Seeing Stars

This is a public service announcement, which you should totally read.

I’m going to get straight to the point: this is about Stuff@School, a Monday pullout with the Star! Pool your friends, and subscribe noww.

I had the best birthday gift last Monday when I was told that I was one of the 40 Starstruck! writers! It’s a young ambassador program that’s going to take the newspaper by storm all the way till September. Very very cool stuff!

It’s a fantastic initiative, providing a snazzy avenue for young people to hone their writing skills and to get recognized for their work. The stuff inside it is pure juice! Written by teenagers, it shows everyone how the world is, through our eyes. It’s quirky, fun and most of all, it’s gonna be very very cool. And for us Form Threes and our Form Five seniors, there’s this F3/F5 thing floating around the pages, so check that out!

AND, they have the evergreen Write Stuff space, which will be retained even through the revamps. It’s the avenue I was talking about earlier. Write a short story, or any piece of fiction or non-fiction, and send it to the Star. If you manage to knock their socks off, your work will be published and suddenly, your pocket feels heavier. Keep writing in, though their socks are fastened tight to their soles.

the facebook page

link

ALSO they have a hyperactive Facebook page that’s just embarked on a sempiternal caffeine high! I’d really appreciate it you guys go give it the thumbs up over there alright. It’s gonna be really happening over there! AND lastly, this might sound very narcissistic, but I’d appreciate it too if you would check out the 40 Starstruck! writers’ photo profiles on the page, read their bylines and thumbs up anyone whom you think is pretty cool! Go become fans on Facebook now kay? Spread the word far and wide!

Counselor

I sent this as an email assignment to my English teacher, Puan Norashikin, who looks as lovely and is as witty as ever. Her comments?

*laughs* So, here we have this email from Justin’s group. *laughs* It’s the longest, and why don’t we ask him to read it out loud for the class to hear.

I refused, mostly out of embarrassment than anything else – the entire class was looking at me, including my group members, who obviously had no idea what I had written on behalf of them – and pushed the thing to one of my friends. He stumbled over some words, but overall I thought it was a pretty good recital, but I might be wrong; I was keeping my head down, reading a book, avoiding my teacher’s eye.

*clears throat* That was very good! Excellent. It was a little bit long, but still…

I breathed a sigh of relief and lifted my head. I wonder if she knows I had whipped it up in the 25 minutes I had before tuition. So here it is, and yes, it’s long, but I guess frantically finishing it in such a short time forced me to finish a blunt, straightforward essay without much play with language.

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Peer pressure is an integral part of your social life that nearly always occurs during the transitional period between schools. When I first experienced the shocking atmosphere of teenagers’ lifestyle that brings that constant pressure to conform and ‘fit in’, I was in the first few months of secondary school education. I was looking for good friends to begin the journey with, people that would make good partners and be a support. I mixed into a group of popular guys, and then suddenly I was plunged into the whole affair of being exact copies of who they were. It took me a few months and a disastrous result slip to realize that I wasn’t living the high school life that I wanted to, that I was trying to live someone else’s life. The realization came slightly before the next examination, and I resolved to find a bunch of friends that would accept me for who I am. I did, and now I’m enjoying school life to the fullest.

I think that what happened was a small turn in a teenager’s life, the period when you start making decisions consciously and shaping them to who you really are, or towards who you strive to become. I realized that I didn’t need to be cool and popular, that I was comfortable just the way I was. I would hazard a guess that that is what you’re going through right now, starting to think about what’s best for you and your studies. Pertaining to your question: ‘I want good grades and keep my friends as well. Is this possible?’ Definitely.

First things first, remember that a secondary school education is just what it sounds like; you’re here to study and graduate. Hence, studies should always come first when faced with the choice, say between studying for that midterm exam and going to the movies with friends. The decision should be immediately ostensible, even though it might not seem so, but trust me, resisting temptations will prove to be an important ability in times to come. As you describe it, you have to do things to make your friends happy. Going over these words, do you really ‘have’ to? I thought I did, but even when I started making my own decisions, my friends came to respect me as a sensible person who has a clear mindset. In a way, standing up for yourself doesn’t alienate you from your band of friends, but it could even strengthen your relationships when you start respecting each other.

Even so, it is always advisable to keep a balance between your studies and hanging out with friends. A study freak is probably not going to help his social life much if he studies all day long, and in the same way a ‘popular’ person who does not study can not achieve his maximum potential while partying. Yet it is a precarious, nearly impossible balance to maintain. It’s probably important to remember that it’s okay if you tip the scales one in a while, but always remember to repay the debt. Planners and timetables were made for a reason; as a student with a hectic life, you might want to utilize these tools to organize your events and figure out when to study and when to play. Study hard, play hard; the saying is no joke. It is possible to be a model student with flourishing academics while having a healthy network of friends and contacts; you just have to figure out how.

