*Sigh*

Bio pract was easier than we all anticipated. In fact, Miss Piggy finished hers in half an hour. What a feat. I don't think she'll be able to replicate it during the O Levels though. Even if she could, its rather unwise.

Hydrogencarbonate indicator is fun! Mine turned from red to orange to light yellow to bright yellow to dark yellow. Then I left it alone for some time. After successfully completing the paper and checking my work once through, it was 11am. Half an hour left. Time for some fun. As Miss Piggy can attest, I spent half an hour focusing my carbon dioxide into the dark yellow hydrogencarbonate indicator. After about 15 minutes of non-stop blowing, it began to turn orange. Suddenly, it turned bright orange, then light yellow, then bright yellow, all in one go. So fun right? I continued blowing 'cause I thought maybe it'd turn right back to red. But it didn't. It stopped at bright yellow. And to top it off, I think I breathed in some of it, because after that I felt a bit funny breathing and started coughing. Hmm.

Anyway. Don't ask me about English Oral. You don't want to know. If you want the conversation question, its "Tell me about a time when an event took a turn for the worst". Rats. There was nothing in my memory I could use. So I made up a little story, not too creative, but good enough for me to pass the Liar's test. If I should ever have to repeat that little feat, I will now have a truthful tale to tell. About today.

I don't want to go to schooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooollll tomorrooooooow.

I shall feel very ill tonight. Yesssss, very ill.

Ok now I'm mad.

I'm so pissed.

Someone, some dumb Westerner I'll bet, went to change all the names on the Naruto webpages on wikipedia to the English version from the original form.

I'm not pissed off because it's Naruto; no, that sort of things not worth bursting a blood vessel over. I'm pissed off because the person had the NERVE (and the time) to change everything to his or her own freaking culture.

It's a JAPANESE manga??? Hello?? Why WHY WHY in the world are you trying to pronounce it as "Sakura Haruno"???? That is SOOOO WRONG!!!! Its so obvious the person watches the English version. Oh, I hate English dubs. Even Chinese dubs are waaaaay better. In the English dubs, they say it in their Westerny ways and it so does NOT fit. (Prime example: Howl's Moving Castle. No doubt they're good at voice acting, but the way Christian Bale says Sophie cannot compare with the way the Japanese seiyuu says Sophie-san.)

It was so nice in the original Japanese version :( All the names were nicely done, and "Haruno" came perfectly before "Sakura". Then some idiot had to come along and change everything to their own "Sakura Haruno". (No, I am not her fan. I am just making use of her name.)

I, for one, do not want to be called a Jiayi Lau. Like EXCUSE ME!?!?! Just because my name is Lau Jiayi does not mean my first name is Lau.

For goodness' sake, NOT EVERY BODY WANTS TO BE AMERICANIZED! (Or Westernized, for that matter.) I am so pissed. Even when English names are translated into Chinese or Japanese, we don't force it around and start calling one "Smith John". Its just the original name, "John Smith", pronounced in Chinese or Japanese.

Baka. Aho! Stupid moronic person.

Which Freaking Idiot did that??

Wait till I find out.

In the book "Why the world hates America" I think I would find some familiar sounding arguments brought up in it. What a pity I'm too busy studying to go read it. Must make a point to read it. (Makes mental note to self.)

Argh. Bio Pract Prelims is tomorrow. Now I'm all worked up. Argh.

Breathe in, breathe out.....

The Flower

The Flower with a Single Petal

Once upon a time, a little flower sprouted from the ground. When its young head first felt the wind caressing it, it rejoiced, because it had been waiting since the beginning of its life for this moment. However, as it was the last flower of early spring, no one cared very much for it. Nevertheless, the little flower, still a tiny bud, was eager to live well. It knew its sole purpose in life- to bloom one day and make the world just a teeny bit more beautiful.

Mid-spring came, and the flower saw that many of its neighbours were already opening their lovely buds to reveal well-proportioned and vividly coloured petals. As spring grew older, the other flowers came into full bloom, colouring the countryside with different shades of different colours. The little flower's bud still would not open, no matter how much it tried.

Oh dear, what am I to do? Thought the dismayed flower. My flower bud is so small and pale next to all my neighbours. So it bent its head low and tried to hide among the tall grasses, but even then it had no respite, for the grasses laughed at it all day long.

So the little flower tried to hide its head under the the soil. Perhaps then I can pretend that I am just another blade of grass, it thought. So it used its soft, perfectly tipped bud to push and dig at the ground below, but no matter how hard it tired, the soil did not give way.

No, little flower, the soil mumured to it. You are not meant below the ground. Stay up, stay away!

Oh dear, cried the little flower. It stood up straight again and felt its aching back throbbing. Then it saw how its once perfectly tipped pink-coloured bud was crumpled and stained with soil, and burst into tears. It slumped down onto the ground and cried itself to sleep.

