lishun's musings

Wednesday, May 31, 2006

the error of my ways

there are a few things i either wish i've done/said or wish i haven't done/said...

i wish i didn't imply that your friend was an ass.

i'm sorry for suggesting that you're too good for your friends.

i'm not proud of the fact that i went to help you...unwillingly. and was kinda moody about it.

i wish i spent more time with you.

i'm ashamed for bad-mouthing you behind your back.

i wish i started exercising sooner.

i'm sorry i took you for granted and was very inconsiderate.

...and the worst mistake of all, one that i discovered last night...

i wish i weren't such a nerd last sem and spent more time on the rooftop playing darts. darn.

lishun at 5:23 AM

Friday, May 26, 2006

bits 'n' pieces

i love the fact that it's possible to have an inter-religious forum in my university and not have people come in with permanent mindsets. granted, the topic of discussion was very safe (you can't get controversial with something like "women in the eyes of religion"), but the very idea of being able to share the different views of different religions without the fear of offending anyone...it's as close to utopia as anyone can get.

anyway, i found the discussion a little bland, thanks to the safe topic, but it was interesting to note that the students attending the forum were there not to argue but to learn and reason in a mature manner, and that's what impressed me most.

---

being in a university means that everyone around you is either just as good as you or better...there really isn't anyone that's worse.

of course, you could very well argue like my fellow pbl group member said: if people are either as good as you or better, it would mean that you would be worse than someone and that implies that there are people who have other people who are worse than them.

but that's not what i mean. i'm just trying to say that there is no such thing as a "bad" student in university, especially not in the medical faculty. no one cheated their way in...if they did, they wouldn't survive. there isn't anyone who has an unimpressive curriculum vitae. i have yet to meet anyone in imu that doesn't deserve to be where they are today.

and that's as humbling a thought as any thought can be.

---

i don't know about you, but i think there is something seriously nice about being infatuated with someone, regardless of the "depth" of it. perhaps it's the anticipation and the knowledge deep down inside that nothing's going to come out of it simply because you don't have mutual friends or that you don't have any excuse to spend time together and get to know one another. somehow that fatalistic attitude just makes it all the more silly and exhillarating at the same time.

there's nothing more...uplifting than being midly infatuated with someone. it serves just the right amount of electricity to keep you awake during the day, and enough distraction to keep the mind from getting too worn out. it's nice. it's just kinda nice.

---

when i was in secondary school, i used to blame my parents for forcing me to grow up just that little faster than my peers.

but just what is "growing up" anyway? when can you consider yourself to be "grown up"? at what age should we be feeling our age, and who on earth dictates the level of maturity needed at a certain age? can it even be quantified?

now i feel that growing up is a whole load of rubbish. i highly doubt that there will be a day when i look in the mirror, at age 52, and decide that yes, i am finally acting like a 52-year-old should. now that i can see my parents as people and not just my parents, i realise that although they're in the autumn of their lives, never once has it ever crossed their minds that they're in their 60s and should be doing stuff designed for senior citizens. they can still be 20 in their heads, or even 70+, but it's all in their minds.

so maybe i don't find cartoons funny anymore, or i roll my eyes at the kind of music "kids" listen to these days. perhaps i sometimes feel a little old when i realise that england's youngest national footballer will always be 16 while i will never always be just one year older than him.

but am i "grown up"? who are you to tell me when i'm a "grown up"?

---

having been a prefect most of my life and in the position of role model (for cousins, friends, my students) in between, there really hasn't been many opportunities for me to be rebellious.

sometimes i feel jealous when i hear stories of friends going through a stage where they defied every one of their parents' commands - sneaking a swig of vodka during christmas, getting a nose/belly button/eyebrow piercing, spending time with a forbidden girl/boyfriend, or driving the car without a license.

i've been caged in by invisible rules and whispering voices from my conscience, so much so that i can only recall 2 instances in which i have consciously gone against my parents' desires: the first in primary school, when i ponteng pol mandarin class and got caught; and the second after pmr, when i got myself a second ear piercing without consent. i can remember my mother's exact reply to the second incident (for the first, she didn't talk - she just reached for the cane): "you will get tired of it in a couple of years or so."

needless to say, i got tired of having to wear two pairs of earrings all the time and decided to let the second piercing close up on its own two years ago.

that basically says it all, really.

