A Touching Story

Yesterday, i heard this touching story. So here it is just to share with all of you guys. It goes like this,

Once upon a time, there was this very wealthy man. He would always lend money to the poor or help the poor whenever they required it. One day, he was doing some thinking when he realised that he was getting old already and there were still a lot of people owing him money. So he decided to call upon all those who owe him money for a meeting.

At the meeting, he announced to everyone: 'As long as you tell me what you will do in your next life to repay me, all of you need not return me a single cent in your current life.'

A lot of people were delighted. All of them stepped up to him and said that they will be his maids, his cows, his horse, his slave and so on and so for except for this person. He went up to him and said: 'I would want to be your parents in our next life.'

The wealthy man was furious to hear that and burst into anger complaining about this person’s audacity to actually even think of being his parents. Then the person replied: 'Every one wants to be your slaves but can being a slave really repay your kindness that you have given me? Only through being your parents then I can repay your kindness because the love and contributions that parents give to their children is unconditional.'

Aftermath

I was dead yesterday. Dead after the mass destruction caused by maths and econs. It was like the realease of a nuclear bomb in our tiny little brains that contains of nothing but fear. Well i died. Confirm dead. Open the paper and the first 3 questions just added question marks to my already full of question marks brain. The examiner would be like "Aiyo this boy ahh waste paper. Write name and copy question only then hand in." crap.

Today had chinese. It was like some concentration camp to me. Sit in the badminton hall with a very cold climate for slightly more than 3 hours. Intrestingly, i enjoyed writing the compo while i was at it. It just flowed out naturally without any hesitation. By the time 1 and a half hours is over, i was already so eager to go visit the toilet. The second question paper was given out and i was contemplating on whether to go toilet or just continue and wait. Then one by one, they left for toilet. I was like "hmm i should go too, but i got chinese. ARGH!" So in the end i resisted. It was getting more and more urgent towards the end of the exam that i was already on the verge of asking for permission to go to the toilet but suddenly i heard "All student there is 15 mins left for you and from now on, you are not allowed to leave the badminton hall." AHHHHH!!!!!!!!! 15mins passed like nuts slow and i could feel each second slowly making matter worst. Checked and checked the paper again and FINALLY we are let off to go to the toilet. I was so relieved after that.

Went to clementi with Mamudigeda, Wei Jie and Ronnie. Ate at this japanese restaurant and started crapping of all sorts of random stuff. It really comforts me when i talk to all the ex 4/2 people. It feels as if i belong to somewhere when im around with them.

On the pass, i started thinking of stuff that are happening around me. Then this question came to my mind, how do you describe a feeling where u hate someone u actually love?

The Battle Begins

And so the battle begins!

This morning, hundreds of ACJC students braced themselves as they, for the first time, step into the battle field of ACJC. Different sections of us were distrubuted over various battle grounds in hope that the environment would more conducive for us to battle in.

So the first paper. GP. GG is the only 2 word. Open the qns booklet and smack in front of you the first question is some chimish chim chim word question. They asked something like what is "masquerade (something) cinema". Can't really remember that something but yea. Its like WOAH! MASQUERADE AND CINEMA?!?! EHHHH?????? The first question was really a major setback but luckily, the battle went on "smoother". Passage B was not so difficult perhaps its because i could really picture it and feel what it meant. It was more applicable to Singapore so maybe thats why easier to understand. The Vocab part had this weird question. It asked for the defination of "pungent". Smelly would be "dictionarily correct" but if smelly was used to replace pungent in the passage, the passage sounds funny.

The battle with GP was an incredibly tough one especially with the cold weather conditions. Most of us who were first timers came unprepared to cope with the tormenting climate ending up shivering. When the battle with GP was announced over, all combat units returned to base and awaited for the next battle.

For me, there was chem. But according to me, No food no brain. So yea FOOD! Went to canteen to stock up food and then went to find an empty classroom to gear ourselves up for the next battle. Supposed to mug but end up talking random stuff-_-"'

The time came, so back we went to that place with the terrible climate. The battle started and the first question gave a good impression. Then second question came and it was hard. Ended up guessing but then got correct after i retried doing it. The whole of the paper is really tough. Got all the weird weird question that never really did before.

Came out almost dead. Felt so upset about it that i decided to indulge myself in food.

So tomorrow is Econs and Maths. Maths is like fighting a losing battle and econs is like maybe still got hope.

Just 3 more days to exams. Stressed? Worried? DUH! But the problem is that i cant get myself to study mood. When im sitting in front of my desk facing the windows and trying to study, my attention would then turn to the world outside, wondering what is happening out there. Seeing the birds and squirrels roam so freely, how i wish i could be like them. Sadly, im always jolted back to reality by the fact that i need to study for exams but no matter how hard i try, it just seems impossible. Maths the problem and i really need a mathematical miracle. I tried sitting down with paper, pencil and calculator to solve maths but its like maths knows me but i do not know maths. Physics is another mind boggling one with all the maths within. Well i just hope that i can make it in time.

Chinese homework

Hey! Another week just flew by, AGAIN. Hais time is really flying for some reason. Come to think of it, it is already half way through june! HALFWAY THROUGH THE YEAR! Its like argh, what have i been doing for the first half of the year?! It feels as if it was just yesterday since i entered JC life and its alot more tougher. I don't really enjoy it now for all the politics and stuff is getting more and more involving. I really hate what im doing now and perhaps would hate what i would do next but is that how life is supposed to be?