The next morning, the little flower was awakend before dawn by a breath of wind stirring its ruined bud. It looked up sleepily, too tired to remember its crumpled bud and feel ashamed of itself. To its surprise, it found the Flower Fairy gently rubbing a soothing oinment onto its flaccid stem. Overcome with shame, the little flower did not resist when the fairy took out a small flask of liquid and poured it carefully onto the little flower's bud.

"That will help you to grow up nice and strong," said the fairy.

Will it make me beautiful? The little flower wanted to know. The fairy only smiled in reply, made a wish, and disappeared.

Confident in itself now that the fairy had given it her blessing, the little flower worked hard. Every day, it ate carefully, drank eagerly and received thankfully what the soil had to offer it. It sunned itself carefully and concentrated all its efforts on making its petals beautiful. Every night, it slept early deeply, dreaming of the day it would one day bloom.

Then the day itself came. It came so suddenly, that the little flower itself did not realize it. It stretched itself as a habit, and realized with a start, that it had a shining, golden petal over its head. Its petal, unlike the petals of the others, was not long or oval, but round; it did not come out from only one side of the flower, but surrounded its entire head like a huge golden crown, adorned with the dew of a spring morning.

As it shook its shining petal in wonderment, its neighbours awoke. They gasped at how the little flower had turned into a beautiful queen, asking themselves if this was really the little bud they used to know.

Just then, the Flower Fairy appeared.

Thank you for making me beautiful, the flower cried. I didn't have a chance to say so before, but I'm really very grateful.

"Nonsense," said the fairy. "I didn't do anything. The liquid I gave you was pure water."

With that, the fairy gently lifted up the little flower by its roots from the yielding soil while its neighbours gasped in amazement. And to this day, the little flower has lived in the fairy's garden, together with the other flowers who dared to dream.

The End.

Bio pract prelim is tomorrow. Elaine and Ms Lye say fruits and flowers and vegetables may not come out 'cause they did last year. I hope they're right. But then again, I don't want to get something stupid like prawn.

Oh no. What if they give us oyster??

>.<

O levels English Oral is tomorrow too. How sad. My last oral exam for English. Oh well.

Time to say Goodbye

It's August 5th today. So this post is a little late.

(Speaking of "Time to say Goodbye", I still haven't managed to find a nice recording. How sad.)

I think for me, this year, the most memorable performance was definitely the one at the Esplanade. Besides the fact that being able to play on the Esplanade stage was beyond my dreams, Ike See was just soooo good. As in. Good. If the government doesn't allow him deferment, I'll never believe anything they say about trying to cultivate local talent, because if he can't make it, then who can?

Like... man. I'm sorry, but he makes someone else I know look bad. Even though I wasn't sectional leader (that was dear Gloria, next to me) it was still quite an experience. (I found out an even more surprising fact, by the way, but I'm not going to mention it here). Half the time I was busy listening to him. I think I missed my entry twice during practice because of that. Ack.

"Viennese Delight" was on Tuesday.

On one hand I'm sorry to leave Kristie, Evelyn, Kimberlyn, Fiona, Hui Lin, Joey and all my other Sec 4 section mates plus all my other wonderful juniors like Shi Ru and Marissa (how sad, you mightn't be able to call me "Yahner" very much now), and having to see the end of all the fun we've had. The other part of my heart, is however, very relieved to be out of it and heaves a great sigh of relief, as though all my burdens will be gone with the wind, like shedding skin or moulting unwanted feathers.

Now I know what it means to be of two minds.

For the procrastinator in us all, I say this, "Never fear, I haven't graduated yet." :)

I know Viennese Delight received some rather unpleasant criticism. Granted, some of that criticism might be justified, but just to remind some of those who are riding atop their high horses: Look closely, and you might find that perhaps the horse you're on isn't Arabic or purebred, but a grey donkey just like ours. If we've been nice enough to praise and adorn your donkey with ribbons, it would be nice if you could just return the favour. Otherwise, one knows the quality of tea when it is placed in hot water. Boiling, scalding water, something like SYF 2007.

Anyway, I'm certain I'll be free from all that. I shall steer clear of String Ensembles and join and a CCA involved in an area I'm much better in, like something to do with writing. Yes, indeed I shall.

It doesn't mean I'll abandon music completely of course. In fact, I'd like to learn the harp. The only problem is, I seriously doubt the level of commitment I can give. Hmm. I think it'll be fun, and interesting.

*Smiles in delight.*

But really, I'll miss NYSE. Perhaps even more so when I've finally settled the handing over of my duties to Kristie.

Time has really left me behind. I remember how I didn't want to join SE at first, then for some miraculous reason, changed my mind; how I was so afraid of the Sec 3s when I was in Sec1; how we hated auditions; how my violin went out of tune something like 6 times during Corde!2, allowing me to finally get a new violin; how we memorised every bit of our part for SYF; the largely frustrating but still somewhat fun collaboration with HCISO (wow, it's going to be one year soon!); how we planned and planned for the VCH concert only days past.

Arigato, minna-san. It's something I'll never forget. The memories may fade, may become vague and murky, but will never totally disappear.

What can I say? For moments like this, there really isn't anything words can express, except for three phrases:

Thank you, goodbye and good luck.