As to your friend problem, there is one gold nugget of wisdom that could be helpful: “Friendship is when people know all about you but like you anyway.” Friends that last are those who accept you for who you are, those people who lend a shoulder to cry on, friends who don’t mind sharing absolute silence and still think that it’s okay. True friends are hard to find, but they are out there. And when you do discover them, you might be surprised to notice that you might have somehow overlooked them in the past.

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There are numerous cliches, overused little idioms that teachers often force us to include at all costs, those which I generally avoid on a principle-like basis. But it is true. In a way, even though this is not a particularly groundbreaking piece of writing, it was extremely important to me. Having someone read it out to an entire classroom to hear, even if they may not know if it was true, in a way served as a reminder that what has passed is the past, and looking for the silver lining in the dark cloud has indeed, yielded the best results of all.

Why I Don’t Have A Girlfriend

Because someone asked me about it. Slightly nonsensical, and most definitely unrecommended reading because I wrote this randomly before sleeping. Anyway -

1. I can’t remember all my female friends’ birthdays. I nearly forgot my sister’s. *gasp*

2. Pleasepleaseplease don’t ask me what’s different about you. I really really don’t know, and to be honest, I don’t really care about how much time the barber hairstylist spent on your highlights.

YOU: Hey!

ME: Hey!

YOU: So, notice anything?

ME: Um, you got a new haircut?

YOUR FRIEND STANDING BESIDE YOU: *snorts* and looks funny

YOU: Well no, not really.

ME: Oh.

YOU: Actually I got my nails done, seriouslyitwassoawesomethemanicuristjustlikepouredallthestuffonmyfingeranditwas AWESOME.

ME: Oh.

3. I hate horror/sappy/romantic/chick flicks, so I can’t tear up with you or scare you until you wrap your hands around me.

4. I will look tall and awkward and skinny and totally end up ruining your social status thingy you girls worry about.

5. I DON”T FREAKING KNOW WHAT’S SHOWING ON CHANNEL 8. Unless there’s a rerun of 环珠格格, I’ll most probably not watch it.

6. I love reading, I love math, I love science, so any conversation with an awkward silence will probably be filled in with some talk about random mathy stuff like calculus, how I proved some equation, or something about the maltase-is-an-enzyme thing that went around for a few minutes around the classroom. MALTASE IS AN ENZYME. Just because the funny Science Form 2 textbook says there’s three enzymes in the digestive system – amylase, protease, lipase – doesn’t mean that it isn’t an enzyme.

7. I’m 14.

8. I don’t need a relationship right now. And I don’t think that anyone aged 14 needs one.

9. I’m weird. Like geeky weird in a good-natured kinda way. Like jokes about math and stuff.

Q: Why did the computer engineer get Christmas and Halloween mixed up?

A: Because Oct(31) = Dec(25)!

dunno if it’s bad that I got it the first time.

i to pi: Be rational!

pi to i: Get real!

cracks me up every single freaking time. =)

I tried telling those two to my friends, but only a few got the second one. Then I explained the Christmas joke on the blackboard, and proceeded to prove that ‘women = evil’.

10. I ‘proceeded to prove that ‘women = evil’.’

11. I’m 14.

12. I don’t want a girlfriend.

First Day

Well in approximately an hour and a half I’ll be leaving for school, and then sit down with pens, paper, and three examination papers. Yeah, today is the first day of the first exams of the year.

I don’t know why I’m writing this right now, I should really be pushing some last minute stuff in, but just so you know, I probably won’t do so well in this exam. You see, I’ve been kinda sluggish lately, even though I’ve finished all the major stuff and thus don’t have to worry about those anymore, but I really don’t know, it just doesn’t seem that I’ve been giving as much effort as I’ve given to last year.

It was the same last year: I thought I could again get straight 90+’s just by slacking off like in primary school, but that didn’t work out. My friend was like ‘OOOHH finally a C’ when I came back with a 62 in Bahasa Malaysia. I got 16 questions wrong. Out of 30.

The grades I’m getting now are generally stable, with the exception of Chinese, which I’m really freaking out over, but let’s hope that I’ll get my guesses right. If I continue on like this it’s not going to work out, remember ETR?

Well according to my teacher’s projected results, I’m gonna have to get a 97+ average on my finals to freaking say that I’ve been improving.

Aw.

What Though The Odds

It’s been a year.

It’s official, my first year at the sometimes intimidating Sekolah Tinggi Kluang has ended. In many ways it’s a love-hate relationship: I like the environment there, yet there seems to be something off with the teachers. Somehow, I don’t few like most of them are giving their best to educate us, to fill us with knowledge, with the exception of one teacher I greatly respect.

A lot can happen in a year, even at my school. I know that many people can breeze through high school like the monsoon, but I kinda hit a rough patch in my academic career this year: I had to learn how to accept getting B’s and C’s.

A brief overview, I received my results for my Penilaian Kokurikulum 1 (PK1), and was wholly disappointed. C in Bahasa Melayu, B in Geography. To tell the truth, I was really shocked at my performance, not because I wasn’t expecting it (we compared answers beforehand; I kind of knew how I did), but because I was totally caught off-guard. Never in my life had I have to face these results; it seemed like a looming threat. I didn’t freak out over the results, I shrugged it off and decided to work harder.

