o dear Sun.

Last week. At South Lawn. A few shades darker now, I love it.

gentrification.

deep within.

// fieldwork

So, maybe that's the case.

ohemgee.

For my own reference, these are the things due before mid-sem :/ Week 5 starts tomorrow.

• Week 6 GEOG20008 tute paper
• Week 7 GEOG20003 tute presentation
• Week 8 DEVT20001 tute presentation
• Week 8 DEVT20001 essay
• Week 8 ANTH20011 essay
• Week 8 GEOG20003 essay

Week 8 is the last week of uni before the start of mid-sem break, so technically, by the end of Week 8, I seriously need a break.

hola.

Honestly, there's nothing worthy to update (or maybe I'll just think of a few along the way), but currently I have this urge of typing something other than my MW essay. The juices are not flowing, and major disappointment on the two essays. Not that I did badly per se, its just that I expected a lot better than this judging from how I fared for the first assignments.

*UPDATE* POLS LECTURE SLIDES ARE BACK ONLINE OHMYGAWD SQUEALS.

Wow, I guess there was a backlash about him taking down the lecture material.

I had my last hope, but now everything is just falling into place.

This is definitely newsworthy. In other news..

I'll be able to watch the World Cup matches for free (sorry to whoever's reading this that has to pay SGD 60++ *evil smile*) just because SBS will be telecasting it. I've already highlighted the matches that I'm interested in watching. Oh, I can't wait already. "Brazil, Brazil!"/"Forza Azzuri!"

Yeah, better get back to that essay now.

undergraduates, no more.

Woiloon's graduation on 25th March. Two days before mine. Me and Nee wore the same colour combination (cream and gray) which was so unplanned :) And then the 27th came, and it was a bittersweet moment, knowing this really marks the end of my maths and stats journey. Somewhat like a closure, maybe. Though I know for sure I am definitely going to use some of the skills I've learnt the last 3 and half years. No, I am serious. To make my graduation more memorable, I've actually imposed a colour theme on the family and friends. And I am so glad they actually made an effort to stick by it. I forgot to remind Sumi, though. So, this is it. Officially a graduate. Without my family and friends, both here and back home, I would not have come out of it sane.

wipes off the dust.

So, I've pretty much abandoned this space for a while now. Had a major setback, but all that is fine now. It was probably a blessing in disguise because in the end, I could attended Weiling's and Jesslyn's graduation. Which honestly, made me even more excited about my own graduation ceremony in March! All our hard work, stressful days/nights, tears and headaches finally came down to this. My short stint back in Melbourne wasn't so bad after all :)

Nothing would be complete without our crazy jumping shots. Credits go to Weiling's dad and cousin for these photos. I really regretted not bringing Lily back with me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alright, fine, epic fail because neither of these shots have all of us successfully jumping at the same time.

 

 

 

 

 

Oh, and Merry Christmas to everyone!

so long, Richard Berry.

The last few minutes spent in the maths & stats building. I can't believe its actually over (provided I don't screw up my finals). How did I spend my last day as an undergraduate? - Rushing to complete my assignments. I had 3 assignments due all on the same day, and at the same time. By now, I would have gotten used to this lifestyle, but the fact that it was my last ever maths assignments, I guess it made me more stressed, unknowingly.

Today I realised..

I'll never forget Operations Research. The toughest unit for me, because I am a noob in programming. But it is by far, one of the most applicable maths subject in my opinion, especially in the real world. In doing this unit, we had the chance to help a non-profit organisation (VicRelief Foodbank) with our Industrial Project (my fyp), where we had to use our OR knowledge (optimisation) to help solve a couple of their problems, like the company's distribution, stock collection, national sharing and volunteer rostering. We're reaching towards the end of our project now. Friday will be the submission of our final report.

This semester, I was fortunate to have HSG and GQ as my lecturers. Nothing beats having dedicated, committed, approachable, helpful...(you get the idea) lecturers.

Also, how fast 2 years of time spent in Melbourne University have passed. Even till now, I could still remember the time I made the decision to transfer unis. It was the first time I ever went to the city with my parents, on a cold winter's afternoon. We were standing at Lincoln Square, and video-caming its surroundings. And then we saw the uni logo, which what I know now, is the ICT building. And I thought, it would be nice if I could transfer here, since that was where I initially wanted to go to. Paps' words and a few other factors motivated me to do my best in my first 1 and a half years in Monash. Somehow, it paid off, and I got what I wanted.

