What is our world becoming?

Personal observations have also further supported what I am going to discuss – the changing perspectives towards relationships.

lack of loyalty

This is probably the main reason as to why relationships seem to be taken so lightly by individuals nowadays. There could be several factors that result in this bulk effect, and if I may, discuss some of them here today.

¤ increasing affluence
As the somewhat skewed saying goes, “with more money comes more power.” And that is true to a certain extent, at least in the main topic here. This is probably also linked to my next point.

¤ independence
With more wealth and hence power, the individual is more likely fully able to support oneself financially. Gone are the days when men were the breadwinners and women had to rely on them for financial support. Inevitably, more independence means that individuals have the option to choose ‘better’ partners in terms of heightened expectations and prospects. Even if they may be in a current relationship, the lack of loyalty + the availability of ‘better options’ out there, basically potential partners with characteristics more towards their ideal ones, resulting in more relationship makes and breaks.

the loosely used term
Probably due to the above factors, it leads to the casual use of the term relationships. Individuals today tend to place less and less emphasis on the ‘original’ meaning of relationships. Being together doesn’t guarantee the existence of love for each other, or maybe promises and vows made are no longer as strongly adhered to as before?

I don’t know. Call me traditional or conservative, but I choose to believe that relationships are more than love itself. It’s the promise to love the person as a whole – flaws or not, to cherish each other, in sickness or in health. Don’t those words mean anything anymore?

It’s even more disheartening to know if kids are involved. The most innocent party of all.

They have to grow up in incomplete family structures, and more often than not, it affects their perceptions towards social issues. Sometimes the more warped an environment they grow up in, the more screwed up their growing years will be like, generally.

Valentine’s day just passed, and I hope that other than celebrating the occasion, may it be a reminder for all of us to treasure our loved ones and those around us.

Even if things don’t work out, be glad that you’ve tried and given your all. Trust that there is always someone out there waiting for you. Despite all, at least there’s me here to love you to the best of my ability.

Cheers (:

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To appreciate.
The people around you, loved ones and friends.
The environment surrounding you (simple journeys on the train can provide entertainment too).
The life you are given, to live another day each day.

Tears can be shed,
words can be said,
but more often than we may notice,
once out of the bag,
they cannot be un-said.

Life cannot rewind, it doesn’t work this way.
It isn’t easy either, nobody said it was.

Yes, we can choose to be carefree and rid of troubles.
Yes, we can choose to ignore and move on with our lives thinking it’s for the better.
Yes, we can deceive ourselves by saying that it’s positive thinking.
But let’s not kid ourselves – reality is how it is, take it or leave it.

Learn instead to appreciate all that you have right now.
The people,
the environment,
the life and soul you’ve got.

Friction may occur,
Downsides will come,
But think about it this way.
Would you truly treasure everything if it were always smooth-sailing?

There is a reason why there’s a down to an up, a fall after a rise, a storm after the sunshine.

(Just imagine how the earth would survive if it were sunny all the time! Wouldn’t there be a lack of evaporation, condensation and water vapour going around? Might there be dehydration issues to deal with? It isn’t easy to have sunshine all the time either!)

Take it one step at a time.
I’ve learnt today that I still need to be more patient and communicate more clearly,
While appreciating all that I have around me.
You can do it too!

Forget about the “bad predictions” for this new year.
Step up and step out to explore and treasure all that is in front of you.

Cheers! (:

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faith

That’s an interesting reminder that happened several times to me this week, apart from the Slice of Life article you see up there.

Random chats with friends touched a little on this, mainly with regards to relationships though. And here and there, bits and pieces formed up the entire summary of this post – having faith in yourself.

Well I could probably say that I’ve had a few lessons on this though how strong or weak that faith I have is unknown, I can trust that at least I’ve have some.

treasure your loved ones

Relationship-wise

Yes, I do think that I may have some regrets not having faith in myself and finding out what would really happen if I had chosen to believe in myself and just go for it. Like what one of my seniors said, you need to be initiative before any spark can occur – that’s how his relationship started.

Then again, I’ll think of the differences like he’s a guy and I’m a girl, so technically it’s alright for the guys to take initiative.

Thinking back however, a few couples I know got together because the girl took the initiative first. Maybe it’s called the 21st century because of this, things are changing, traditions are evolving, gender equality is increasingly practiced.

paint your own future

Career-wise

I have stepped up in this, by choosing to embark on the NOC programme even though things are still unsettled and unconfirmed. It’s worth a try anyway, that’s how I’m going to stretch myself and the belief in myself. I’ll definitely share more on this when things are finalized, for now, pray that things go smoothly for me and that Israel settles down soon without all the military dealings ongoing with Iran and whatnot – I’ll appreciate that (:

Spirituality

Spiritually

I would say that I’ve been working hard at building up the relationship with God recently, although I’m still figuring out my way around things. It’s a tug of war game because sometimes, I think that I’m analysing too much into the text and I get confused by what I used to know and whether I’m reading things correctly as what I’m supposed to. Other times though, I experience the love of God through every little act He does – and so that’s where the lopsidedness comes.

