nar6us

Monday, May 31, 2004 .:

to everyone who replied, and those that i buggered over this weekend- jing jing, char, pak, ling, esther, mel, kelvin, jiehan, adrienne, shining - thanks minna. ^__^

when you boil down to it, (and i realised this when talking to jing) is that i don't want law because it's not what i love. it's safe and stable and can earn me a lot more money than if i get an english degree... but it's such a sell-out. and i don't want to sell-out... it's a stupid way to live your life but... i guess i've chosen it so i'll have to live with it.

she took the flowers and left at 12:43 PM

Thursday, May 27, 2004 .:

sigh. ok, i suppose there's no more procrastinating anymore, seeing as how there's a package from nus silently watching me (it says it is what i want)... i really need help now. which uni, which course-- which life? i think i mentioned this to pak before... it's so easy to dream about what you're going to become when you're younger because you don't actually have to make it reality. yet. and now when it's the time to start taking steps to fulfilling these dreams you have to realise just how impossible and unfeasible it is but it's so ruddy hard to let go. i just... wish.

sigh.

anyway, can y'all help me out with uni choices by giving me your opinion?

king's college london: english with film
the good: well, king's is in london's west end. that means theatres and arts, not to mention the west end is the safer side of london. also, their drama society is called 'the king's players' which for some reason really appeals to me, and they've got a huge musical society that stages musicals which look rather big budgeted for amateur productions.
academics: they have the best teacher-student ratio among the choices, and excellent graduate employment rate. its times.co.uk ranking for english is 16th, but it is not ranked for its film studies... but there's a great range of modules like film noir, movie music, asian popular cinema, creative writing modules etc. and with film in the mix, hopefully english won't be too monotonous.
living: the halls of residence are also intra-collegiate, which means you get to mix around with other university of london students which makes for interesting stuff.
career prospects: the thing is that i want to work overseas- for the experience at least, and i think prospects for employment for foreigners would be higher in london and the fact that i would have been studying there for a while would mean that i'll be familiar with the place, and know how and where to hunt fer jobs... or since i'm based there i could try for internships during the hols et al. and if i come back to singapore i can branch out into stuff like film and media, or do film and book reviews for a living instead of just teaching... which is interesting. not to mention king's college is a uk uni well-regarded around here.
the bad: the cost of living in london is ridikkulus. and since i'm funded by my parents it's... not nice to sponge off them like that. and most importantly, for guardian.co.uk's rankings it's 36th, the difference due to guardian giving only 20/24 for king's teaching assessment. which means that there are a lot of teachers- but they're not spectacular.

university of york : english
the good: well... apparently york is a place that's 'not too big for you feel lost, but not too small that a city-dweller will feel out-of-place'. it's got tons of drama productions, and it's just an artsy place.
academics: it's york. it's bloody brilliant. its rankings are great- 4th for times.co.uk and 14th for guardian.co.uk - and the faculty is brilliant, the students are brilliant, the graduate employment rate is the same as king's. there's a HUGE range of modules that don't only focus on lit, but film and theatre as well- like shakespeare in performance, literary adaptation in film, authors on film/film authors etc.
living: tis a small cosy environment, me thinks. close knit student body. but that er, means i'll meet er, emen. (as to who is emen, please refer to 'the bad') and it is definitely cheaper than london.
career prospects: apparently a york degree is really well-regarded and tons of alumni go into arts administration, publishing, theatre, film or broadcasting... and if i come back and teach lit at the newly independent hwa chong... i dunno. good credentials=higher likelihood of employment at an independent school? that's a much lesser point.
the bad: well... york's not london. no west end theatres, no crazy city life. and i guess i wouldn't be as familiar with london to go and try to find a job there. and the thing is york is so damn brilliant- what if i'm the most doofus-y student there? or if i'm a complete dunce. or ill-read (which i am...) and that means i'll really have to work my ass off (more so than anywhere else). york's curriculum also means i can't tip-toe around the less, uh, desirable periods... like victorian literature. -grimace- and... i guess york just makes me feel insecure. how to relocate to london, how to do well, how to find work (other than teaching) with a pure english (in name) degree... all these unanswered questions. and as to who, er, emen is... he's this grand senior i talked to when york sent people to promote the uni at hcjc... and er, i dunno. just feel er, intimidated? and i was in a weird mood that day so it was rather humiliating and er, it's just embarrassing lah. (but this is just a side-note. it's in no way a deciding factor. and emen is er, a nice guy. i'm sure.)