---

...to end it all, a couple of congratulations...

to hailiang, prasad and yihseong, for finishing as the highest ranking debate team from malaysia at the audc. phwoar. power sial.

to the cast and crew of "the phantom of the opera", for an entertaining performance tonight.

to the vast number of people who "got together" this week and those that will be "getting together soon".

and, last but not least, to everyone who managed to live through the week without making fun of any of their friends. it's hard, i know.

=)

lishun at 11:08 PM

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

5 reasons i should keep off the pseudo pitch

1. 2 sprained ankles, 2 bruised shins, one grazed knee, one broken arm, a broken nose and a pair of broken specs. (see * below)

2. i can't play for nuts.

3. to say my stamina is appaling would be a forerunner for understatement of the century.

4. stuff like "get the f**k out of my way!" gets, erm, uttered in my face.

5. did i mention a broken arm?!

---

but i can't help it. futsal rocks. just try to keep me away from it. just try.

*note: none of the above happened to me (thank God!) but they are all injuries sustained by friends and acquaintances during futsal matches. worst that happened to me was being tackled rugby-style onto the ground by a senior and getting my darned frameless vanity-laden specs broken. for the 8th time. no worries, lishun is all-seeing once more. lol.

lishun at 11:07 PM

Monday, May 22, 2006

rumours

"he who guards his mouth and his tongue keeps himself from calamity."
- proverbs 21:23

"if any iniquitous person comes to you with a [slanderous] tale, use your discernment, lest you hurt people unwittingly and afterwards be filled with remorse for what you have done."
- al-hujurat 49:6 (from www.islamicity.com)

"do not accept anything on account of rumours (i.e. believing what others say without any investigation)."
- buddhist teachings

"those who have cultivated ren (compassion or loving others) are, on the contrary, 'simple in manner and slow of speech.'"
- lunyu 13.27

---

it wasn't meant to be this way. they were two separate events. they were not supposed to spill into each other, and the whole thing was never intended to become so blown out of proportion.

it was fueled by rumours, hearsay that fluttered around like butterflies, landing on the greedy ears of immature individuals who detect scandal where there is none. the situation was fed by "did you hear?" and "somebody told me..." and other seemingly innocent phrases that were really laced with a poison so deadly that it could strip someone of his or her credibility.

of course it could be that i am a naive idealist who refuses to believe that people can really stoop that low just for a juicy piece of news. judgement doesn't lie in my hands - no one is in the position to judge, save God alone.

but once in a while things like this make my foundations shake and cause me to lose faith in people, or allow the needless things of the world take up a little bit of my time. i'm dismayed at the readiness that seemingly intelligent people soak up lies without giving them much thought.

words spoken do not necessarily carry the truth. messages whispered may be nothing more than sensationalised stories. have we not the discernment to take each uttered sentence with a pinch of salt? since when have we lost our ability to think?

rumours are called rumours simply because they are not meant to be believed, at least not without further investigation.

i would think that for a bunch of several hundred people with impressive cvs and pretty darn good academic achievements, we'd be mature enough to exercise caution with any information we get hold of...or at least smart enough to know that careless ears and a loose tongue can only lead to no good.

lishun at 10:29 PM

Thursday, May 18, 2006

neat little boxes

does anyone remember hanson? that group made up of brothers taylor, isaac and zach? don't pretend you don't know them...you had a crush on taylor. admit it.

anyway, they released a song called "strange" several years ago. it's one of my favourite hanson songs (yes, i was a fan), simply because it contains the words "when you live in a cookie-cutter world being different is a sin".

at the time, the lyrics were relevant to me. i had just started form 1 and, being in a so-called "not-so-good" class, i felt as if people were judging me all the time. i always felt not pretty enough, not smart enough, not worthy of anyone's attention simply because i looked frumpy in my prefects' uniform and the cool girls were in the classes at the other end of the corridor. it certainly felt like i was living in a cookie-cutter world where each mould is of something beautiful and i simply did not make the cut.