Did my chinese homework today, boy oh boy its like im only doing chinese homework la, so weird. Had to do this holiday assignment and i choosed to do a recording of a story, alone. Recording chinese is not as easy as i thought. Took like 3 hours to get it done and its all because of the recording! The addition of effects took like just 30mins. Have a listen :http://www.geocities.com/zning4/story.mp3

4o2 Outing!

Hello! Yesterday it was 4o2 Class Gathering at Sentosa! Well we were supposed to meet at 11am but then we waited and waited for all the people to arrive then made our way to Sentosa. By then, it was already 2pm. We stoned at Food Republic for like 3hours? Ate Bah Chor Mee and Chendol. Wah the Chendol is seriously expensive. $2 for one small bowl. So waited and waited and we talked loads of crap. Also not very sure what were we talking about. Awhile we were on do we like our schools, the next minute we were on gossips.

We made our way to Sentosa on the new monorail and when we reached Imbiah Station, this kid in the monorail said "Mummy this is imbah station ahh?" Immediately, all of us went "IMBAH STATION!?" Okay we were very mean. We went to Palawan beach but we had a hard time finding a spot to settle down. It was so crowded over there but we eventually found a spot under the coconut tree. The first few hours were non stop of continuous stoning. The soccer guys went to watch this beach soccer match nearby and the rest of us just stonned under the cocunut tree. Zheng Han was interacting with his volleyball which was kind of weird. He went into the sea to swim with the ball. In the end, me and Clement went to join him. We lazed around in the sea and we were sort of drifting out into the sea. The life guards kept screaming at us to get back near the shore. Okay its for our own safety, safety is always the most important.

We grew so bored that we went to rent bikes. Clement, Zhe Kai and I rented our own bikes. Clement cycled half naked but me and Zhe Kai were not. We cycled to Siloso Beach and went to the 7-Eleven over there. Bought some drinks and headed back. I was holding onto this drink and cycling with one hand. There was this beach tram on the left and behind it was some ang moh skating. I was on the right cycling quite fast. THEN SUDDENLY, THE ANG MOH JUST SWERVE INTO MY LANE! WTH! I braked so hard that my bike jerked and it hit me so hard and it hit for like so many times. Luckily i did not fall off the bike and the drink was not spilled. Wah the ang moh just kept going on la.

Reached our original spot and by then the girls have arrived. There was Sophiana, Su Jun, Yanru and Eewen. I think they paid $3 to come to Sentosa just to play cards. The 3 of us continued cycling. The time came to return the bike and we were officially bored again. Some of us, okay me, got hungry and we went to 7-Eleven to get some cup noodles. Sophiana, Eewen, Clement and me walked there. Shei Pin and Wei Jie also walked with us but they were already leaving Sentosa. They left us when we were at the train station. There was a 7-eleven over at the train station but it was super crowded and there was no seat for us. So the 4 of us walked to Siloso beach and ate at the 7-Eleven over there. Eewen was pretty funny cause she spotted her interact club people over at the 7-Eleven and she was trying to hide from them. She kept staying outside the 7-Eleven while we got our cup noodles. All of us got this "Xin" spicy mushroom noodle. Then came Clement and his mathematical, calculative blah blah blah mind. He was comparing the price to weight ratio of the big bowl and the small bowl noodle to decide which is more worthwhile. So he finally came to a conclusion that the big bowl is more worthwhile. We paid and then cooked the noodles. Sat down at a corner of 7-Eleven and started eating. Eewen joined us because her interact club seniors left 7-Eleven. She said she was not hungry but then don't know why she still got a big bowl of noodles. I finished eating the noodles but i was still very hungry. Sophia was also still hungry after her cup noodles so we went around 7-eleven again to grab some snacks. In the end we got ourselves candy. It cost $2.60 and clement went RAH RAH RAH SO EX and started calculating its price to weight ratio again but he was convinced that it was more worthwhile because the candy was significantly heavier. Walked back to Palawan beach after that.

On the way we talked about random stuff and then Eewen said something about her name saying that if her parents were to name her english name using hokkien translation, it would have sounded like Ee****. All of us kept laughing at it but we made a promise not to leak this small little secret of ours out.

Made our way back to Palawan beach and on our way, we saw this beautiful sun set. We grew bored again at the beach. I started building sand castles. Sophia, Eewen and Clement joined in and there was this competition between the guys and the girls to see who could build the better sandcastles using the super big gulp cup. It was so funny and fun.

Then i got thrown into the sea-_-. Darren said he wanted to get revenge because i kneed his ass. All of them were like chasing me around the beach but i was not fast enough and eventually Hosen got me. I was dragged down the beach and eventually thrown into the sea. Wah of all places somewhere so shallow that it hit so hard on my back. Haha. I got back up and started chasing Darren. Could have almost got him if not for my poor stamina. I think Dylan helped me to stop him but im not sure because i was not wearing my specs. Wanted to drag him down into the sea but i was just so exhausted from all the running around.

So the sun set into the sea and all of us prepared ourselves to go home. Took a quick shower and went to vivo city to eat our dinner. Ate at the Kopitiam. After eating, we discussed on what to send to Sook Xian because the next day, which is today, is her birthday. In the end, we came up with this. " HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO SOOKIMA, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU! HAVE FUN AND A NICE DAY AHEAD. 4o2 ROCKS =)" This is what the 5 of us decide to send to her at 12 midnight.