national university singapore : law
the good: it's in singapore. it means no messy living costs, no exorbidant tuition fees (as opposed to those in the uk.) and my parents will be a lot more secure (i'm their only child now... i don't think i can afford for anything to happen to me in a foreign land. it'd kill them.) and they do love the notion that their daughter'll be a lawyer. my mom's always fancied that thought since i was a kid (i think it had to do with the fact i could weasel her into buying me toys i really didn't need.) and i can continue with tuitioning dawn who i really adore as a li'l sister sorta thing. my friends and everything are here. and law is something i find i might enjoy. i suspect that the theatricality of court is the main factor... that 'performance' aspect of it. and i can definitely earn a decent living with it. and should i really wish to be involved with the arts i can go into artistic/creative laws like copyrights and stuff. or be legal advisors to arts companies et al.
the bad: it's the same old same old. same old crowd. same old environment. same old apathy. and law just strikes me as being incredibly cut-throat. and the thing is... law seems like a dream to me. it's like a pretty sort of vision, of the prestige, the money (?) but there's a lot of hard work that has to go into that... (i applied to law on a whim.) and it's nothing special. you aren't really helping anyone. you're no one special. and there's no real flaming gushing passion (like that which i have for theatre). it's just... i don't know. it's something i feel i can live with and that i feel at least -some- sort of liking for. it's not the first of my fa-vou-rite things (neither are raindrops on roses... but that's a different matter.) but it makes the cut.

queen mary, london : english and drama
the good: it's in london. it's in the east end of london, but it has its fair share of theatres (not as glitzy as the west end ones though) the college itself has its own theatre, however, which means a lot of student productions.
academics: well, as the course suggests, it's got an equal weightage on both drama and english. drama's got a mix of theory and practical (which means -gulp- time to get over my stage-fright) and the english courses are pretty basic stuff. as in, dante, milton's paradise lost, etc. the usual suspects. nothing not offered elsewhere. the main draw of this college is the drama bit. guardian.co.uk ranked it 9th.
living: it's a london collegiate so intra-collegiate halls as well. they have their own student village though. which means there's actually some semblence of a 'campus' instead of just a building here and a building there like king's.
career prospects: well... this is the main draw about queen mary. it's a drama degree. which means that i can go into this field... not necessarily as an actor, but arts management etc. or i could come back to singapore and teach in the new arts school. it's just... something i really love.
the bad: well, the cost of living in london is still ridikkulus, east or west end. they have a pretty bad teacher-student ratio, times.co.uk ranked it 29th. they're not held in that high esteem, especially not in singapore, and the east end is apparently notoriously unsafe, especially for girls. the thing is, if i end up sucking at drama, and dropping it to take only lit, then this defeats the purpose of going to qmul altogether. and the thing is... i guess if i want to study drama (like, if i get over my stage fright and prove to myself that i have it in me), i could do it in a performing arts school instead. after my english degree. which means more expenditure for my parents... but... argh.

so i'm just lost... the thing is, theatre and drama are a big thing to me, and they're one of the major reasons i'm going to uk. that said, having talked to people, i realise i maybe should have applied to america instead. and do media studies, or film studies, or major in lit and minor in one of em or vice versa etc. america seems to have more dynamic courses in media and film studies, and they're a lot more open to hiring foreigners. it's just that i dislike bush so greatly and the situation is so unstable there. but too late to regret now anyway. -wry smile- sigh. and sometimes i don't know about lit. i like it. i like reading about it, it's fascinating... but i don't know if i'm doing it because i think i can do it, or if i'm doing it because i really like it. and what if i'm really crap at it? i'm not the brilliantest litter ever. i read theories about harry potter and i realise i've never even considered four-fifths of them. i just... i love theatre. but i can't do a degree in theatre cos that's... not practical. and when you have parents to support and pay back for the money they've invested into your education... you want the degree you get to be worth -something-.