8 years have passed and i can no longer relate to the insecure tween i once was. now i know the world isn't made up of pigeon holes where you can put neat labels in large type on the contents of each box. in fact, the more i see of life, it seems like there are more grey areas than there are black and white. it confuses things and it makes me have to think just that little bit harder when forming a stand, but it is kind of a relief to know that no one can really shove me into a category anymore and look at me as a one-dimensional figure.

after spending 2 days at seremban hospital for nursing week though, i have to rethink that.

if you have been to a hospital, you would know that there are lots of different departments that handle different...disciplines? is that the right word? disciplines of health?

it's no different for the wards where the patients are, erm, warded for their various inflictions. some of the wards are multidisciplinary (?) and house patients suffering from all sorts of ailments - from broken bones to hernias to deep lacerations. others are more specific and are special areas for people who have communicable diseases, really serious orthopaedic injuries and so on.

in each ward, the men are separated from the women, the second class patients are separated from the third, the patients being prepped for surgery are in different cubicles from those who do not require surgery, and the cancer patients are set apart from their "healthier" counterparts. besides that, the histories of the patients are filed in colour-coded files. the patients' names turn into bed numbers and their identities are replaced by the drugs they are taking and the treatments they are subjected to.

every person is placed into a specific category, which is under another huge category, and yet another big division...and all these divisions come under the large heading of "patient". someone who is ill. someone who needs help.

i know it's for the convenience of the staff at the hospital. the nurses work very hard, as do the doctors, and it would be a nightmare if they were forced to remember names and be very personal with each patient. plus let's not forget that the progress of every warded patient must be monitored closely in order to ensure that all goes well or, in the unfortunate event that something goes wrong, investigations into mishaps can be conducted as efficiently as possible. having a good system of classifying patients is essential in making sure the right treatment is administered in the right way to the right person.

but the thought of being shoved into a neat little box the moment you enter a hospital, a place where people go to to seek relief from their ailments, made me feel rather sad.

i remember being ill in singapore once. i had a high fever and it was during the sars panic period (sidetrack: a professor in imu said that sars really stands for singaporeans are really scared. haha). i knew it was because i had a bad sore throat and that all i needed was some antibiotics, but i had to go see the doctor anyway because the hostel had to report all cases of fever. the moment i got to the clinic and had my temperature taken, the nurse gave me a mask to wear (although the sars scare was wearing off by then) and sent me to a consultation room at the end of the clinic.

the door scared me to bits. there was a red sign on it that said "acute clinic" and, not knowing the actual meaning of acute at the time, i felt rather frightened. the nurse opened the door and declared to the doctor inside that there is an "acute patient" waiting for him outside.

i was suddenly reduced to nothing more than a masked figure with a sign on my forehead saying "acute patient", and i felt like how i used to feel in school - shoved into a compartment, labelled and ready for someone to deal with me.

i had a fever. i had chills. i had a burning throat and a headache and i was just neatly classified by a nurse as something red. it was the last place i wanted to be, but it was the only way i could get the antibiotics i needed to get well. it felt horrible though. and that was just a fever.

i don't like the fact that the moment a patient enters the hospital, he or she ceases to be a person and becomes a number, a colour or a concoction of drugs. it makes me all the more determined to never get ill and to do my best to make someone feel like a person everytime i meet them.

it's just so awful that we spend our lives trying to live out of the box and prevent ourselves from being a nameless face, but when we reach the twilight of our lives and find ourselves in the unwilling role of residence of illness, we become the illness, get a big label slapped on our foreheads and live out the toughest days of our lives in a neat little box.

lishun at 4:22 PM

Monday, May 15, 2006

...and then there was light

after months of darkness...

behold! there is light!

no more are the walks to the library dark and dreary. no more shall we roam the halls in the thick blackness, with pathetic imitations of sunlight to guide the way. never again will our tired pupils strain to dilate as we make our way to our destinations.

never again...!

oh sun! how we welcome your presence once more! we have missed your celestial presence that once flooded our hallways. the dank smell of darkness is gone and the crisp fragrance of your goodness has returned.

see the smile on our faces as we greet you in the morning, and the contentment on our lips as we bask in your afternoon heat. we are now reunited and shall not speak of the horrid days when we were forced apart by unfeeling planks and cold steel bars.

light! glorious light!