Bible study is where we analyse the text, try to understand it better and apply it to our lives. When I read through it myself though, sometimes it just feels contradictory to me – or maybe it’s just the version that I’m reading that causes this problem.

In any case, slowly but surely, I’m finding my way around God and I hope that soon, I’ll see the light.

living life to the fullest

Living

In some sense, a faith in living is related to one’s religious beliefs and their values in life.

Personally, both are inter-related and I’ve grown to treasure life much more than I used to – just think about the past when I used to wish to die young so that I could go to heaven earlier.

Well now I don’t focus so much on the dying part, but rather on the living part. Yes, we need to have faith that there will always be a tomorrow, but we must also learn to live life treasuring each and every day as though it’s the last. Only then will we be able to see what/who are the most important to us.

Cherish it/them before it’s too late.

Related articles

• Importance of Passing on Faith At Home (guyonfamily.com)
• Importance of Faith (walkonwater727.wordpress.com)
• Pure Joy? Really? Yes!! (ponderingbylaurie.wordpress.com)
• Faith – Pick-up style (thelaundryyears.com)
• What comes first? The talking or the walking? (redletterbelievers.blogspot.com)
• Faith Will See Me Thru… (justsaynototoxicrelationships.wordpress.com)

they're out to get us!

1) seriously, they’re bent on getting rid of us – whether by using oil or salt, fat or hypertension. Whichever is the most unhealthy goes first :/

spiked food?

2) either that, or they can playing with our food – well, investigations are still ongoing with regards to the 70 cases of running bowels residents had.

all just a facade...

3) and don’t think they look delicious to eat from the outside, just wait till you take that first bite – it’s all a game of being able to look good on the outside.

short and sweet post, simply because i can’t comment much on the ongoing investigations as of yet – don’t get me started on the dirty utensils. it’s just appalling that such a good brand name is giving us this kind of…catering, they’ve effectively killed all good reputation i previously had of them.

this is a business, a food business. you’ve got to take care of how you handle your different business areas and ensure quality in ALL areas. one thing good about this – you make me have one reason less to miss hall, the ‘convenience of meals catered’ is no longer effective.

At the beginning, I was still supportive of the lack of variety of food provided, because I just blamed it on residents being picky and choosy about their food – but this, is probably the sole reason I’m in their camp now.

It’s as though the caterers can’t learn from their mistake – bad food, dirty utensils blah blah blah. now that they’re packing us food while MOH undergoes investigations into the 70 or so cases of residents’ falling ill from dinner, I was just about to comment on how I wouldn’t mind having packed meals everyday until this morning.

It seems to me that it looks just like what they’ve cooked usually with their bland fried rice, or in this case egg rice, with a whole lot of oil and salt. only difference is that this time it’s packed rather than placed on the trays they use while serving us before the whole saga occurred.

makes me wonder how different the cleanliness of the food might be, considering if the cause of the incident is still unknown. it may be from another kitchen, but doesn’t it still sound dubious?

say the incident arose because they had been transporting the cooked food from their central kitchen to hall – which I heard was against our contract with them – then doing so now with the packed food doesn’t seem too much of a difference, especially if the food is still cooked by them just at different kitchens?

just think about it…

Check out the blog link at the end of this post for the contest details.

Meanwhile, I’m going have a short and sweet post as to why I want to win the iPad, albeit the older version – I’m still going to try for it! (:

Source: www.apple.com

I admire Steve Jobs – he’s one of the greatest inspiration to me. Winning this iPad would be a good memory of his creativity and willingness to take risks leading up to his success with Apple. Besides, it’ll be a commemorative gift for the passing of one of the world’s greats.

Source: www.gettyimages.com

Potentially going to need this when I’m going overseas next semester, so it’ll be a great farewell gift as I embark on a new chapter of my life! (:

Source: www.apple.com

And I’ll be really appreciative of your nice gesture in letting me win it.

Dude, what are friends for? Hahahaha. 

So I know I’m supposed to be creative, but I kinda thought that it’ll be good to also be honest about why I’m joining the contest in the first place, so here’s to nothing! At least I can say that I’ve tried and had no regrets :p

—

Check out the link here if you’re interested in joining too. It’s actually my friend’s blog and his posts are really pretty hilarious with daily updates! Have fun (:

It’s been a long while since I last touched the blog and I really feel guilty for that, but honestly speaking, I’ll be glad just to have enough time to sleep much less blog. No fret though, I’ll definitely post more in time to come, especially from boxing day onwards (:

Well, as close friends would probably already know, I’ll be embarking on a life-exploration, self-discovery journey to Israel next semester! Alright, that’s subject to companies holding their promise of hiring us as the previous batch had quite a few last minutes withdrawals. That said, many attributed parents’ objection on our side too, so I’ve got that covered at least.

