STARS - Spastic Totally Annoying Retarded System

I've never experienced this much frustration in my life as I do now. All the way up to now, its been pretty smoothsailing. You didn't get to choose much what you studied in the past. Suddenly, you have many choices. A potentially life-changing experience to try something you've always wanted. You think its time to rejoice?

Think again. Its actually a smokescreen. The choices available to you are equally few, only lousier, more irrelevant and in many cases, the total opposite of what you really want to study. What is the point of giving us 10000 modules, if you are going to lock all of them up with 0 vacancies anyway? You might as well give us the most obscure modules, tell us to suck it up and shut down the whole system because it is irrelevant and really a waste of bandwidth.

Its even more frustrating when your core timetable is poorly planned. My wednesday tutorial slot happens to be sitting in the middle of every single module in the sciences section, effectively freezing me out of any choices in science and technology. Which genius planned this? Couldn't you have exercised some foresight? I have 9 AUs to fill in Sciences. If you want to do this, can you exempt me from filling those AUs then?

In addition, why are the seniors allowed to fight for the same modules as the freshies and bid first when the freshies have the most limited choices? We should be allowed to bid first for the modules, because we can't do most of the higher modules due to pre-reqs we can't meet if we can't even get the basic courses in the first place! Its a stupid vicious cycle!

Couldn't NTU have planned more classes for basic modules and less for advanced ones, since few will ever scale the top echolons of those higher up courses?

STARS. A nightmare that will continue to plague NTU students for years on end.

The hall camp

Just when I thought orientations couldn't get any cornier, here comes the hall camp. However, it was actually enjoyable. Although it was a thinly veiled front for the SDU to push their graduates should marry each other agenda, (a date-o-meter? oh god) in the end everything turned out fine.

However, if you're guy-phobic or have an aversion to body hair, odours or intimate contact of any kind concerning body parts, please do avoid all SDU sponsored camps. You will not enjoy trying to shove your cheek into somebody's armpit while trying your best not to faint from the pong. I didn't enjoy it, and neither will you. I'm a guy btw.

Neither will you enjoy kissing guys on Orchard Road in front of bemused tourists and bewildered gawkers alike.

However you will enjoy the camaderie only 3 hours of sleep for 6 consecutive days can bring. When you're all stoned (like a glue sniffer), nothing can affect you. And you will also enjoy the little stupid games, with forfeits of course. I actually did a poledance on the MRT. It was exceptionally well received, but that was probably because I was so stoned I actually went all the way.

Anyway Qing Chao here's to everyone for a great orientation camp. You guys rock.

The itch.

Its strange but after I came out of the army, my online life was put on hold, when you would naturally expect the opposite. I lost myself in a factory job, an online game, a student care centre and a course. But somehow, the urge to post something on an online platform never really goes away.

Maybe its the prospect of text-whoring about your life to people who can't really care less. They want you to read their blog. Your blog is just the appetiser before they go back to admiring their own blogs. Sounds familiar? The inner cynic in me but I find that it seldom fails me. Besides it helps when you have super low expectations. You are never disappointed. So you stay a happy person, live a longer and more fulfilling life, and contribute more methane gas to the Earth. Yay!

But anyway, here's a little bit of text to thank the new blogger. Thanks for saving our drafts automatically. I can't tell you the number of times I wrote something absolutely fantastic, almost of Harry Potter worldbreaking standard, only to have faulty code in my browser cause me to lose everything when it crashed on me. I'm actually trying to praise myself, but I thank blogger too. Hey I tried.

The sudden prospect of school looming large once again though provides me with the inspiration and free time to start putting stuff online again. The one week I spent calling myself a certain yellow strand of noodle emphatically with about 20 other equally "zi high" people is a very good start. But, I feel enough has already been said about this orientation, except thanks to our very enthusiastic OGLs for making it absolutely memorable. You can never get thanked enough. The recognition seriously kills you. Especially so if you're a certain FF who needs a lot of recognition ha ha.

The smoke is back.