Eventually got home and waited till 12 midnight to send her the SMS. Watched "I Not Stupid" on TV while waiting. Felt pretty sad while watching the movie.

Well Happy Birthday Sook Xian!

eye popping experience

WAH!!! THE RRRRR SOUND FROM THE PEOPLE CUTTING TREES DOWNSTAIRS IS GETTING UNBEARABLE!

Yesterday, i woke up earlier than usual to go to my father's office to work. They had to produce this programming cable in the shortest time possible for their customer, thats why i was brought in to help them. I was there to solder the cables. The office only had enough material to build 4 of that cable so the max was 4.

When i first saw the cable that i had to make, i just went "OH MY!" There was this 20 something over pin D-Sub connector and 2 9Pin D-Sub connector to solder. But the worst thing of all was to solder this 24 pin IC to the connectors and soldering 5 Surface Mount Deviced( SMD) capacitors to the IC. Then also had to use wire wrapping kind of wires to lay the circuitary. Its just too bad that i did not bring a camera along to take photo of that cable, but to me it really is like a piece of art work (:

The first cable came out within an hour or so but the bad thing is there was some circuitary problem with that cable itself. Yu Kuet, an engineer in the office, took out the schematic and traced the paths of the circuit. He realised that he drew the circuit wrongly and had the input to the output and the output to the input. So i took back the cable and the sample and changed 2 pieces of wire and YAY it works.

The second cable came out after another hour and it worked too! Then lunch came. Ate in the office because some of the workers brought food for everyone! Its so nice of them to bring food to share. There was spaghetti, "wu xiang", nuggets, curry and apple. Ate till i was quite full and help pack up a little. Went back to my soldering station and began soldering again.

By now, my eyes were already getting tired and my brain is starting to not think properly. I did not design the circuit so i had to follow the schematics but i'm seriously bad at following stuff if i do not really understand the circuit and how its connected. So i was kind of zombified and robotic when i was soldering the 3rd and 4th cable. Kind of crazy too i must say. Fortunately, the third cable came out perfectly fine.

When i was starting work on the 4th cable, Yu Kuet and Xu Jun had a conference call to someguy overseas through skype. They were discussing some stuff about their ongoing projects. That kept me quite awake while i was soldering the 4th cable. I think if not for that conference call, i would be soldering the wrong stuff already. So out came the 4th cable but sadly, it was not working. So i began tracing and tracing but hmm, all of the connections are right. Then i began searching for shorts. Good thing there is this wonderful invention called a multi meter. I found the short at pin 6 and 7 of the 20 something over pin D-Sub connector. It was due to some leftover solder that shorted them together. Took the soldering iron and desoldered it. Tested it again and yes! it works.

Managed to complete 4 of the cable and seriously im quite proud of myself cause i never imgained that i would be able to solder such small components and wires. But well i did it (: AND OH! I SO LOVE THE SOLDERING IRON AT THE OFFICE! IT HAS TEMPERATURE CONTROL!!!! WOOTS!

Amp in Progress

Hello! Here's some updates on my amplifier project. Today i made a trip to Kallang in hope to be able to purchase some aluminium. My friend told me of the place and recommended it so i decided to give it a try. Its Block 26 Kallang Place. Its like a JTC area and all the industrial stuff are there.

After going back to school just to hand in my EoM, Cynthia, See Toh and me took a train. See Toh and Cynthia alighted at Tiong Bahru so i was left alone till Kallang. On the way there, i noticed this couple who had a child perhaps 4-5years old. The father was enthusiastic about the child but the mother was just so cold towards the child. Its like as if the mother made a wrong decision to give birth to him like that. It really aches to see such a thing. The mother was constantly giving the child the cold looks and nagging at the child to keep quiet because she wants to sleep. Then when they reached their station, the mother actually made a comment that the child could continue to sit in the train for all he wants. The boy replied no very loudly and the mother sort of lost control? and hit the boy's mouth. Fortunately hist father was around to keep matters cool.

So i reached Kallang, took out my handphone to look at the map and started walking. Walked for about 10 mins and finally found the place. Im so glad that i found that place cause guess what? I also found Poly Electronics over there! Poly Electronics is a company who offer custom winding of transformer. So anyway, went around block 26 but found no Hiew Hup Eng. I only managed to find Hiew Hup Soon. I was rather puzzled cause Soon and Eng is like quite far away? Wanted to give my friend a call but then decided to give the Soon a try and ahha! Its actually the same shop.

I stepped into there office and was greeted with warm welcome. They are rather friendly people over there and they actually welcome small orders. Discussed with a woman over there about the price and the dimensions and the holes to be cut. She calculated a cost of around $40 and i was rather surprised as i thought that aluminium will be very expensive. The lady needed the dimensions of the holes to be drilled to i decided to go straight to Sim Lim Tower to get them and pass it to them so that they can cut accurately.

Went back to Bugis area to take my lunch and then left for home on 67. The aluminium would be ready by next week, can't wait to get hold of them.

MRC Camp

Hello! The last 3 days have been hell but then it was memorable. MRC camp finally ended just now. It was quite meaningful to me but i ended up really lost. Don't really know how and why i am lost by yea, im just really displaced.