And then I met the girls. W, V, S, and J. Without them, I can't imagine what my life would have been in a whole new environment. They helped me through the tough and stressful life in m&s. It definitely wasn't easy, but they made it bearable. God knows how thankful I am for them. And now each of us will embark on our new lives, with the different paths that we choose to take.

As much as I want my undergraduate life as a m&s student to end, I will definitely miss those times. 19 years of solid maths. That's my life.

operahahaha

I decided to finally download Opera and compare itself against Safari. Now I'm at a loss because both are great in their own ways. So probably I will juggle between the two as I can't find a way to transfer the bookmarks from Safari to Opera.

By the way, the widgets on Opera is cool, and yes it does make tweeting much easier. But then again, there's so many other Twitter platforms, eg Tweetdeck etc. This sounds like its coming from a tweeting-addict.

Anyhow, we finally submitted our poster today, and it looked something like this.

Due to such, I am now nursing a splitting headache, which I think is the effect of staring at Macy for far too long, probably unknowingly squinting my eyes to shift the objects around. So now, one down, and many more to go. No kidding. 2 more assignments due this Friday, and now what am I doing? Presentation on Monday, which we have not started on, but I guess things should work out fine because we are The Gilds.

And also for the record, I am so so so so sick of my hair.

females.

Another English. The daughter of Gavin Rossdale, Gwen Stefani's husband. And she's only 20.

Don't worry. I have not turned lesbian.

Anyway, I came across a picture of this living space the other day.

I know, right! Look at the room upstairs. So simple, though I'm not sure where the space for the closet will be. But just look at the living/kitchen/toilet/dining area. All in one.

Earlier today, I checked my mailbox and received a letter from the Maths & Stats department telling me I've achieved the marks to apply for Honours or Masters in Science. The feeling of reading that letter was rather bittersweet because as much as I wished I could do it, I guess my heart and brains do not entitle me to. I know if I were to pursue this, the probability of earning more money would be greater (maybe). But I guess its time to pursue what I've been meaning to. Its scary how unpredictable life is. I mean, one moment you think you want this, and then everything changes. I guess my parents are pretty disappointed, and probably even more disappointed now knowing that I had the chance to actually go further with my Maths degree.

That's just life. We make choices, decisions. Accept it, and then move on.

On a totally different note, She & Him's Volume One is a good listen, especially on a cold, gloomy day like now.

monday blues.

You know how you wake up on a Monday morning, and then hope that you won't get infected with the so-called Monday blues, but too bad it did happen? So I went to uni with a pretty sick feeling, mostly because of the many failed attempts in finishing the assignment (its not like I didn't try). The only consolation was that I get to walk with QQ so the 'walk' wasn't all that unbearable, plus the weather was not too bad. Oops, minus the winds.

And then you enter the room for the first lecture of the day, and though you came in not too late, you still couldn't manage to sit with your 'homies', so you're pretty much left alone. Until this weird guy who talks to himself, walks weirdly, and let's just say everything else about him is weird, comes in, and sits next to you, only to leave a few seconds later. So you heave a sigh of relief because yay, Weirdo is not sitting next to you anymore - unfriendly look probably killed it. And then somehow, out of nowhere he appeared again, taking that seat. Next. to. you.

And spent the whole lecture making remarks to himself.

So after that you spent the next 2 hours, attempting the assignment for the 131747288th time, and then Weirdo appeared, next. to. you. Doing what he does best.

I am not exaggerating but Weirdo 1, 2, 3...,n does in fact, exist.

Going home was the best part of my Monday. Despite the walk in the drizzle, and cold. By the way, I am already looking forward to the end of the week.

:/

I don't really fancy this semester.

It is boring, yet mind-draining.

COUGHS.

Let's see.. what's new?

Vina officially graduated last Saturday :'( Soon she will be leaving for CCHHHIIINNAAAA. Lucky her. Anyway, thanks for the lovely dinner, Vina! And your parents are so cute! I didn't realise your mom was filming us during our picture-frenzy ;)

On Sunday, it was Singapore's 44th Birthday. A chance for all of us to wear all red and not be shy about being extremely bright. I swear, in the day I felt I was seeing more red than usual in the city, but most of the people wearing red were actually the whites, so..

Preets got voted for best dressed (hehe!) and yes, we managed to watch the live screening of the NDP without much lag. Took part in the Pledge Moment, and I actually recorded it but guess what? I accidentally deleted it from the memory card last night.

I started the week with a full on cough, lost my voice for a couple for hours, coughed, coughed, coughed.. and coughed.