---

*p/s: rm5 that in 2 weeks, we'll be complaining about how hot it is. lol.

lishun at 9:05 PM

Sunday, May 14, 2006

home

as a med student who doesn't get much fresh air (my own fault), it was great to have a 3-day weekend and have time to waste. i woke up early on friday morning and decided to take my ageing-yet-suspiciously-ageless dog out for a walk. we covered our usual route: up the slope, down the next road, around the playground, across to the next road and then back home.

as mei-mei took things into her own paws and led me for a walk instead, i watched the neighbourhood i know so well.

walking up the slope, i passed the house where the first dog i ever fell in love with used to live. her name was koko and she was a beautiful golden lab with the most soulful eyes a dog could ever have. koko died of food poisoning (she always had a bad habit of eating people's rubbish) when i was 14 and if it weren't for the fact that i already had mei-mei by then, i guess i would have missed her so much more.

koko's owners, an elderly couple, watched me grow up through the bars of their gates. i was 5 when i first began paying them, or rather koko, visits so for 9 years they would open their door and be greeted by the sight of me, hand squeezed through the bars, giving their dog a good head massage. i watched them age and go through the toughest of times: the loss of their son, their own degeneration, as time takes its toll on the body.

when i was a kid, i played in the playground nearest to my house alot. on my way there, i would pass by a house on the street where my sister now lives. the house is slightly more elevated than the other houses, and an old man would sit out on the driveway every day in his white singlet and blue-and-white striped drawstring pants. he had the biggest grin ever, and although i remember thinking of him as a rather ancient old chap, he remained a regular sight in the neighbourhood until my late teens. it was only in my first year of college that i came home one holiday and found that the familiar sight of him sitting outside his gate is no longer there for me to claim.

the neighbour whose house lies diagonally to mine is a distant relative to my father. she visited my house the most. once in a while, there would be a "guest appearance" of vegetable curry or beef stew - dishes my mother hardly ever makes - on the dinner table and i would know that auntie contributed them. i was often a delivery girl as well, sending over bundles of vegetables from my garden or sometimes a pot of herbal tea. the relationship the auntie and my mother shared is something i hope i will have with my own neighbours in the future.

my childhood friends still live close by although we have gone our separate paths since secondary school. i went to a different secondary school and got myself a whole new bunch of friends. it's amazing how a simple change of schools can bring such a distance between me and the people i played badminton with, cycled every day for 1 1/2 hours with, had so many adventures and misadventures with...people i celebrated christmas with. and we hardly talk to each other now. through no particular person's fault, of course, but there was always a nagging suspicion in my mind that i am primarily to blame.

another familiar sight in the neighbourhood is now gone. my grandmother was once the darling of the neighbourhood, always ready with a cheerful "hello" (in hokkien, of course) and a word of gossip. when i was younger, she used to take long walks in the morning and in the evening, sometimes bringing us much anxiety because she had a habit of leaving the house without telling anyone.

it was during one of those walks that she fainted, which led to her complaints of difficulty swallowing, followed by the two collapses in the toilet and finally her last 3 months with me, struggling against the advancing cruelty of cancer.

during her funeral, all my neighbours came. koko's elderly owners came. my neighbour with the beef rendang came. my childhood friends, the family of the man with the white singlet, the woman who looked after my grandmother when she first fainted...they all came. the people who made up my life here in the place i call home all came to say farewell to my grandmother.

i thought of all this as i dragged my dog back home on friday morning. although the neighbourhood hasn't changed much throughout my entire 21 years of life - the same families still stay in the same houses - there is a gradual change that's going on. my childhood friends will most likely get married and move away within the next 10 years. their parents and the more elderly members of the community will leave this earth one day.

with every moving truck and every white canopy that opens up in my neighbourhood, a piece of the place i know as my world is taking flight and going away.

