Sometimes I just hate myself. When I keep screwing myself up. When I can't keep my thoughts to myself. When I lose a winning game.

Sometimes, I just make an idiot out of myself. And I guess I can't really help it.

Yesterday was one of those times. One of many times this year when I feel like brown stuff that comes out of a male cow's ass. This time however, the blow struck much closer to home. I'm just happy it's over.

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Strangely enough, there dosen't seem to be as much work as I thought there was. I studied yesterday for a trigo test that was already over. I guess boredom does make people do stupid things.

Now I just need to study for that dumb History test..

I think there's a conspiracy by the teachers to collectively act angry, furstrated and angsty in a ploy to stir us up to study hard and try to get promoted. Well, it dosen't seem to be working very well, and not much is changing.

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Well since I just got pangsehed, it looks like I'll be giving the NDP preview today a miss. The goodie bags will have to go to waste I guess. No fun going alone.

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I overslept. Or I could be walking around visiting ancient places in chinatown for a weird history field trip.

...

Sleep is better.

On a side note, I just got flooded by Mr Chua. 24 new emails from him. Quite frankly, I can't really be bothered to read them. Semms like a common trend nowadays.

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Watched a video about religion and evolution. Quite frankly, I'm tired of all the non-existant conflict that existed between the two. I mean how important is it how humans were created? All that matters is that we're here on this earth as we are, running our own little rat races. It also made me realize how sad the world is. If an obligation to religion is needed to keep some people from becoming complete insaniacs, I guess it shows how degenerate this world is. Ahead of our time? Nah. Worthy of salvation? I don't think so. I swear, one of these days I'll just lash out at an overzealous christian.

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Harry potter has just joined my list of going to heaven, tkgs, children under the age of 4, War of the Worlds and Ben & Jerry's as severly overrated... stuff I guess. It's a sad world.

It's amazing how with so much going on, I can just get by and still have time to sit around and do nothing. I guess I'll actually have to DO some work soon. I don't get why everyone wants to do well for tests and study like mad for them when they know that not only are they going to at least take a long while before even touching a B or C, and that doing well for internal tests serves no purpose other than elevating themselves to S paper status. It seems everyone has decided to work like hell and leave me heaving in their dust, but you know what they say, a step in one direction is 2 steps in another. By the time they finish their global trek and threaten to overlap me, they'll be too tired for A levels and lao hong. Either that, or everyone just happens to be smarter than me which results in me being eleven steps behind everyone else.

Now, to get promoted with 4 subs first.

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It was raining heavily yesterday. Nontheless, I decided to walk out of my house holding a tiny umbrella that shelters your head.

And nothing else.

So, within 2 minutes of walking out of the house, my pants were soaking wet. Poseidon must be proud. So i walked back and waited for my parents to slowly get up so I could be fetched to school. And when I did get to school, I realized there was no history lecture, which resulted in much head-banging action on my part.

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The biggest upcoming event in MJC isn't National day, Teacher's day, or block test. It's the festival of praise, a christian concert. Practically half the MJC population is going, from what I gather. 3 consecutive nights of christian music and the same songs dosen't get boring if you're a believer I guess. Quite frankly, it dosen't sound all that great, but faith does do a lot to overrate things. The last time I saw a dvd on christian music, the person I was watching with it was calling a fat woman with a makeup cake pretty and hot.

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I think I can relate to King Lear now. I'm slowly losing everything, and sooner or later my sanity has to go. Bad judgment is synonymous with me more than S S Durei or George Bush.

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Back to insanity.

Went to VS speech day on saturday with Reyneth and a bunch of AEP people. It was quite dumb since most of us wouldn't be able to sneak in wearing rich yellow PE shirts. So we just sat at the gallery and watched. Nontheless, things were still funny.

VS is a racist school. At the very mention of Indian dance, peals of laughter could be heard coming from all around the hall.Dosen't help that te TLDDS happily screwed up the performance. Also, the mats singing into the microphone trying to be emo didn't exactly help racial harmony much. Even I was trying to contain my laughter when Mat #1 strained his voice and ended up sounding like a crow with a sore throat.

That being said, VS cultural groups are still good, though rather predictable. I can't count the times I've heard the band perform the austin powers song for the fun of it.

The VS spirit was somewhat erratic throughout. I believe the cheering for the guest of honour was instructed, and the school just did a good job of covering it up. Even if the GOH did seem like quite a nice guy who told stories. It was, however, pretty cool as the hall(now air-conditioned, probably at the expense of students) erupted as Mr Maran received the 10-year service award. However, after the event, the old Victorians who came back to get their certs all started doing the now-infamous VS spelling cheer in their different coloured blazers, while the hundreds of current Victorians just sat there. And watched. Looking silly and stagnant. The poor fools.