First day was just full of test for me. LOADS of break which is like the most boring part of the camp. The test are quite challenging but i managed to figured it out for most of them. So my first test was outdoor system setup. I was given a 2hour period to settle this outdoor thingy but i managed to complete it within 40mins. Wei Liang was that booths operator. When i stepped into the classroom for the outdoor system, i already noticed something really wrong. THERE WAS NO AIR CON! So i ran to the distribution box, realised it was all down, then fling them all back up. Good thing the aircon came back up. Laid wires until very nice when suddenly i realise i am missing one XLR cable. Wei Liang said that what i need is already given. After some thinking, then i realise that im suppose to parallel the speakers outputs. Readjusted the wirings, then started to connect everything up. When it came to powering on, no power. Grabed a testpen and started opening the power extension cord. Started with the plug and omg! the wiring is out. Put it back then went to the extension side the opened it up. OMG! Its out too! No wonder no power. So setted up everything then i had like 1 hour 20mins of extra time. The bad thing is my next period is break -.- So total boredom until my next period, lunch. Had some food which i cant remember is what. But heck, at least after lunch i have something to do again.

My next period was a test in hall. It was chapel setup test. Managed to set everything up but i took quite some time. Then went up to the cage and i was timed to fix back the video section of the cage. That took me like 15-20 mins i guess and all the stupid freaking BNC to RCA changers are all spoilt. Then was the light mixer. Set it up in like less than a minute. They remved the DMX512 head from the wall point, unscrew the monitor, remove the power plug and plug in the other end of the DMX512 to another port on the video mixer. Programmed it and voila done. Then long long break again-_-

After that was dinner dinner we had err can remember food too but anyway after dinner was my LT test. Hao Ting was testing me and there were 2 other people following me, Ivan and Brandon. First up was Ivan. HT's first question was whether he knew how to turn on the lights in LT4. It was really very funny when he wanted to setup the LT system in the dark. He had some difficulty setting up everything so HT asked Brandon to go help him. After Ivan finished, it was Brandon's turn. He was good and managed to set everything up. Then i thought it was my turn but NO~~~ , It was Ivan's turn again. Made me so gan jiong. This time round, HT challenged him to a time limit and he made it within 5 mins. Then after Ivan's turn, HT asked Brandon to help Ivan dismantle and screw up the LT system. Then HT asked me "Zhen Ning, how long do you think you need to set up the LT system?" Obviously i could not say like i need longer so i also said 5 mins. BUT THE SYSTEM WAS SCREWED MORE THAN ALL OF THEIR SYSTEMS LA. Then i had to work in the dark. Only light source was HT's handphone with this camera light. It was really looking with my hands in the end. Good thing is i still managed to finish everything in 5 mins.

After LT, i went to the outdoor system room to take a look at Shermaine's progress with the outdoor system. I would say that although she did not really perform well, she is already trying her best. I was locked out of that room after awhile because Wei Liang was uncomfortable with me around cause maybe i would leak info to her.

So after that it was shoer time. Went to the sports complex to bathe and then went back and sleep. Gave Babi chong my sleeping bag to sleep on and i slept on someone else opened up sleeping bag. My tail bone hurt like nonsense while i was sleeping and i was experiencing cramps and such while sleeping. Did not really slept well. And the air con was like so cold that i had to go and turn it off halfway through the night. Sometime around midnight, this group of people took torch light and shine aroudn the room and they were like whispering "XLR cable la" then i was like "wah lao ehh"

At 5am, TADA, the lights were turned on and WL made all of us wake up and assemble outside MR room. We were going to play treasure hunt? Not sure what game but it was this game where u must find clues which will lead u on to the next clue. My group started off with this clue, "where little mermaid lives". At once we went over to the sunken gallery. walked around that area but found no clue. Then went up to the pool deck and found one clue but it was not the right clue that we were suppose to find. But anw we just took it. Then we were like stuck. I walked around the sunken gallery scrutinising every speck of dust and FINALLY, found this stack of paper pasted onto the wall. Grabbed it and went on to the next clue. We got stuck at the 3rd clue. It said "BACKside attack". We went to the hall, to the back gate to everywhere we can think of but found nothing. So in the end we decided to skip it since we found other clues without even finding their previous clues. Half way through, all of the teams got real frustrated and started to share info and clues. We wandered around to the various venues we exchanged with the other groups and finally, we managed to find all the clues except for the back side attack one.
The game was stopped halfway cause it was getting late and we were suppose to eat breakfast already. For breakfast, we got Nasi Lemak. It tasted like heavenly stuff. Wait everything tastes heavenly when you are hungry. So after this was my theory test. we had to sit in that room for 3 hours. I was Piaing through everything at full speed but in the end still cannot finish. Towards the end, the remaining people in the room started to talk and just don't care about the papers at all. It was quite funny.

Lunch was fried noodles. The serving was seriously so little and i was not full. But no choice. Then came the video lesson. We had to come up with a 1 min short clip of Rock AC withint 4 hours. At first i thought, hmm should be quite easy. But then once i started to do, its like ehhh WAH SO HARD AHH! The funny thing was Jeffrey. He was sitting beside me at the G5 when Poof went the screen. WTH! JEFFREY!!!! WHY U MAKE THE G5 TURN OFF!!! The best part was we didn't save it-_- But nevermind, HaoTing came back to turn it on and in no time, Jeffrey made it turn off again. % !@! !$ But anw, we got it done just in time. Quite satisfied with it but zzz, videoing really SUCKS big time.