it's only now that i realise that the sad look in the eyes of every neighbour who came to my grandmother's funeral was not because they were mourning for her loss. it was more...grief because our home, my home, is changing every day and my grandmother's death is another piece of evidence to be placed into the evidence box of the case that is unfolding before us.

lishun at 7:42 AM

Thursday, May 11, 2006

the knots are tied

i'm actually pretty happy at the moment. it's the first time i've felt shallow when i'm happy. haha. the fact that campaign week has ended, i've survived a tough public speaking session and managed to ace my first summative (only by the grace of God!) is enough to put me in a pretty ecstatic state.

but yeah. feeling shallow. so shall blog about cute married men. hah. i actually wrote this entry before the summative, but was way too busy to edit it and publish it during the weeks that followed, so it spent some time fermenting as a draft.

anyhoo...

there's something unreasonably attractive about unattainable people. it's what drives women to scream louder for nate berkus than for ty pennington. it's the reason why rick springfield wrote a song about "jessie's girl".

it's also the reason why i'm here trying to take my mind off the life cycle of Plasmodium falciparum to present to you...

chris daughtry

chris caught my eye the very moment he walked into the american idol audition room. most fans would do the ridiculous mentality thing and go "oh pity he's married" (as if it concerns you la, pfft) but trust me when i say that i was more touched by the fact he took on the responsibility as a stepdad at such a young age (he's only 26!) because he loves his wife so much.

it's freaking sweet lah!

i'm pretty upset at the moment because he's just been voted out and it's the one and only thing preventing today becoming the *perfect* day (americans are idiots) but i'm very sure he'll be a successful musician should he opt to pursue it as his main career.

jon bon jovi

some people never grow old. not too much anyway.

jon bon jovi is 44, dorothea hurley's husband of 17 years, a father of 4, and one heck of a good-looking rocker-past-his-musical-prime. this is a guy who has obviously exhausted his musical talent (don't get me started on how much i hate bon jovi's new stuff) but looks as though he will beat shah rukh khan hands down in a competition to see which middle-aged geezer can play a more convincing fresh grad.

it's amazing. he was cute in the 80s, with the pout and long hair, and he's still pretty darn hot now in his 40s. some people never grow old.

hugh jackman

i like guys who have short hair and are clean shaven.

*looks at above pics*

oh scrap that.

rob thomas

hands up whoever found the "lonely no more" butt-shaking routine really sexy! marisol maldonado is one lucky woman.

ewan mcgregor

i can think of some really really really rude captions for this picture but shall refrain from writing any of them here. or anywhere else, for that matter. because it'd be right rude. right.

yes! it's my favourite scotsman! i absolutely love ewan mcgregor. i haven't seen all his movies, and i don't care much for celeb gossip. all i know is he's a fab actor and he's freaking cute. super freaking adorable.

he and his wife, eve mavrakis, have been married for 11 years and they're raising 3 kids. can everyone say "awwwwwwwwwwwwww..."?

anyway, since he's my fave married guy out there - well actually he's on the top of my "celebs-to-drool-over-for-the-sake-of-destressing" list - i thought it'd only be appropriate to drool over him for the sake of destressing and make a montage out of some of his pics.

long hair, short hair, no hair, lots of facial hair, preppy, grundgy, elvis-h...

i particularly like the last pics in the first and second rows. the first because the full, uncropped pic shows him on a motorbike (he's done a bike ride from london to new york via asia and canada) and the second because his sweater matches his eyes. really. it's amazing. it's the perfect shallow thing to swoon over. woot!

alright. i've done enough swooning for now. it's time to go back to those darned parasites that all look the same. bleh.

do tell me if i've missed anyone you think deserves to be here.

*note: omg mei just reminded me i missed out johnny depp! and i also forgot about ryan reynolds! gah!!! how could i have done that?!

lishun at 8:21 PM

Monday, May 08, 2006

rejuvenated

He's given
joy peace love and
strength to last for the day
His mercies - new every day
sufficient, Your grace is amazing
thank You Father
for the mighty cross
so that I am Yours
mighty child of God

- extracted from "who am i?", the "x-cavation" cfcamp theme song, by ivy@mightylady

i spent the weekend at cfcamp, and all i can say is...i feel rejuvenated.

although my body is in its rebellious phase right now (sore muscles, sore head, sore eyes), there's nothing more refreshing than to be reminded of why i'm going through all this madness in uni, with the campaigns, conference, etc.

there's no other reason than that i'm doing it to glorify God.

that's my purpose. that's my mission. that's who i am. and i wouldn't have it any other way.

