Today

Today marks the day where three major events of my life happened. I shall go through them one by one.

Firstly, we got back our IB results yesterday. Well, I was mightily afraid that I was one of the 12 of 316 people who took Mandarin B SL who got 6 points, but my fears were unfounded. I was kinda depressed throughout the speech and all, as I was resigned to the fate that I was one of the lousy people who got 6 points. This wave of negative emotion continued even after I was assured of my 7 points, not that it is anything to be proud of, and I still have two very important Chinese teachers to thank. Hrmm, I won't be able to get used to this for awhile, but that marks the end of me compulsorily studying Chinese in my life. My life. The thing everyone has only one of. Yea that. What an anti-climatic sort-of-satisfactory ending to my tumultous history of studying Chinese -
1. Quite Good at Chinese in lower Primary School
2. Chinese Remedial in Tao Nan School (the standard of chinese at p6 IS FREAKING HIGH)
3. Higher MT at secondary level till sec 3 (how did I ever get in?)
4. Acheiving B4/C5 (omg I can't believe I forgot) at Sec 3 MT O levels
5. Dropping to normal MT at Sec 4 but deciding not to retake the Os
6. Then to Mandarin B SL in IB
7. With a grade 7.

That aside, the principal's speech and honour roll of top students was probably one of the most inspirational and mugger-inducing event ever in my life. Though I went through a similar one a year back, when we were all at the start of the year 5, the event this time round somehow felt different, more... how do I put it, it was more relevant to me. I could daresay that most of us at the start of year 5 still feel a little detached from the reality of IB and all, but now this really concerns us. From the question on my MSN of "omg we broke the 40 marks barrier, now what we do?", I got the replies of lets qq more, get started mugging, and play less. I guess this effectively sums up what year 6 IB life is about. Have fun guys, I'll see you all on the stage next year, I promise. (Doesn't this sound familiar?)

Second thing on the agenda for this morning: Less than 5 hours ago, I sent my older brother (yes I do have an older brother who is 8 years older) off to Perth to continue his Cadet Pilot studies and training. He'll be off for about 10 months to a year, and in that time I'll be able to kope his room. It's not his first time off overseas on an extended period of time, with him doing a semester (read: 6 months) of university in France. I guess in this global world where we are all global citizens, everyone's connected. We have invented/created/forged/made/constructed a highly complex method/system of communication that involves multiple handphones with both Singapore and Australian phone lines, and of course the webcam and Skype. Not to mention email and msn (lol I'm always online). And snail mail for those hopeless romantics who can stand reading letters 2 months after they're sent. The send-off at the airport was a surprisingly dry event, with various factors contributing to the lack of moisture. Such as the presence of my brother's gang of buddies, whom after 6-8 years they still keep in contact regularly. Hrmm, if I'm not wrong, I wrote something before/after the France trip on this blog awhile ago... O wells I wish my brother well, being a pilot is a darn cool occupation.

And for the final event, today marks the week aniversary of the passing of my dearest dog Jade (JJ). On the 31st of December 2008, while everyone was readying themselves for the countdown, and while I was at one of my favourite hangouts, I received the news that one of my dogs would not be stepping feet (she has 4 of them) into the house again. Ever. She was sick two days before that, and our whole family sent her to a dog hospital. She got a drip there, it was quite cool. That night, when I was preparing to leave, I took one last look at her and that was to be my last. I never saw her again after that. I heard she was terribly sick, and her passing can be seen as a relievement of the pain she was enduring. Well, I speak far too much, her story is one which I'll go into detail another time.

It takes a shocking event to change a person like me and I guess we all don't treasure the things we have till they are gone (I still have to say this no matter how cliche it may sound). Sorry guys for not providing much humour nor entertainment in this post, everyone needs to get serious once in awhile.