For those interested, Srini looks like a hotel bellboy wearing the NJC red blazer.

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The world is coming for me.

I have lost interest in school. I'm pretty much making the 45 minute journey to school to stone around in random classrooms.

I need something to get me back. I need it fast.

I seem to have an aura around me that tells strangers to approach me. Out of hundreds of people walking down the street at a certain time, I always get to be the lucky bastard who gets asked for directions, buggered to buy something, pressured to join mormon, pressured for donations etc. Which kind of gets irritating sometimes. And occasionally in a language I don't understand either.

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Choir has officially lost its appeal. Slightly subpar committee? Fine. Horrendous division? I'm ok with it. What promises to be lousy hotel conditions? Bring it on. Singing National Day songs for the school? Nuh-uh. It's not like national day songs are really hard to sing. Any tone deaf idiot could probably churn out a decent rendition of My People My Home.

I just want this to be over soon. Granted, the choir did get suckered into it by the horrible school admin. I mean even in VS the students didn't humiliate themselves that way. Well other than Nicholas in sec 2 anyway.

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With every passing day I spend in school, in Singapore, in this world, in this wretched life, I feel myself becoming more and more of a misfit. I don't gossip much, don't express myself much, most of my jokes freeze hell over and then make ice cream of it, I don't worship God, I am of a minority gender, I zone out most of the time, I'm not cheena, not good looking, and not charismatic. I often find myself at converational standstills, and I see more to life than good grades, a good social life, and a pretty girlfriend. I often find myself staring helplessly as events unfold, unable to do a thing about it. I think one day I'll either die of frustration or end up flaring up at someone. It's only a matter of time.

I guess I'll live and die a hermit. The world is a bitch, and there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it.

There was an article in the newspaper a few days back on religion. Somewhere inside it mentioned that about 14% of the Singaporean population in Singapore were christians, with slightly more religionless people.

14%, my ass.

Every day, I go to school, and realize half my class is christian, possibly more. Then I realize that are in fact quite alot of christians in choir. Then I look at the people outside of my class, and realize quite a few of them are christian. Heck, even my history teacher is a christian. Christians populate MJ like sheep populate New Zealand.

That being said, with so many christians, how many of them actually join with the intent of worshipping God? Quite frankly, many churches have extra pull factors to them, such as making social connections, learning music and wanting to go to heaven. In fact, in many places, christianity has become such a social thing that sometimes, it just loses its meaning. Most probably wouldn't even worship God if they didn't have any friends to look forward to meeting at church. It almost seems as if Christianity serves as a source for a sense of security. To put it bluntly, there are people who join churches for the same reason delinquents join gangs. They still do pay the church protection fees, under a different name. That being said, a church can also be likened to a community.

Then, there are people who act like they are superior just because they believe that they're going to heaven, and it reflects in their daily behaviour. I hate those people.

I shall stop here, in fear of drawing more flak.

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I seem to have lost my passion for all things associated with school. Granted, it definitely is a fine place to learn and get an education, but the school is shagging me to the point where I feel too tired to do much else. Granted, I'm not exactly swarmed with work(not yet anyway), but it just feels like life could be spent doing much better stuff. Life is short. 6 months in MJ just flashed by me like it was nothing. Quite frankly, I don't feel like I learned much from MJ. I hate to say it, Mrs Raj may have been right.

And instead, dumb existential questions plague my brain.

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It's not you
It's all me
As if me taking all the blame would make you feel better, now

But our light's, burned out

What a tiring few days. I guess it happens with irregular sleeping hours.

Thank goodness I survived the lit presentation fairly unscathed. I had been working on the lit slides the previous night till like 3.30 in the damn morning. I was pretty much freezing by then since I was lazy to go turn up the aircon temp and chose to not feel my fingers as I went to sleep. Whooptee-doo.

What can I say. At least Karthi did what she said she would do and acted knowledgeable while not doing much else at all.

Now I have to finish reading Dracula, which, while being incredibly thick, is deemed interesting by people 50 pages into the book. Maybe I'll ask them again when their 300 pages in. At least I get to wait till week 9 before I do my presentation.

"Good or bad, I'm the guy with the gun!" I sure do like the sound of that. Kind of fits into my style of thinking. I'll probably be eating my words soon though.

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Well, all the midyear results are out. While I didn't do outstandingly good, I didn't do outstandingly bad either, thank goodness. I hope they don't print stupid things like the top mark in the level, percentage groups and stuff. It's really dumb since parents being parents in the modern society of Singapore will just be as anal as they will always be which results in very angsty, misunderstood students.

