Day Lockheart

I am back from 2 days of orientation camp at Teck Whye Secondary School.

The class I was assigned to was originally 1H, but was later changed to 1D due to reallocations. D - Delicious, daring, Damien! I can’t really say I like my class, but neither can I say I don’t like them!

I guess it is probably because I have never been an OGL or faciliator which really follows a group throughout a camp. I am so used to planning comm. that I really expect a performance no less than great from the STAR leaders.

Class 1D

As much as I try to interact with the class, I cannot manage to befriend all 40 of them. Probably I have 2-3 closer ones, like Erwan and Weiming (Arsenal FC Supporter!), but also a bunch of boys who can really support me when I needed them (Shahriza! etc.). The girls were much more quiet, but I guess I just didn’t get to know them enough. Junhong the emo-drifter, I will definitely remember him! Sincerely, I hope for the best for them because they can be awesome. The potential is there, I believe.

1D Class-Leaders

I don’t really know my own class-leaders well, particularly those who were gamers. I didn’t get the chance to tell them that as a whole, they really improved a lot on the 2nd day. On the first day, some of them really got it from me when the standard was simply unacceptable. I’m sorry if I missed out some names, but Sarah, Daniel, Syairah, Ashiqin, Eunice and all… great job =)

The Camp Itself

Every leaders have their own problems. I have a great deal of my own, but I think I’ve said enough to the facilitators who have participated. It’s all about the discrepancy between our camp standards and theirs, miscommunication and new experiences.

In any ways, I didn’t enjoy the games, the mass dances or the songs. Okay, maybe I did enjoy the songs because they have “The Great Escape” but it was not played at all! Awww. But again, we were not there to enjoy. I have played those games so many times in other camps, and I’m already tired of mass dances! It is not fair to judge a success of a camp based on that factor. If the campers like the camp and learned something from it, then it is a good camp.

What I’ve Learnt

Do the right things at the right time. Seriously! I learn about this by making a mistake (waterbomb at MC), and seeing others make this mistake and correcting them. Of course… many other things from other facs: anger-management from Lizhong particularly! So damn funny. And Chingkit’s 爱的教育.

Met some awesome people there. Will miss ‘em!

Photos

View all the photos on Facebook!

I’ve always regarded ‘throwing away’ as the highest form of cleaning my room. Not this time though, even though I managed to fill up half of my bin with papers. It feels great to see a neat room, but here’s the problem that follows up: how long can this (cleanliness) last.

I almost didn’t wanted to pack my room because Shenn said she’s gonna pack hers before CNY and I kinda agree with her. Spring cleaning! But the situation my room was in, was unbearable. I can’t start school with a room like that! So either her room is super-duper clean, or she loves the accompany of dirt, dust and papers (lying everywhere).

It’s 2009 and I haven’t touched most of the Times magazines I subscribed to in 2008. So here I am, reading. Catching up with what has already happened months ago really isn’t cool at all.

The tendency to speak of 2009 as ‘next year’ is pretty high. I think I proved it enough yesterday when I headed to library to do some revision. “Next year got A levels, ugh”, “Next year finally 18!” etc. Well, it is the start of a new year, not very far from 2008 - yet. =)

Next week (5th - 11th) would be my last week of holidays. Damn. I’m probably gonna be home for 3 days, while the rest of the days will be spent on leaders’ stuffs. 2 days of facilitating (at TYSS), and 3 days of camp (OGL prep camp 1).

Goodbye holidays.

Oh, and I just wanted to share some quotations I came across. They are from Helen Kellen. If you don’t know her, then you are in the 0.1% of world population who don’t know who she is (as claimed by Shenn):

Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature…. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.

Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.

College isn’t the place to go for ideas.

I guess people have no idea that staying home can be so much more tiring than going out. Last week, I was stuck designing the orientation shirt. This week, I’m stuck designing the AYL shirt. I’m holding on to pencils and mouse more than my PSP for these 2 weeks. I’m fretting over color combination rather than how to pwn in the game DISSIDIA: FINAL FANTASY.

Holidays. Sigh.

So my mom came into my room one day and told me: You are always designing things but not getting anything back for yourself. I thought that was pretty true, ever since secondary two when I began to design blogskins. This power, this knowledge, this skill which I wield, is it making me vulnerable to exploits?

What I have come to understand is that, I am not good enough to make it into a service. I try to think in such a way that I am practicing while being ‘exploited.’ Maybe one day I will be good enough, but for now, I just need to keep trying.

Here is the AYL shirt I have submitted an hour ago, but spend an entire day staring at and working on it. I wandered about portfolios of designers while I took breaks every now and then, and I really envy them.

Can I be one of them someday?