Just in case you’re so influenced by the agenda setting of media, Israel isn’t all just about wars, fighting and missiles. There’s definitely more to that than what we’re made to believe.

Do a quick google search and check out their tourist places, then will you discover the beauty of nature that country holds.

Think about it this way, Israelis are just more expressive of their opinions and are just more obvious in their anti-whatever beliefs. And I don’t think that’s wrong as long as no innocent party is harmed – and that’s probably where the issue is. The few black sheep who tar the entire community’s image.

In case you didn’t know, they do allow citizens to carry certain firearms for self-protection too, just like in the US. Difference is how they are more open to allowing others to see their firearms and how they are more responsible than their Western counterparts in handling them. Or so I was told. I haven’t actually been there yet so I can only tell you what I’ve been told and update you later.

Basically, the program is one organised in collaboration with our school and a partner school there – Tel Aviv University this time round. And basically we will be working full-time at companies as interns while lessons a couple of classes at the university.

What’s exciting for our batch is that the school has kindly offered MBA classes for us, even though we’re all still undergraduates. How cool is that! I can actually say that I took MBA classes while still being an undergrad, nice!

Oh and I do believe this is part of the advantage of being the first few batches to embark on this experience – we’re only the second batch while the pioneer batch is still over there and will be back end of this year.

While many things are still pending and awaiting confirmation, I’m sure praying for a smooth process and that we’ll all get to go; there are 12 of us for now.

Meanwhile, I hope that at least I’ve cleared some doubts about Israel so that others won’t give me shocked faces when I tell them I’m going to Israel for a semester next time round.

Oh and I forgot to mention that there’s many tech startups there so creativity and innovation strives there – makes it all the more exciting right!

Okay, I’m reaching my mrt stop so I’m going to end off here.

Do share anything you might know about Israel too if you’re willing! Thanks (:

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 FASS NOC Criteria as stated on their website

Students not informed of rule change

If you can’t see it clearly, the photo shows the National University of Singapore‘s Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Club has listed the criteria for the NUS Overseas College programme - a year-long internship overseas while taking technopreneurship modules at top partner universities there.

Students are eligible to apply as long as they have studied a maximum of 80 Modular credits while the Cumulative Average Point (what you may know as GPA) of 3.5 is required only if the student wants to read discipline modules while on the programme.

The same was found in the NOC Office’s website for their application system.

What I wanted to raise is the point that students do not know that new rules have been implemented since last semester – of which affects Year 3 applicants like myself this year.

The problem is that only an official email was sent by the Vice-Dean of FASS to the NOC Office regarding this new rule, no hardcopy regulation handbook or whatsoever was available.

My question are plenty, and maybe I should just list them down here for a quick reference:

- How was the decision made? Considering that it is unfair to my batch since a) we weren’t informed of this rule and b) senior batches have all been allowed to go for the programme in previous years and c) undergoing the programme will not make us overstay our maximum candidature in NUS

- When the decision was made, why was there no announcement made to students, or at least a notification for applicants before they get through the whole application process of NOC, including two rounds of interviews?

- Why the sudden change if students are not overstaying as extending two semesters will still end up with a maximum candidature of four years?

- Is this how a school administration should be running, deciding students’ graduation date for them and hindering their “freedom” in their curriculum?

- Or simply by making decisions without informing the student body beforehand, that doesn’t sound very transparent to me does it?

They can argue with me saying that I could have applied earlier or wait till I finish up with graduation before finding an overseas job, but don’t they understand that situations change and differ? - that was what the manager of the Dean’s Office told me by the way.

In the first place, the manager Shirley Koh was “too busy“ to help me with my enquiries when I was at the Dean’s Office, and I had to obtain my answers through a middleman, Latisha, who had to go back and forth to clarify my problem and to seek the answer from her manager.

Is this how the 28th best school in the world should be reacting to their students when they need help? Well maybe they had issues on hand, but considering that I had an urgent case (I had to decide what to do within the next 48 hours, and considering it is a Friday, I had to get it settled by today), I think it’s fair that help should have been rendered then – face to face.

Yes, I’d admit that it took me quite a while to decide to apply for the programme when I could have gone in my Year 2, but I have my reasons and they shouldn’t use that as a way to ‘argue’ with me about the rule change.

What’s even more absurd is that I personally know of two other friends who are in a similar situation as myself, applying for NOC in our third year but until today, none of us knew about this limitation in their criteria which was virtually non-existent on their websites.