Then had a short short break then dinner. We got hor fun for dinner which was quite bad because it has all dried up. Almost wanted to add hot water to it but decided that im too lazy.

After dinner, we had games in the hall. We were splitted into 2 teams. The game was such that one of us was blind folded and the person up there has to guide them through a maze. Was quite difficult for me especially when it came to my turn to be blindfolded. I actaully lost balance and fell-_-. So sorry guys. Had a debrief after the game then we got back our test papers. I was the top scorer with a score of 87%. Or was it 82%. hmm cant remember. But anw, quite happy with my marks (:

We shifted the base venue to 2.13 to sleep. I was just really tired that i slept within like 30mins after we reached the room. Everyone was still so high and stuff and they were playing card games and using their laptops. At around 4am, BOOM THE LIGHTS WENT ON AGAIN. Reuben and Hao Ting came in and made us all go to the hall. We were given this team challenge to setup chapel within 3mins. The first time we did it, we took 30 mins because of all the screw ups of the mic. Packed the thing in like 10 mins. Wah all of us were like zombies in action. So zombified. Had to keep redoing and redoing and redoing but this time we planned everything. Cause we got 17 people, all of us grabbed one mic and did it. Along the way, we changed tactics from time to time and soon our timing got better and better. We had once where we actually did it in 2 mins and 53 seconds. Quite fast i must say. The hall was very hot while we were doing it and i think i developed slight rashes. Quite itchy and pain.

Lunch came and we were treated to good food this time. Nasi Brani and ice mocha. Enjoyed it real much. But after lunch we continued doing the chappel setup. All in all, we did chappel for like 22 times. Enough to last for the next term.

After that, we were asked to pack up the cabinet and after that we had to do fun-o-rama setup. The fun-o-rama setup was kind of large scaled cause it spreaded throughout the school. Once we got everything setted up, we tested it. At first there was no sound on one of the horns so i had to like run around the whole school to hear every horn. Trust me its tougher than runing 2.4km. Strange. everything was connected properly but why was there no sound? I ran back to room 3.6 which was where our amps were. Tried and tried but no sound. Then i flicked a switch and WOW! GOT SOUND AND SO LOUD! haha! We did not turn on the amp thats why. Ran down to ask Reuben to check. As Reuben went around the school to check, Zhong Xian was like talking crap into the horn. Like conversation with someone then somemore so loud. Quite funny. After the checks, we packed up and ZZZZZZ coil the super duper long cables that are flying around the school.

MRC camp was declared over after the Fun-o-rama thingy and some briefing. Stayed back to eat dinner with them and 2 seniors came back to visit us. stayed on till like 10pm then left school. Took bus home with Shu Ting and when i got home i was so freaking tired that i felt like just going to sleep directly. Its really that tiring.

Hello! I just donated blood Its rather meaningful actually. So at first when i entered the hub with my consent form and IC, i had to go through a check by a nurse to see if they can find my blood vessels. Bernard and me were lucky as we were guys and the nurses only had to look at the vessels from the outside and we were ready for the donation. Jovia, Sam and Jiang Fan dropped out halfway for various reason. Then we had to fill up this form which was asking about our health status. They were like asking when did i last corpulate. Well answer is NO...Never ever before. Admin stuff later was going through a medical officer which we had to wait like real long. I think bernard, me and soemin waited for like 45mins before we could see the medical officer. Finally it was my turn to see the medical officer. Walked behind the screen and tests were carried out. The guy who was checking my health status circled this AIDS thingy and said that it needed 12months for the AIDS virus to act up. Then he cancelled my no answer and circled yes for me. I was like "huh? i didn't have sex and never used drugs before?" Next was testing for HB (which i don't know what is that). The nurse used some prickly little mechanism and turned it and shoot at my finger. Felt a short sharp pain and i saw blood. A tube was used to absorb the blood then the nurse dropped the blood in the tube into this blue solution. Not very sure what was she testing for, but anyway, the fun/scary part was next.

I went into the station for donating of blood. The nurse sat me beside this very friendly J2 girl who was also donating blood. It was her second time already and she was very friendly and kept comforting me. Obviously i was SUPER NERVOUS! The nurse came and started doing the necessary stuff. she took like dunno how many tubes and then this bag for the blood and gave me iron tablets. Itstarted off with her labelling the tubes, which she was very quick at, then she injected me with this anesthetic which really hurt alot. Then she took out this BIG needle which was connected to tubes which led to the bag. I was like WOAH! SO BIG?!?! She pushed the needle slowly into my body. It felt really weird. The early entry part is just like feeling nothing. Then as the needle makes its way in, it starts to feel as if some weird thing is crawling around inside you. But thanks to the anesthetic, it did not felt very bad.

I started to exercise my hand and very soon the whole bag was filled. Another nurse came to end the process which included the withdrawal of the needle. Amazingly, i felt nothing at all during the withdrawal. I was even wondering if has the needle been taken out of my body. Sat there for around 5 mins while applying pressure to this cloth which was above my insertion area. Then this man came to bandage my wound and i was ready to go. Felt a little giddy at first but after awhile, i was feeling fine already. Hope that this pack of blood would save someone's life.