Take a conversation with my mother, for instance :

M : How did you do for midyears?
W : E,O,E,F
M : Is that good or bad?
W : It's good enough to be promoted.
M : That's very bad, you know.
W : Then why did you ask me if that was good or bad if you were going to tell me it was bad.
M : You have to study hard, you know.
W : Yes yes, I know that.
M : Revise everyday, read newspapers for gp, practice maths often, .....
W : Yes I know that.
M : You're old enough, I don't want to have to tell you all this.
W : Then why in the world did you just do that.
M : What did you get E's for?
W : Lit & Econs.
M : Everyone else get A right?
W : What the hell do you think this is, PSLE?
M : Well I don't know, people in JC seem very hardworking...
W : Damn right you don't know.
M : What did you get F for?
W : Maths.
M : You need to practice maths everyday...
W : You just told me that like 2 minutes ago.
M : I shouldn't need to tell you this..
W : You're not listening. *strolls off, presumably to slack off*

A similar conversation occurred with my father later on, minus all the small details but with a whole lot more condescending tone added.

I don't understand why my parents fucking think everyone is getting A's while I'm getting something else. And in the rare occasion I do get an A, they think it's a borderline A. Like what the hell? A grade is still a freaking grade, god dammit. I think I'm just going to make minimal contact with them from now on. It's no use talking to them anymore. Not that talking to them used to be a frequent activity anyway. However, not talking to them basically means not watching TV, because that's basically all my parents do anyway, without noticing that students aged above 16 normally spend more time at school than they do at work. Of course, they're going to assume that I bum off 24 hours a day, which is totally not true since I actually do the occassional assignment, which is almost certainly not bumming off. What they also fail to realize is that JC does not equal O level. The third thing my parents are horrendously disillusioned over is that I have to be under their supervision, or I can't get anything done.

...

WHAT THE FUCK?! You might as well take me to the grave with you like an egyptian pharoah when you die, since I'm probably going to rot and die without you around anyway.

I'll probaby write about misconceptions of Singaporean parents sometime soon.

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One more week. I might not look like it, and you might not detect it, but rest assured, I'll be counting the days. Things have been somewhat stale for a while now, but lets hope what was once familiar can be rediscovered.

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I feel like puking now. Perhaps I should give cookng tips to my brother. Like never bake at 3am in the morning. And never make your muffins too big. And tell people you ran out of sugar only after they start to eat it.

Being sick is not much fun at all. Well maybe I'll be excused from House day tomorrow. Then again, most people probably are going to pon it anyway.

How a doctor can tell I'm feeling queasy by randomly poking at my stomach, I will never know.

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My grades currently stand at an E8 for chinese, c5 for GP, F for maths and E for econs. I am rather disappointed with myself right now since it looks like I'm on the right track to getting retained.

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Suffice to say my life has been boring as of late due to a sudden anti-social heel turn on my part.

hahaha lit is screwed. I doubt my group member(s) have yet to do anything about the presentation.

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It seems like human nature to look back on past events, and to realize what you could have done to make things better. And then regret sets in.

Every now and then, I look back, and I think that I could be in a different situation now. Perhaps I would not be so anti-social. Perhaps I could be doing sciences I could actually study for. Perhaps I could be doing another cca instead of Choir. Perhaps I could be in Poly doing mass comm, which looks like a missed opportunity, because JC is not the answer to my problems, and makes sure my life ends earlier.

Which in turn makes me think : What are the solutions to my problems? Before that, what are my problems? And how would doing something differend help that? A step in one direction is two steps in another. More problems would probably have arisen.

Like it or not, cruelty dominates the world. From sadisitc principals to oily-faced managers to golden-laced businessmen to wrinkly world leaders, they didn't get where they are now by being kind. No, leave that to people like Gandhi and Theresa. They got where they are by being unfeeling. Cruel to some, but unfeeling. Doing what needs to be done. Firing employees who rely on their income to support five children. Cutting wages to increase profits. Not everyone would be able to do that. Yes, it takes strength to gather the courage to be kind, but it also takes strength to shut out your feelings. To be cruel. Because at the end of the day, everyone dies alone and knows they die alone. So everyone lives for themselves. Life is, in fact, a quest to make yourself feel good. Dosen't matter if you're helping out in the middle of Africa or picking pockets, if you feel good about it, you live. Just that the people who feel good being cruel get better returns on their lives.

