whee). "weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning" - Psalms 30:5

not that i was in tears last night (although jackie's ra-ra speech was rather touching, but it really seemed quite hopeless. in which i couldn't sleep and sat up for 1/2hr drawing out this ridiculous timetable for the next week and a half, which i actually think is going to work. :) He has blessed me so richly and direct my path. Praise Him! anyway, i guess it helped that i went for econ 111 office hours today, and really, I feel, by God's grace, there was just one other guy there who was just talking about stuff so i pretty much got personal tutoring for 45mins. SWEET. :)

and it also helped that i started studying for psych earlier so i finished going thru lectures and can SLEEP. YAY. i thought i t\was going to die in econ 153 today. don't know how come time passed SO slowly, sheesh.

anyway, i believe. now, i believe i can do it. yesss! inspirational speech to self. ahaha.

so... after the initial relief at finishing my soc paper (which I really hope, by God's grace, will go well so I don't have to take the stupid final), I am now DEAD!!! whee. with a thump i fall back on the ground of reality. from soaring in the clouds. wheee.

here is what the rest of my "quarter" (more like week and a half) looks like:

tmr: econ 153 pset due (which is like 5% of my grade and i spent >4hrs trying to write up the analysis on facebook.... how inefficient is that)
thurs: psych 60 quiz. i NEED to ace this one, at least i started reading earlier so this shouldn't be such a problem, i hope and pray
fri: econ 111 pset due. this is driving me UP THE WALL. i am going to be a bat soon, hanging from the ceiling. what sort of noises i'll be making, i don't know.

mon: optional soc final (which i really pray i won't have to do)
tues: econ 111 take home essay due (1500 words, yippee!)
wed: psych 137 final (i have no idea how to integrate lectures on "models" and "concepts" and various other abstract things, our study guide has 19 qns, we're supposed to look at the midterm study guide which had about 15 qns which may be on the final)
thurs: econ 111 final (so, i'm currently below the mean for this class i.e. i NEED TO ACE THIS FINAL ELSE I'M DONE FOR)
fri: econ 153 final (also think i'm around the mean for this one, and i have no idea how to answer his qns to the point, so that's going to be interesting)

... basically, i need a miracle. or actually, LOTS of them.