Hello again! Guess what? Im FINALLY soldering at home again!!! Yeps. Feels real good to use back my own soldering iron and i really got to admit, it is way lot better than MR's soldering iron. So this time what did i solder? Err a circuit. Yea its a circuit that i sort of modified from another circuit. Its a audio amp.

Schematic:

Then i began planning how am i going to put the components [sorry for the bad picture, my phone's camera really suck ): ]

So then after planning, I took everything out from my drawer

And started soldering according to my plan

See all the black holes, they are markings i made to tell me what goes where.

Lets play spot the difference, see if can u spot the difference

In case you are wondering why are there only like resistors and a 8pin socket for the opamp, its because the circuit has no caps and the mosfet and transistors are yet to be installed cause i need them to be on a heatsink which needs to be drilled. Unfortunately, i have no drill-_- Anyone willing to lend me a drill? A benchpress would be better (:

Hello! This week was seriously very very fun! Its the last week of exams and next week there is not exams, except for chinese-_- YAY!!! And the week after next would be holidays which is already "reserved" for studying for terms.

Yesterday, there was Passion AC. Setup was almost the same as Rock AC just that the on stage work isn't as bad as Rock AC. Okay actually the on stage work is almost non-existent. We just need to help CF set up their things right and then its ready! The stage monitors were run through the mixer before going to the stage so that the monitors were controlled by us.

I did videoing and the camera stand i got was some crappy crap crap one. The pan mechanism was "okay" but the tilting part of the mechanism is like very "SMOOTH". It jerks alot whenever i want to shift it and its just super hard to get that nice angle i want to take cause i can barely control it. But anyway just did it lor. Took videos of the singers facial expressions, the drummer's expression, pianist expression, guitarist expression, computer girl's expression and the audience expression. For the starting part of Passion AC, there was no lights shining at the audience so i could not take the audience's expression. Tried turning this night shot plus function but still too dark. In the end, it was like 1 and a half tape full of the performers and pastors expression. Only until halfway through then the lights came on. Then YAY! Can take the people's facial expression.

Towards the end of the whole Passion AC, the performers started performing again then i saw the back lights go on and off and on and off in some rhythm. I was wondering if it was pre programmed or not so i pass the camera to Colin and ran to the cage, okay im very mean. Then i realised that it was just Shermaine pressing it but not bad leh at least can catch the tempo. HAHA I TOOK OVER THE LIGHTING MIXER!!!! WOOTS! It was seriously like playing O2JAM but its LIVE!!!! Had so much fun with it and trying to do some impromptu stuff like changing the lighting tempo and the pattern of the way the lights light up. This song, Take It All, CAME!!!! YAY!!!! Its Sam's favourite song and i knew the song well, cause when she was around she would play it like again and again AND AGAIN for the whole of morning pre assembly-_- BUT, cause i knew this song, I could like make the lighting effects so much better la! I loved this song especially the part that went "take take take it all, take take take it all" I made the lights like blink at some tempo with the song. Wah i seriously love doing the colour lights, its really so much fun especially when the audience is so high. Good thing is i did not get scolded for operating the lights like that for me myself was worried that i would spoil it. I was pressing so fast that i think sometimes i made the light turn on and off at a frequency of 2-3Hz or so? But well im very honoured to be able to do the lights at the last part.

YAY! Im 17 today! Haha. Thank you Firedrake. Thanks for celebrating my brithday. I really thought that u guys won't remember my birthday but well, im so wrong. Its always so touching to know that you guys are always around for each other.

So how was my birthday? Quite touching i must say. Early in the morning, there was Samantha and Ryan's SMS in my phone wishing me a happy birthday. Aww, don't they seem like a couple? Haha. After that, when i reached school, nothing was much different from usual until halfway through chapel, oh and anyway, i miss the drums :(, Clement SMSed me wishing me happy birthday. Then i started thinking, hmm maybe not so little people dun know and remember my birthday afterall. Later on, i went to back stage and started talking with Nyssa (I didn't spell it wrong this time round (: ), Christiana and PK. They robbed me of my wallet and ransacked it! The first thing they took out was the EZ-Link card. Then wow! They wished me happy birthday. So nice of them! Then after that i got SMS from Sophiana, Jasmine and Jade. Thanks alot everyone (:

Oh then it was NAFA... The test that i predict i would fail for i think 2 more years. I jumped 245 for SBJ which is a freking 1 cm from an A, got 10.2 which is like 0.1 second from an A then got 40cm for sit and reach which is a C, then got 44 for sit up which is an A and got a U for my pull up-_-. FAIL. Finito.

Met up with the firedrakers. COOL STUFF! They bought me a cake!!!!! SO nice la! Aiya i seriously don't what to say and how to thank them. Just so nice of them. Then they were singing the birthday song so loudly, until i super paiseh. But its really nice of them la.

Well a few more hours to go before its gone, so off i go (:

damn weird. the blogger isn't working the right way. but i think still can post.