However, the cruelest entity of all would be the passage of time. Too often, we do things that we wish we would have undone. Even if things are not in our hands, we wish we could have done something at least to rectify the scenario. Time does not allow this. Every move you make is engraved into the slate of time. Time makes us grow weak, both physically and mentally. As we grow older, our exuberence detoriates, and for some of us, the glaring lack of it just becomes more apparent. Bones grow weak. Skin wrinkles. Illnesses kick in. Science can only deter this for so long. Nothing escapes time, the cruelest entity of all. As our minds are exposed to the erosion of the world around us, what was once pure and pristine soon becomes dreadful realization that while life does have its ups and downs, the downs sure as hell do outlast the ups.

Which leads to the sickening enlightenment that in fact, my ultimate nemesis isn't the differentiation tutorials, the idiots who ignore me and treat me like I'm invisible, lousy parents, or even myself. It's time. Before I know it, the sand has flowed out of the hourglass, and there's not a damn thing I can do to invert the hourglass that dictates how long I live, and whether I can keep up with its pace, or get left behind. I'm being left behind right now.

And why are we left behind? Emotions, or the lack if it. While being numb to feelings results in a lack of motivation, being too emotional often leaves you a prisoner of your own feelings, being slashed and whipped by failure, tortured by sadness, tickled by irritation, and electrocuted by love. These all create the proverbial quicksand that prevents us from moving on. And even if we do, sometimes we find ourselves in no condition to concentrate on the present, being haunted by the past.

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So in conclusion, my life is miserable, my enemies insurmountable and my direction in life opposite. And there's not a damn thing I can do to help it but plod on, knowing one day I am going to be swept away.

Life is crap.

I'll play your goddamn game.

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Anyone wanna help me switch templates?

Things aren't going too well. Not only have Wei Kang and I decided to screw ourselves by signing up for a lit presentation next week, we probably dont intend to do anything about it.

Well, at least tutorials this week have been light. All that's been done for history was pretty much watching outdated and corny videos on wars and stuff.

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Lit lecture was spent watching event horizon today. Supposedly the last gothic show, or something of the sort. It's quite a scary movie actually, but as a guy I guess you're obliged to not flinch at anything that happens and just laugh the fear off. Granted, after a while it just got kind of boring since nerves do get numb to these things.

There was a lot of blood in the show. Too much in fact. Blood's only scary when it's actually flowing out in realistic amounts, not when it's just gushing out like water form the genghis river. Some of it was actually pretty cool though, but still excessive.

Other than having a lot of blood, the movie quite frankly didn't have much else. The plot and sci-fi bits were marginal at best, even if there actually were quite a bit of gothic elements inside. Other than that, it was more or less an everyone-dies type of show. I had no idea why a hilarious black guy had to be forced into the movie however. It became so completely out of context that it was funny. So basically if you're scared of blood or gore of any kind, don't watch this.

Actual cinema movies are going to seem a whole lot better after I compare those to this. =)

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I want to ask... I just don't know how to.

I' m stuck in the library now, feeling groggy as hell and completely invisible since almost nobody talked to me today. I'm not in a sociable mood today. Hate it when I lose sleep.

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I think the holidays have made me allergic to sunlight. My eyes have been hurting all day and I can only attribute it to the presence of daylight. This is not good. I might go blind soon or something noooooooo. And the anti-myopia move of staring at faraway objects dosen't seem to be working in making my eyes feel better.

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It felt awkward just now, just breezing past.

The Olympics are stupid, and here's why.

1) The cities running to host the olympics, are, in fact, fighting to see who gets to waste money on building the most facilities for "the biggest sporting event in the world". After that, they soon realize that they have a bunch of stadiums that nobody wants to use.

2) Half of the sports nobody really cares about. Honestly, you could just boot out stuff like taekwondo and fencing and nobody would even notice.

3) Okay, so they need to have a meeting to discuss where the next Olympics is going to be held. But why in the world do they need to have a meeting specially to decide where the next meeting is being held? The worst part is, countries actually have to fight for the privilege to host this meeting. How logical is that?

4) More people are excited about David Beckham coming to Singapore than the Olympics coming to Singapore. Just shows how much people care about the Olympics.

-On a side note, some of the NS men are going to be spending their next 3 weeks at Westin for their reservist training for security purposes. More reasons to hope to be drafted into the police force after BMT.

Sigh. Life has been boring as of late.

Chinese oral was pretty much a disaster. At least I knew how to read all the words. But I got really stuck through the conversation. Words pretty much bounced around in my mouth before they came out and it was all wrong. Not to mention I think I pissed one of the examiners off when I said that parents don't always understand children. I hate glares from middle aged men. You can't tell if they're gay or angry.

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Time is a screwed up thing. When you do have it, it comes in great quantities, and you find yourself with nothing to do for long stretches of time.

And when I don't, I have too many things to do, and I find myself having to make choices due to the problem of limited resources and unlimited wants.

Sigh. How irritating.