--

*p/s: do you see the addition on the navigation bar? yup, part of the campaign! if you would like to show your support for me in my bid to become the next vice president of the imu students' representatives council (src), do download the button and add it to your sidebars!

it would be best if you could save the picture onto your own photo host, but if you don't know how to do that, just copy and paste the following html onto your template:

lishun at 5:22 AM

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

critical thinking crisis

jian dropped a comment in my last entry:

read this.
http://www.xanga.com/redsheep/47...f- academia.html

i've mentioned before that i don't do "serious" commentaries like the one in the link above. i'm much too serious already, which is why i like talking crap and being stupid on my blog. don't care too much about the consequences come campaign week. after all, to quote *certain* bloggers out there, it's my blog and i can do whatever i want with it.

but i just have to say something about the article at the link jian directed me to.

some of you might know that i'm currently running for vice pres of the students' representative council (src) in imu. should i get voted into office, i'll be handling the academic side of things. that means academic meetings with the big shots up there about the curriculum, examinations, lectures, learning tools, etc. basically i'll be the voice of the students when it comes to academic affairs.

one issue that kept popping up during my 2-week apprenticeship, during which i had chats with lecturers about academic matters, was the lack of initiative students have towards learning nowadays.

imu is very proud of its structured independent learning (sil) system. everyone is expected to take charge of his or her learning experience. that means 2 hours of lectures a day, tonnes of private study time, and a whole host of other learning tools that will only be helpful if we actually use them.

the problem is that students still expect to be spoonfed. we want more lecturer-assisted lab sessions, more clinical skills sessions, guided medical museum tours, tutorials, and so on. we want all these to be included into our timetables so that we have specifically allocated time to do it all. we want to be told what to do, when to do it and how it should be done.

as i have mentioned, imu is very proud of its sil system, which is why everything in the previous paragraph is not done in the university. what students are expected to do is request for more lecturer-assisted lab sessions, make appointments with lecturers for additional clinical skills practice lessons, arrange for guided tours with seniors and bring up questions to lecturers or to the batch representative so that the lecturers have something to discuss with the cohort during the currently ineffective q&a sessions...all at their own initiative.

however, more often than not, students, myself included, find ourselves with no questions to ask and no real reasons to independently schedule additional lessons with our lecturers simply because we take everything at face value.

i myself am guilty of absorbing lectures like a sponge rather than adopting the "socratic questioning" method mentioned in the blog post above. most of the time i accept everything i read without question. after all, the books are written by doctors with years of experience. my notes are arranged by content experts. if there are no discrepancies between the books and my notes, there is no reason for me to ask any questions, no?

rarely do i think about alternative views; mainly because i don't know enough about the topic to even start questioning it, but also because all i really care about is passing my exams.

yes, in the corner of my mind, i want to make my learning experience interesting. i do want to think of challenging questions to ask my lecturers. they are open to questions and very much unlike the teachers i had prior to college, but, like my college tutors, their knowledge and eagerness to discuss issues outside the curriculum, is left largely untapped.

it frustrates me that i don't know how to be a critical thinker.

of course, that is a contradiction in itself because in actual fact critical thinking cannot be "taught" per se. there shouldn't be manuals and self-help books to tell us how to be creative and critical. it should be an ongoing training process, one that should eventually mould individuals that get better at critical thinking as the years go by.

so what's going on here? are "they" to blame? is there something wrong with "the system"? who exactly are "they" and what is "the system"? do our parents have something to do with this? or are humans naturally born to sit back and take in info without question? the last one certainly explains why there is only a minority of people in this world who bother to think in angles that don't even cross the mind of the average person.