So RockAC is finnally over with all that hectic stuff to plan and organise and setup and bla bla bla. YAY! Its finally over. I was on backstage duty (AKA "Sai Kang" Warriors) yesterday for rock AC. It was kind of time pressing especially for the very very first contestant. We had to setup everything which included the drum set, bass amps, guitar amps EVERYTHING in under 1 minute. Well we had the help of he councilors to help us shift all the heavy stuff like the HEAVYWEIGHT bass amp. Its like 60kg.! So fortunately our task is to just lay wires and plug everything into the amps and mics. Amazingly, all of us managed to set everything up in like less than half a minute!?!? Wonderful isn't it, but if not for the council people, i doubt we can do it in such a short amount of time. So after this, it was less tough for us already cause the following bands did not have much variations from the initial setup. OH! the first band. They had this crazy drummer. Trance like i would say when he drums. Totally out of the world. I think he whacked one of the mics while he played half way and it shifted it. He was like yelling at us the mic while he was drumming and all of us were like, err what should we do? But in the end Wei Liang went up on stage to adjust it. Then came the Maksim wannabe. He is real good in my honest opinion. He played Nostradamus and Kolibre. AND DANG, Stage monitors had no sound for the 1st and 2nd half of the song. HAHA all of us at the back stage was like yelling into the walkie talkie, "TURN ON THE STAGE MONITOR!!!!!" Only until like halfway through Kolibre then TA DANG! got sound. I felt really sad for the pianist cause he was slightly off tempo for Kolibre cause he could not listen to the backing track, but well he got LOADS of praises from the judges. Good for him (:

Okay i got to go for now shall write more on RockAC a little later.

RockAC
It's your stage.

hello! quite some time since my last post already. Its finally friday again and it feels so good to know that it is a friday. This week has not been as busy as the others. Don't know why but perhaps its because im starting to get used to it already.

Im so looking forward to Rock AC and Passion AC. They are events that i crave to do because of all the technical stuff that MRC has to settle. Okay fine i don't sound right, but anw, there is a rehersal tomorrow and lets see what happens. The plan that we got is quite "big" in a sense that there are 3 projector screens that will be used during he event. Its like the the hall is not so big? To me the main item i would be looking out for would be the drum duet.

Had a good encounter with KSL today. Actually he is quite a nice person, quite funny too! I helped him tape people talking, okay more like i helped him interview people using the camera. The interview was on what we thought would be a ideal college and classroom. Some of the comments i heard are simply wonderful and i really hope that the teachers would at least consider them?

I stayed back late today till like 8 then i left the MR room. I was watching this super vulgur video in the room when suddenly the VP just popped out form no where. IT WAS SO SCARY! He was like, "playing games again ahh". Lucky he did not hear any vulgurities when he came in. So he talked a little then left the room. Really lucky that he did not hear anything that he should not hear.

Hello! Haha! I just realised that i spelt Nyssa's name wrongly as Neesa. I better change it in my previous post.

I just edited my blog's template. Added 2 new links and 1 video. I was the editor and cameraman of that video. Those girls interviewing were my team mates. This video is not a very good video but nevertheless, its the content that matters and yea, its created using movie maker. Its about poor and needy people. How they survive and what the society thinks of them. We met with some difficulties when doing this video because of the different public responses. Most of it were negative responses but there were some positive feedbacks. I remember there was this part where we interviewed this old woman selling tissues at a MRT station. The moment we took out the video camera, the people around us went " How can like that?!" Its really the mixed views that really bugged us. Fortunately, most of the people we interviewed were very open and they were willing to talk to us about why they resort to selling tissue paper on the street to survive.

I really would like to thank my teacher, Mr Chiu, who guided us along while we were producing this short clip and spending countless hours on teaching us the techniques. I would also like to thank my wonderful team members and their courage to take up such a controversial topic as their video project.

Hope you guys would enjoy watching this video and feel differently towards those people selling tissues the next time u see them.

Hello! I went to Sim Lim today! Cool right? Okay maybe not so cool. So any way, I sort of followed Reuben and Nyssa and Christiana tagged along too. Xiang Jun also followed us "on the MRT". Meaning she took the MRT with us to bugis then took it back home. A little odd. Went there to get my components for my new amp. Finally decided to build my next amp but will most likely start work only in the june holidays cause obviously i haven't got the time with all the tests and assignments. Reuben brought the wireless RCA transmitter to complain to the shop owner that it cannot transmit as far as it stated. Haha. So he got a swap and he got a more powerful transmitter. Honestly, i think that even with a more powerful transmitter, the signal cant really travel very very far. If its open space like the hall, then its possible, but if the signal has to go through walls, then very very unlikely. The logic behind it is that because the signal is transmitted in analog mode instead of digital mode, it cant travel far. Think of it as this way, if there is no wall and u want to talk to a friend say 10m away from you, obviously ur friend can hear. But what if there is a wall just right in front of u and u try to tok to your friend at ur normal volume, your friend would not be able to hear clearly what you say. Thats why i feel that it will still not be very effective.

So after visit to Sim Lim Tower, we made our way to square. First stop at square was this audio shop. Reuben was looking for a flight case for his recording mixer. So asked around but could not get a suitable one. While at the shop, i was so curious about all the diffrent cables the shop had although all of them were klotz cable. After that i went to 4th floor, i think, to get my chasis mount RCA female connector. Met up with christiana and nyssa then we made our way to Bras Basah Complex, is that how u spell it? Reuben found his flight case there and Christiana got her pens there. As for me, i bought a CD. Its called "The Sun". Its a chinese orchestra recording by HUGO productions and i must say that the recording is extraordinary. From there i left for home while Reuben, Neesa and Christiana stayed for dinner.