as a side-note, do visit www.JohnKerryIsADoucheBagButI'mVotingForHimAnyway.com. fun stuff.

and as a sidenote, congrats to jing jing and mel for getting what they wanted. and grace: you got an moe scholarship? go you! what subject will you be major and minoring in?

she took the flowers and left at 2:36 PM

Monday, May 24, 2004 .:

[ambivalence]
i got into law.
[/ambivalence]

she took the flowers and left at 11:10 AM

Tuesday, May 18, 2004 .:

the saddest thing about visiting the blogs of people you've met(brushed past?) in the past is that the more you read about their lives the more distant you feel from them. it just becomes so apparent that you two are just such radically different people that you can not and probably will not ever become friends.

it doesn't mean that they're nasty people or that i don't like them. they are genuinely nice people that i do like. it's just that we'll never ever become close friends because other than the fact we shared the same classroom in the past and sat at the same table during recess there's really little else that we have in common with each other. we're the kind of friends that will probably see each other once in a blue moon, in aisle 6 of the supermarket, exchanging the usual pleasantries and comparing families, and talking about (among other exciting topics like the weather) "how the prices have risen... remember how we could get the same packet of biscuits from our school canteen for 50 cents?" and always ending with 'keep in touch!' because deep down we know neither of us is brave enough to take up that challenge.

and this is directed to no one in particular, btw. and no, i'm not pissed with anyone either. sigh.

i realise this blog has been wasting away in its recent spate of vapid topics like diets and movies. it's just that, to incessantly blog the sentence "i don't know what the fuck to do with my life right now" in its different permutations (and variations in vulgarity utilised) seems... i don't know...a tad bit too depressive?

she took the flowers and left at 4:39 PM

Wednesday, May 12, 2004 .:

personally i'm a bit lost as to why critics hate van helsing so much. it's not exactly the deepest movie ever, but it's just good ol' chop-socky fun with lots of cheese on the side. not to mention melodrama. : ) it's one of those, 'it's so bad, it's good!' movies where you just have to check logic at the door and just go in for an OTT mind-numbing action fest.

and i really like the dracula scenes... true there were parts where richard roxborough sounded absolutely flat... like lisa wilson singing 'come to my window' flat. just yell yell yell and one-dimensional... but scenes like him rising from his coffin yelling 'marishka!' in all its melodramatic and hammy glory are just scrummy. and his scenes with his brides are just so true to good ol dracula tradition... all cold yet emotional, simpering wailing sensual and theatrical. he's really not -that- terrible at it, and he's just got that evil charismatic charm. (btw, he's the same guy who played the snivelling duke in moulin rouge. fascinating contrast to say the least.)

and well... i really like the movie. despite the terrible transylvanian accents. and kate beckinsale. and kate beckinsale's tiny corsetted waist mocking me throughout the course of the movie.

ps, david wenham (faramir in the LotR movies) plays the most generic comic sidekick i have ever seen, but with enough cutesy cuddly-ness for you to still love him. -beams-

she took the flowers and left at 5:40 AM

Friday, May 07, 2004 .:

just solved the sequel to the crimson room: the viridian room with a lotta help from chan xinhui and pak. i thought the ending was rather cute. ehehehehehe...

in other news today, i have decided that i am done being porky and fat... and that i will become a TWIG. or as near twiggy status as is physically possible.

i will not eat desserts.

no more snacks.

no more coffee/mocha/hot chocolate

really little carbohydrates.

fast foods at the maximum, once a week.

really little red meat. (chicken and fish are your best friends!)

no more buffets.

a lot more exercising.

and thus i hope to:

lose 2kg

drop my body fat percentage to 22%, 3% lower than what i have now.

lose the jiggle in my arms

get a flat stomach

get a perky butt.

and of course, lastly, to become a twig even if it KILLS me.