Still coughing, by the way. Even had to cancel Salvador Dali's Art After Dark! Was looking forward to it!

Oh, and a pile of assignments are just waiting for me to caress it.

LIFE.

results.

I don't even know where to start. Maybe a little flashback from last semester where I had a couple of entries mentioning about my struggle for Stochastic Modelling. Not sure whether I've mentioned this bit before but I would actually cry when I'm doing each of the assignment. Was that bad. But I'm glad its all over. But of course the thought of results scared me. I don't think I've ever felt this stupid before, though I really tried my best not to leave any blanks for the questions that I have no idea how to solve. That old saying we have heard so many times since primary school - attempting every single question and not leaving any blanks, really is true. I know one isn't supposed to be pessimistic but I was kind of prepared to fail and come up with an explanation to tell my father how I lost his $3000. Or be satisfied with just a 50, even.

Today I got back my results and was utterly surprised because I did not only just pass. 2 more marks and it would have been the next grade. So glad that I did not give up on this unit no matter how many times I've felt like doing so, but I kept thinking of Paps and somehow I got through it. Last semester was quite a horrific one but I am pretty much satisfied with my results.

Now, enjoy the rest of the Winter break in peace :)

sugar

I am done, done, done with Stochastic Modeling. So much feelings were felt for this subject, and 99% were bad ones so I would never want to experience this again. Its too tough for my humble little brain's capacity, but despite that, I've tried my best. Boy, am I glad that this is not a pre-requisite for my Statistics major! The reason why I took it was because I was still undecided as to whether I should do honours, but since I am now clear on what path I am going to take after graduation, it is no longer necessary.

I can't wait for next Wednesday. Even though exams will rightfully end for me then, I felt a sense of liberation the moment the clock struck 12.30 p.m.

:)

5 more days, people. Before my activity list becomes alive.

I'm digging this Taylor Swift's song at the moment.

third year, semester one.

Finally. Project season is over. Assignments deadlines. Over. Its hard to put what I'm feeling to words. All I know is the exuberant feeling one gets after finishing a presentation, that earned a smile on the lecturer's face.

These past 4 weeks have been a whirl. Everyday was a routine. Wake up, go for lectures, breaks were spent for projects, and on some days, assignments. Weekends were spent on meet-ups with the girls for projects, again. Late nights in uni, for the same thing. I'm not sure how I got through the most toughest time of my academic life, ever. I've never been this busy, and tired. Slept at 3 am everyday, and sadly, I always have a hard time waking up in the morning. Sleeping late is so not me, but somehow it has become a norm. Now, this is something I want to erase..

This semester, I was bogged down with two projects. The first one was for Linear Models, which took quite a lot of our time because we had to always go back to the glass house to water the plants. The project used to be a 3-member thing, but one of our group mates dropped out of the unit. So, it was only me and Ling left. So many things happened during the course of our experiment. The lugging of soil and pots all the way from Richmond and then to uni (in the end we found out we didn't even have to get them 'cos the uni has it!), the waiting for the germination and growth of the beans, the many models we thought up for our analysis, the list goes on.. Two days before the deadline for our report, our lecturer told us we had to re-model, which also leads to re-analysing our whole experiment. The worst thing was, at that time, we were already done with our report. That was the worst day ever..

For the second project, I was quite fortunate to have the rest of the girls with me. It required a lot of programming (which sadly, I have no experience in). I really feel that programming is no joke, and I wish I had the opportunity to learn it. Why didn't I know of such units before? I would say, this was our toughest project, because of the mathematical terms and analysis involved. We went for the first batch of presentations and got really freaked out by those groups, because they presented so well. First of all, it really isn't an easy task to present something mathematical. Not only does the presentation has to be in 'mathematical' sense, it also has to be explained in lay-man's terms, so that anyone who doesn't have any mathematical background would at least be able to understand.

This was all over yesterday, as of 12 pm. I think we girls did well! So obviously we had to celebrate and reward ourselves for all the toil and sweat. I would say, we really deserved it. Jess treated us to Mesh, after which we caught Night at The Museum. The movie was quite a let down. The jokes, was lame, albeit funny. I think I very much prefer the first one. 

Oh, and I attended QQ's valedictory yesterday. I can't believe those kids are finally out of Trinity. I knew some of them since a year ago, and gee. A year flew by that fast. Hope to see them in Uni Melbourne soon, and most importantly, get into the course of their choice.

From yesterday and before.

fooling around with my instax.










our beloved 'babies' for linear mod.





before QQ's drama exam at trinity.