twas a dark and stormy night

and i sat deep in thought in my room. while working away at statistics ( including Permutations and Combinations, Hypothesis Testing, Normal, Binomial and Poisson Distribution, Probability and Correlation and Regression) i began sinking into my own little stew.

this "stew" is composed of several extremely trying worries. as such, it is a sludgy stew, one with chunks of strange, unidentifiable meat and vegetables of questionable origins. thick and steamy, it.... alright, enough. the point IS, it is a dreadful stew.

moving on.

"why do you stew so senior senior skipper han?" you may wonder. "have not your A levels been progressing just dandy?"

true enough, i state now that i am ready for my A levels. GP Paper (interesting note if you didnt already know it: GP stands for General Paper. why everyone refers to it as GP Paper is normal i suppose, but upon finding out that i have been calling it the GP Paper or GP Exam for the past three years, i resolved to phrase it intelligbly. General Paper Paper makes me squirm just thinking about it. Then again, i doubt that i will have to use this phrase often ever again.) was rough, but managable. unfortunately for me and the hundred other ACJC people who did Essay Question Number 10, only the most distinguished and outstanding papers stand to attain an A grade. Turns out, the majority of RJC's cohort had also opted for "Is it possible to protect the environment when there are so many countries needing extra amounts of energy to progress?"
needless to say, only the strongest GP students who presented astounding, different answers will make the upper end of the bell curve this year.

At this time, i must set aside some time to speak of Boren Ang, my classmate. refresher: Boren plays the bass guitar, swims, sings (albeit horridly- ask me for the banshee slaying recording of Boren's cover of Radiohead's Creep) and enjoys the occasional backflip in front of a captive audience. but he is a good friend, a great person and someone who i cant help but respect.

Boren did question number one, despite constant chiding from Sophia Ng (our GP mentor). if i remember correctly, it went something along the lines of "the voice of the masses is always right. Discuss". Boren Boren Boren... my poor friend was visibly shaken after the paper and we all were deeply concerned for him. his past experiences with questions like these have not been kind to him and he had reason to believe this time would be no different.

Curiously enough, my good buddy Shi Han did the same question but was all smiles after the exam. at the time it was strange: on one hand, we had boren, moping and filled with gloomy prospects. on the other, we had Shi Han, chuckling about what he wrote and discussing society's failings. on hindsight though... what was to be expected? Shi Han DOES love doing those questions... no matter. good luck to both of you, chums.

Moving on to the Maths Paper. Pfag. Peanuts compared to Prelims. Nearly everyone i talked to said they lost 20 marks 25 marks (personally i lost near 25), but there were of course some sad faces. Tiffany was one. post-exam, in the cafe she told me that she did, and i quote,













"urgh".

ah, the dreaded "urgh", accompanied by tiny flailing of the hands is a pretty common sight, most often observed immediately after a paper gone bad. indescribable with words, a grunt conveys the emotions that no burden-laden sigh ever can. head up tiff, and anyone else who felt they could have done better.

That aside, my exam was actually very eventful. finishing 45 min before the paper ended, i began feeling restless and fidgety. because of this, i requested permission to go to the bathroom. while strolling to the washroom, people ran to and fro, clearly in a rush to relieve and rejuvenate to readdress math questions.

And then i went into the toilet. And the strange, pervert teacher followed me in. does anyone of you readers know anyone with a "gum smile"? a gum smile is a smile which is 5% upper lip, 5% lower lip, and 90 friggin % upper gum. basically, its a smile in which the gums of the jovial person dominates the grin. this is usually for the worse.

now imagine this old, thin invigilator with a gum smile. imagine him following you to the toilet to watch you while you go. only you cant go because hes watching you. and smiling. smiling a gum smile. you pray to god, but lets face it, ACJC toilets arnt exactly blessed by His patron saints. you start panicking. you want to leave the toilet. but you cant because hes standing in the way. only one friggin metre away from your prone, peeing body.













and then God hears you, and sends a chubby, panting youth into the toilet into the cubicle. while Mr im too hot to show any teeth so here are my gums is busy staring at the boy and the cubicle he just entered, yours truly quickly finishes, washes his hands and ducks outta the toilet.

he then proceeds back to the hall and sings songs for the rest of the exam.

well, next tuesday is my Maths Paper 2. at this point of time, i just want to get all my papers over with. im as prepared as ill ever be and i have other issues to handle. funny as it seems, the A Levels are NOT my priority right now. it comes after driving, learning the guutar and getting back my stamina among many things.

so, until next time my droogs.

i leave you with the song i was singing during the exam, and have learned to play it on my guitar. : )

Coldplay's The Scientist

I was just guessin' at numbers and figures,
Pulling your puzzles apart,
Questions of science, science and progress
Do not speak as loud as my heart.