(i gotta get me an eating disorder!)

she took the flowers and left at 7:08 PM

Wednesday, May 05, 2004 .:

american idol is just plain boring right now. doesn't anyone else realise that latoya yells and that her high held money notes just tremble and go all over the place? latoya has got zero personality. she messed up her presentation in between songs! and i feel like such a stage mother but i just get really pissed with jasmine everytime she bombs (and bombs badly at that). she had so much more potential with inseparable and then it all fizzled away. and i just wish she'd show some damn bitchiness. please. every girl has an inner bitch. no one is strawberries and cream all the time. and i just don't like the rest. george is nice... but... he's just goofy. fantasia just pisses me off some reason and diana is ok. she looks like miss piggy! (but she's ok lah. heh.)

it's just when you think back to last year and there was clay every week just batting homeruns... and this year... there's absolutely nothing. nothing to look forward too. and when you're as fanatical about a show as i am about american idol... and to hear all the hype and be let down this bad... it's... sad.

and the fact that my life revolves around television programmes is... even... sadder. :(

she took the flowers and left at 3:43 PM

Monday, May 03, 2004 .:

nothing interesting to add other than i find it rather difficult to capture the psychotic-ness of go-go yubari's eyes in a drawing... oh. and i watched kill bill vol 2. ehehehehehehehe.

and i'm sorry for using such words on my mother.

she took the flowers and left at 12:40 PM

Sunday, May 02, 2004 .:

i am just fucking PISSED with my mother right now, because i just got yelled at when it was HER who forgot the bloody thing on the stove existed. the thing is, it's HER who put it on the stove. i don't know when she did it, i don't know what she was cooking. SHE DIDN'T TELL ME SHE WAS COOKING. she didn't tell me to remind her to check on it, she didn't tell me anything. so 20 fucking minutes after she puts the thing there (as i have gathered) i go to the kitchen to wash my plate. i see the bloody thing on the stove, and i figure mommy's doing some cooking. fine. she's done it before. soups, ginseng water etc. so i don't flinch. the fucking thing wasn't burning then. so i walk out and turn off the fucking lights because that's my habit. i always turn off the fucking light. i like to save fucking energy. it's a fucking reflex.

and that's why she's pissed. because i turned off the fucking lights and because of that she might not have been alerted when she went out off her room that the thing was on the stove. but you know what the thing is? SHE DIDN'T GO OUT OF HER ROOM TILL THE FUCKING THING HAD ALREADY BEEN BURNT TO A CRISP. IT DIDN'T MATTER IF THE FUCKING LIGHTS HAD BEEN ON. SHE WOULDN'T HAVE FUCKING SEEN IT. and she screams at me for not having the sense to tell her that she had something on the stove. well, i'm just damned sorry about that, but nothing struck me as extraordinary about the fact she had something on the stove. if i had calmly walked out as the thing was burning and filling the kitchen with acrid smoke and NOT told her about it-- well then i'll admit it's my fucking fault, together with the fact that i'm a flaming moron-- but IT WASN'T. it was still in the midst of steaming merrily along.

but i can still take all these. what pisses me off the most is that this wouldn't even have been a bloody issue if SHE HERSELF HADN'T FORGOTTEN THE DAMN THING. if she had stopped watching her damn taiwanese variety show and remembered that, hey, she has something on the stove and walked out to check it. it's something that she did by herself without telling me so don't blame me if i'm not fucking clued in. it's like she's trying to blame me for HER forgetting about it. you should have fucking seen the way she was screaming at me. AND I HATE BEING BLAMED FOR SOMETHING I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR.

i would have apologised if a) she had gone out earlier before the thing started burning and really forgot about it as the light was not on, b) she had NOT COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY FORGOT about it through no fault of mine, c) she had actually told me she was cooking the bloody thing.

look, i know i was wrong in turning off the light. with the light off you might not have even known something was amiss when you went out of your room. but my turning off the light was NOT the reason for you forgetting. YOU FORGOT. and i HATE the fact that you are trying to pin it on me and blame ME for your own folly. blame ME for not warning you. everytime i forgot something you always tell me it's my own fault and i shouldn't blame you. so why aren't you fucking listening to your own advice?

and i now apologise for the appalling usage of expletives. i'm just so FUCKING BLOODY DAMNED SHIT PISSED OFF.

she took the flowers and left at 6:11 PM

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