I did well in the other exams, and ended up being placed 5th in my class. No ‘tingkatan’ rankings. Naturally I strived to improve during the midterms. I worked hard on my BM. I ended up with a totally satisfying 85.

I somehow convinced myself that I had worked hard for Geography. I de-proved by one point. Still a B.

High school’s seriously different for me; I could slack off even through the exams in primary school and still get 95% averages. I didn’t study for my exams all the way from Primary 1 – 4, things started getting interesting in Primary 5.

The Malaysian education system is far from being notoriously difficult – heck, our Mathematic standards are sickeningly low compared to the Singaporean, American and Indian systems – and it is easily conquered by pure hard work, and days spent on memorizing. During the past year, I spent plenty of hours memorizing the ‘tugas-tugas Sultan/Raja’, the order of the Melaka Sultanate, and other stuff. At the end of the day, one has to ask him/herself: What have I truly learnt?

I learnt that Tun Perak became Bendahara in 1456. I learnt that Datuk Maharajalela was a warrior against the British. I learnt that the name ‘Sabah’ comes from a banana.

But other than historical facts and opinions (more on this later), I have learnt absolutely nothing. We don’t learn lessons, we learn to memorize. We learn to produce smart gimmicks to help us remember the places that the Kadazandusun live in. We don’t learn from our mistakes.

2nd point, I’m seriously concerned by the use of textbooks. In the movie ‘Hopeless to Harvard’, the main character, Liz, is asked why her high school uses notes from different people instead of a textbook. She replied: “Because one person’s point of view creates a one-dimensional universe.”

In the Sejarah Tingkatan 1, we don’t learn about how other people think about the history. We only learn the facts, and not the lessons we can learn from them. We don’t stop and think about how we could have handled the situation rationally if we were ever faced with them. We don’t learn things that could benefit us other than intellectual stuff.

It’s not that I don’t like my education system, I don’t love it but I don’t hate it either. It’s just that everyone has their own opinions on how the education system could be better run, and end up hurling criticism after criticism at the government.

I think that we should be content with having one in the first place.

Ok, serious digression here. Anyway, -

For the finals, I got the results back and was extremely satisfied, not because I did particularly well, but because I got a 98 on Geography and a 90 on BM. In the end I got this:

Well worth it.

It was by far not an epic intellectual battle, but I just wanted to say that, what thou the odds, keep on going, and somehow you’ll find a way.

I didn’t make a miraculous improvement like the guy who sat next to me throughout the second semester, Syahir, who got a 25 (E)(that means fail), and promptly received a 90 next exam. Go man.

I wasn’t crushed by my results; I’m usually not quite over reactive to bad results. But I decided to press on, and this is what I got.

Pencapaian Terbaik Geografi

Kedua

Tingkatan 1 STK (2009)

Yup, I was second.

Second is good.

Ouch, People

Surrounded by exam-oriented people, yet not really anxious about finals. Good sign? Not influenced by others, perhaps. People are straining their eyes over books and I am planning my strategy for Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

It’s coming out 10th November 2009. Interesting fact: If you watch the trailer (go search on YouTube), you’ll see that the date is actually written out in MM/DD/YY form.

See it?

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Side note: Seriously considering dropping Chinese for PMR, people. Criticism will come, something like ‘losing culture’ and ‘neglecting tradition’, I know. But it’s so far the only weak point in all of my subjects.

Chinese teacher pulling the old ‘you can drop if you want to, but I’m discouraging you from it’ approach. You know what I’m talking about, right?

I probably will still take it, but just a rant, so this post might qualify.

My Voice

Regarding the British Council problem, I was just going to leave it. The opportunity was looking me right in the face. I just had to speak up. I didn’t.

It’s a little pathetic, this little characteristic of mine. I tend to reflect on my decisions, my actions and my attitude every single day, and since I made the decision not to write to British Council and seek justice (kidding), I’ve always felt that I’m letting go of opportunities, just like that, without hesitation. It’s our own choices which define who we are, and who we are to become.

This morning, I made a decision. To speak up when I felt that it was needed, and to shut up when it wasn’t. I want to be an initiator, not a follower. If I want change, I have to be the change. If I want opportunities, it’s up to me to grab it. “Yang bulat tidak akan datang bergolek, yang pipih tidak akan datang melayang”, a Malay idiom, meaning that opportunities won’t come knocking on the door if you don’t make use of them.

I’ve missed many opportunities. But I’m not going to brood over them. Things happen, and we’re better off without the regrets and the pain. From today onwards I’m going to speak up. Make my voice heard. My opinions matter as much as the politicians. Everyone’s opinion and view counts for something. No, my inner voice will not be suppressed any more, unless there’s a loaded gun pointing at my head, telling me not to speak.

Our voice can bring transformation to the people around us. It can change the people around you.