i don't know. i'm not even sure if i can blame anyone for my lack of interest in asking the important questions or in challenging my lecturers. maybe i can blame television and computers...it would certainly make me feel better if i could point fingers at something inanimate with no feelings. or is it really just my fault?

and, most importantly, as someone who is approaching the age of 21...is it too late for me to start getting used to thinking critically?

it's definitely a crisis we're facing here.

lishun at 3:57 PM

Monday, May 01, 2006

noodle post woohoo!

this is gonna be a noodle post. the only reason why i'm gonna blog about my 3-day weekend instead of revealing some cool epiphany i had while walking my dog is because i didn't have a 3-day weekend, i don't get cool epiphanies and i didn't walk my dog.

ok.

anyway the reason why i didn't have a 3-day weekend was because my schedule was packed full all of saturday and sunday.

i had to wake up freaking early on saturday so i could sit for the bloody malaysian university english test (muet) at smk assunta. stupid letter said i had to be there at 730am. bleurgh. the test wasn't too bad...i probably screwed up my essay because it was such an "easy" topic. "education today should focus on producing creative individuals. do you agree?" i rambled on and on about how competitive the world is today, blah blah blah...and then realised i didn't talk about the role of education. crap.

after muet, it was off to guardian to grab some toiletries as well as the eyeshadow trio i was eyeing (har har) for weeks. cheap, ok? it was less than rm20! trio! right. then got to the supermarket and restocked on milk before running home for a quick shower before i headed off to the hairdresser's to get ready for my cousin's wedding.

the hairdresser's silky terrier was darn cute. =)

with my hair ironed straight, my sister and i flew back home, took 15mins to make ourselves look pretty and then my family drove over to carcosa seri negara for my cousin's wedding.

it was a gorgeous wedding! aargh! guys in suits, girls in lots of pretty pearls and pink dresses (everyone was in pink...and there i was in my all-black prom outfit, gah), ribbons, silk, champagne. it was beautiful! and i missed half of it because my cousin, the groom, appointed me as one of the receptionists. had lots of fun sticking polaroids into the guestbook and chatting with the 150 guests.

my shoes, my divine heels, were an absolute torture. ah. the price of beauty.

once the absolutely touching wedding ceremony was over, we went off for dinner under a tent that was lit by candles. ah. the food was lovely, i've probably never had so much wine in one night ever, and i was amused to see chef wan there at the wedding. amused because, when the night came to a close, he went to have a chat with my cousin and gave him a peck on the cheek. eek.

or maybe i was amused because of all the bubbly. hic.

the wedding ended at 11pm, i got home right before midnight, fell asleep at 1am and had to wake up at 730am the next morning because i had to take my cpr exam.

stupid cpr. i know we went through the theory exam and we should be able to put it into practice, but a 2-hr practical training session and 1-hr practice session does not perfection make. especially if there were, i dunno, 40 of us and only 9 mannequins? crap. the examiners were all super nice people, yes, and 2 out of 3 of them were really really helpful, but did they really expect us to go through the million and one life-saving steps perfectly when most of us have never done cpr in our whole lives???

i think i failed. but i also think i am in the position to be childish and whine about it because...i can.

was pretty pissed off. went home, had dinner (the whole session lasted the entire day), and went to bed at 9pm.

i was supposed to go for a jog this morning, but hit the snooze button when it went off at 6am and opened my eyes at 8. had a banner to paint, so i started on it right after brekkie. spent 90mins on it. bleh. then my mother was like, come let's go for a ride and eat out for lunch so la la la my whole family went out and checked out some stuff.

while we were out, lili called me and asked if i was going over to sunway to meet up with her, debs, and nattie and i was kinda pissed off because no one told me a single thing about meeting up. but heck managed to get home in time to make it to sunway. so the four of us had some cake before shopping unproductively for a couple of hours.

then i sent lili home and got home and here i am, on the computer, supposed to be typing out questions for tomorrow's survey meeting and preparing the agenda for the pre-academic meeting meeting as well as writing emails and whatnot but i'm blogging nonsense that no one's gonna read anyway.

*deep breath*

alright. i need a break. am gonna have dinner. we're having curry! whooppeeeeeee!

lishun at 6:06 PM