Shouldn’t they be informed too instead of going through the whole procedure needed for their applications?

Why was I the only one facing this problem?

And the fact that we’re all non-honours students make it even more bizarre. We’re almost exactly in the same state of education, apart from our different majors, yet this problem only occurred to one of the three of us. And none of us were informed of this rule change until I got the call.

It certainly doesn’t sound like an efficient administration at all.

Ranting aside, I think it’s also pertinent to understand why no news was given out then, when this rule change was applied, and the need for this rule in the first place, since technically, it does not affect our graduation route at all since it will still be within our maximum candidature.

If equality were to be practiced as it is so often said, then where is it in this situation?

Just because we’re non-honours students does not mean that we should be restricted to try for NOC, because after all, the fact that all three of us made it through to the second round of interviews – which is also the final stage of selection for the programme – proves that we could have had the opportunity to be part of the programme if not for the faculty’s restriction.

I’m not sure if those from the other faculties face this problem too, but I will definitely keep an eye on it.

Meanwhile, do let me know if you’re also facing similar problems as well – not forgetting the bus issue as well. Or if you could provide some sort of solution, it would most definitely be welcomed too.

I’ve said my piece.

To begin, I was too early so I thought I’d do something to kill time or I’ll just be idling and wasting my time away anyway. So I started observing and saw a familiar face – one of the contestants for the 987 radio dj competition that I interviewed. I couldn’t recall her name, but I definitely remembered her being very prim and proper – I’d think that she’s more suitable for 938live as a radio journalist.

Alright, the main point of me writing this is simply because of that – being TOO prim and proper that it seems like one is being too uptight all the time. It’s good for certain situations but other times, we just need to learn how to relax – aka chill.

It’s simply an EQ thing I guess, adapting to the different situations. Not only does it show your adaptability, it proves that you’re flexible and it also helps in your relations with others.

Especially in the rat race that we’re in, the importance to know how to relax is underrated!

There is always a balance in life, and there is also balance to one’s emotions. Yes we do have to get stressed and uptight when deadlines are drawing closer, when things aren’t going the way they are supposed to be, but essentially, what is life all about? It isn’t just about making money or being the top scorer for your cohort, but it includes a well-balanced need for family and friendship, to have the downtime we need away from the hustle and bustle of the fast-paced working (or studying) world.

So while the school term has just started for most, do plan ahead for what’s coming up, projects are going to start flowing in, assignment deadlines drawing closer but plan too for time for recreation or leisure. Even the simple ‘me’ time can be much needed at times too!

I shan’t babble on since this entry has spilled over to post-lecture time already. But I sincerely hope that you do keep this in mind (:

Stay healthy, be well!

lonely dog

yes, i do actually think that there’s a deeper level of loneliness than lonely itself.

imagine feeling lonely even in the midst of people you do know, or those who you talk more than occasionally, people whom others label as your friends but you still feel that sense of distance.

i think i might be experiencing it again.

this time though, i think it’s just me.

i used to harp on the fact that i have trust issues – easily trust people in the beginning but never fully giving my trust, not even myself i think.

i guess it’s normal that everyone has their own deepest secret, or something that they don’t want others to know but i think something’s wrong if i’m feeling so much so that loneliness doesn’t seem quite right a word to describe it.

i mean, i have friends who i catch up with at times, those i’m really close with, those who i HTHT to but deep down, i think i still feel distanced, that something’s lacking.

idk what it is, what i’m looking for, what i want to find but it’s been bugging me for awhile now.

it might be due to my dwelling on my future, the fact that the new term is starting or something else – i can’t quite put a finger to it yet.

but on the other hand, i feel so tired to be bothered  by it, mentally and/or emotionally.

and it is probably what’s making me feel this sense of ‘loneliness’  because somehow, the fact that i can’t pinpoint what exactly the problem is, i can’t relate it to pretty much everyone else.

no solutions for this one and till then, i’ll just have to reflect on it :/

—

after reading a few of the related articles, i do feel a little better.

at least i know that this feeling is not uncommon – it’s natural in fact.

and yes, i am putting some effort into talking to new people (aka. freshmen) and hopefully to be able to hang out with the seniors too.

and the more important thing is to find out what’s missing in my life that’s making me feel this way – find the root of the problem eh.

maybe it’s also a temporary thing since i’ve moved back to hall after 3 months of well-fed, well-taken-care-of life at home. so in a way it’s a “new” environment again?

well, we’ll see how it goes.

i’ll be fine,  no worries! (:

Related articles

• 6 Tips for Battling Loneliness (psychcentral.com)
• Why Loneliness Matters (webmd.com)
• How to Handle Loneliness (everydayhealth.com)