I was on my way home when i walked pass this temple and saw this old man sitting outside eating his dinner. Fond memories flashed back. I did an interview with him a few years back about how he find his life. He sells tissue on the street and it sorts of makes me sad. Although he seems to be fit and strong, i think deep down in his heart, he feels lonely.

Hey! Recently have been really busy and this has been a hectic week. Very very tired after every school day till the point where there is almost no energy reserve left for me to do my own stuff. Everyday when i reach home, all i can think of is homework and more homework. Piles of endless homework seems as if they would never be completed.

YAY! I passed all my 3 tests! But im not so proud of them. Heck. At least i passed all of them.

MRC has been getting real fun for me cause we are learning soldering! Okay i already have learned most of the soldering skills and know how to apply this skills but well its something intresting to me. Reuben's method and my method is a little different cause i always like to use the whole reel of solder while soldering instead of using just a few strands. But anw, he thought us the connections and the techniques in soldering. Soldering is fun, REALLY! Its just a pity that we don't get go solder with good cables like Canare or Belden cables. We got some Maruni cables. The other time when i was soldering the laptop sound cable, it was a Canare cable. It was really easy to work with. Maruni cables just melt upon heating. Suck.

On Friday, we stayed back to help out with the Rock AC auditions. Reuben brought his "wife" along. It was a KORG Multi Track Recording Mixer. It was kind of cool. The bands were not so fascinating and there was actually 1 band that was having an arguement within themselves during auditions. There was this drum duet and GOSH! THEY ARE REALLY DAMN DAMN DAMN SUPER SUPER SUPER SUPER GOOD! Speechless is just the right words to describe their performance. After all the auditions, we had our own MRC audition. HAHA IT WAS SUPER FUN! I played Tong Hua on the piano and ZX was singing! Its really fun.

Hey! Sunday already! And another week is going to start. I so hate GP now! The teacher sucks, FULL TIME! First day of new term, she claimed that she is not the kind of person who really likes to mark assignments but now? SHE IS GIVING US LIKE SO MUCH WORK! Last week, almost all of her GP lessons are dedicated to us doing assignment and she not teaching during lesson. What kind of teaching is that?! If we go to school to receive education in this manner, i rather stay at home and study by myself.

All right, anyway, yesterday was guitar's Ritmous Acousticos. MRC had to help them with the sound thing again. Good thing is we did not screw up (: Somehow after the performance, i felt that guitar is really an instrument that is very very soothing. Or maybe its just the way the guitar people played it and their choice of songs. But really it was not a bad performance by them. Stayed in school till like 11+pm before i went home. I brought my laptop to school thinking that i will be bored while waiting, but in the end i only turned it on for like 30+mins? Played O2 jam in the room and when Reuben saw it, he was like "I want to play!". Funniest thing is that he only plays one song, Fly Magpie. He is not that lousy actually.

Next week there is like a GP package test and maths test. GP package test is more or less done last week all thanks to that GP teacher telling us wrong dates. Maths test is really quite bad. I haven't got a single clue what is MI and what is AP and GP and Sum of a Series. I really need to go mug now.

Hey guys! Well after the bad episode with MRC, things are starting to look better for me. Afterall, the people in MRC is all right to hang out with one. It has always been me and myself thinking too much and suspecting too much. Well now im starting to like MRC more and more.

All righty, yesterday was celebrations for international friendship day in ACJC. MRC had to tend to the back stage and overall i felt that it was quite okay with some minor errors. Tomorrow will be Movie Under The Stars (MUTS). Hope it will not hang and screw the whole event up like the other time.

Went to the Jurong Medical Centre yesterday to have my eyes checked up again. The doctor dilated my eyes and i so hate that process. I cannot see properly for a few hours after the dilation process! But anyway, the doctor said that there was nothing wrong with my eyes and the blood test indicated that there was nothing wrong with my blood too. He was pretty sure now that i was suffering from migrane. Well, I don't really know if that is true or not but i just hope that it will not strike as often as everytime it strikes, it really isn't a nice feeling.

Had OG outing yesterday to Five Star Chicken Rice 0_0?! HAHA! We were celebrating calvin's birthday! All of us were suppose to meet at 7pm but guess what, the latest person arrived at 9.30pm! Well that person is Amanda but hey, we can all understand why she is so late. So anyway, i arrived at 7.30pm and wow, only Dantong was there. But at the moment i sat on the chair beside her, Jessica arrived! So the three of us went to find a cake shop to buy a cake. I brought them to Mykes Oven and we bought this cheese cake. It was really very very very delicious! Yummy! So at around 8+pm, most of us arrived and we ordered the food. Calvin was a little crazy cause he wanted to eat 2 chickens. Of course that is insane so in the end we only ordered 1 chicken. amazingly, we finished all the food plus the cake. Shu Ying was there too with some guy whom i think is her boyfriend. But im not very sure. We were talking some random stuff and Jessica was saying something when suddenly *POOF* she disappeared. Upon further investigation, she was found on the floor laughing at herself. She fell off her chair! The people in the restaurant was like trying not to laugh at her! HAHA it was really very funny. Ohh how i miss the orientation times when all of us are just so playful and cheerful and need not worry about exams and studies.