Saturday 28 March 2015

Laporan Peperiksaan STPM 2013

Read the reports released by MPM on STPM 2013.

Laporan Peperiksaan STPM 2013 Penggal 1

Laporan Peperiksaan STPM 2013 Penggal 2

Laporan Peperiksaan STPM 2013 Penggal 3

You can literally see how different is the first term and third term performance. Some papers in first term actually have an almost 50% failures.

Reading the comments by MPM and you will know MPM acknowledges that students are generally not prepared for first term exam (read the laporan on PA penggal 1).

Common mistakes made by candidates are highlighted in the report. Read the comments they made on the candidates answers and you'll know how stringent the marking scheme is and how much mistakes you have actually committed without knowing so far.

Read them. It's interesting.

Monday 23 March 2015

R.I.P Lee Kuan Yew

Lee Kuan Yew, a man who was born to a world of chaos, and who subsequently tried his best to oust extremists and terrorists and eventually form a coalition in bid to form a safe and secure country. He had been vocal with his stance, and on that bumpy road he fell hard when Singapore was expelled from Malaysia. He stood up again, despite being violently beaten, and eventually transformed Singapore from a land of virtually nothing to one of the most vibrant and developed city in the world. He walked a road that is abundant of obstacles, but he succeeded. I couldn't imagine how I could traverse that path and yet survive unscathed. For that I would give him my utmost respect. Rest in Peace, Lee Kuan Yew, the founding father of Singapore.


Few quotes I love from the late Lee Kuan Yew:

1. "I am often accused of interfering in the private lives of citizens. Yes, if I did not, had I not done that, we wouldn't be here today. And I say without the slightest remorse, that we wouldn't be here, we would not have made economic progress, if we had not intervened on very personal matters - who your neighbour is, how you live, the noise you make, how you spit, or what language you use. We decide what is right. Never mind what the people think." - Lee Kuan Yew

2. "Mine is a very matter-of-fact approach to the problem. If you can select a population and they're educated and they're properly brought up, then you don't have to use too much of the stick because they would already have been trained. It's like with dogs. You train it in a proper way from small. It will know that it's got to leave, go outside to pee and to defaecate. No, we are not that kind of society. We had to train adult dogs who even today deliberately urinate in the lifts." - Lee Kuan Yew

3. "I started off believing all men were equal. I now know that's the most unlikely things ever to have been, because millions of years have passed over evolution, people have scattered across the face of this earth, been isolated from each other, developed independently, had different inter-mixture between races, people, climates, soils....I didn't start off with that knowledge, but by observation, reading, watching, arguing, asking, and then bullying my way to the top, that is the conclusion I've come to." - Lee Kuan Yew

Monday 16 March 2015

Teenblue?

What does Teenblue mean?

Somebody asked me this question. Why did I name my blog "Teenblue"?

The reason is this: I was young and very naive when I created this blog. Upon creation of a blog I was required to name it.

It wasn't a rational decision. It was in fact a rash and random decision.

I was 15 when I created this blog, and I was a teen.

Then my favourite colour was blue (now's black, but blue is still top on my list).

Having these two thoughts in my mind first, I merged these two words and came out with the name "Teenblue".

This word that's coined from two other words is meaningful to me, and I have no intention to change it, even if my blog is still active years on, and I swear it would still be active.

Separation That Hurts

Recently some people have begun to feel the absence of friends and to begin to ponder why friends cease to contact each other after graduation. I think I have talked about this earlier but I guess it is inevitable such feeling would arise when one pines for a joy long lost and sadly gone.

It is my observation that only people who have travelled far to somewhere, alone, that feels this kind of hollowness. Some people fill the void by actively participating lots of events to ensure life is being lived with the maximum meaning possible while some decides to finally settle down but couldn't shake off the feeling that somewhere deep in your heart you know you are entirely alone in a foreign place with not a single familiar material or living beings surrounding you. Being alone in an alien place could be really intimidatingly lonely, especially when you feel lost, have no one to care upon or talk to, and such atmosphere is in nature oppressive and daunting.

But it has an advantage - it means you are by force, or by consent, out of your comfort zone and attempting to establish a new life in a new area. It is my belief that forcing oneself to leave its comfort zone, with no possible or easy routes to return, is the best way to gain a new experience, to be independent and to grow up. Because it is the first lesson of being thrown with one experience you despise but have to reluctantly undertake, and life's full of such events.

There are things in lives that suck but nonetheless we have to face and deal and ultimately solve. We have to at times begin to realise that we have to face things we do not wish or are not brave enough to face, and it's not because life sucks, but it's because we are adults, and we have responsibilities.

Adults like our parents lost their youth for reasons. They weren't born to this world old like we thought when we were still young and naive. It's time we begin to understand why.




Friday 13 March 2015

Bahasa....Bahasa

Adik sini mahu belajar Bahasa Sarawak. Ada orang boleh ajar?

Sudah lama tak tulis dalam bahasa Malaysia, nak latih sikit nanti takut lupa semua. Memang tidak boleh dinafikan bahasa Malaysia sangat penting dalam Malaysia. Kalau bekerja di syarikat antarabangsa juga bahasa Malaysia akan digunakan.

Kalau tak digunakan pun bagusnya kalau kita semua boleh belajar bahasa yang lebih. Bahasa Malaysia kan bahasa kebangsaan? Walaupun saya tak biasa guna bahasa ini dalam kehidupan seharian (bahasa ibunda Mandarin dan English) tetapi saya suka juga Bahasa Malaysia. Saya suka bahasa sebenarnya kalau boleh saya ingin belajar bahasa yang lain juga. Tetapi tak ada peluang.

其实说真的学习语文课是我的兴趣。我觉得语文是个很神妙的东西。字,词就是这些,怎样组合它们,怎样用它们来表达一个讯息就看作者怎么写,就看作者的想象力多么好。所以我说我喜欢读故事书。

我曾想过到中国或台湾学习华文。台湾应用繁体字,而且据说他们不用汉语拼音,所以我想台湾不行。去到中国也好,可是想到那边的人礼貌上似乎有待改善,那儿网站几乎都被过滤,到了那边就和马来西亚失去联系(没有facebook/blog/youtube...),我在想如果我去那边三个月,我能生存吗?哈哈。

新加坡华文程度又没有马来西亚高。我看过他们高中华文,PMR/PT3都不如。到了先修班才学文言文。哈哈我想如果真的要学华文,马来西亚应该会比新加坡好。

But anyway language is my soul. Everybody writes by manipulating the words and sentences to a form that excites the reader. If I ever get a chance to be a language expert, I will grab it. Though, admittedly, this job prospect is worse than complete darkness in Malaysia. So I will forgo it.


Kuching Life

Kuching life so far is quite good. I won't say nice because I haven't got a chance to explore the city and thus have so far yet to experience or see its uniqueness.

Anyway, right now it's March and Kuching receives awfully lots of rain. It's almost raining every day, and even if not a single drop of water drops down, the sky is still cloudy and the wind is still nice. Unlike my hometown, Penang is ridiculously dry and scorching. Stand in the sun for half an hour without a fan and you'll die of dehydration.

Right now I still manage to observe some discrepancy between Kuching's Mandarin and Penang Mandarin. I have got more Sarawakian friends and Penangites too and the discrepancies become much more obvious. Till now I still don't understand why Sarawakians insist 学书 is a valid word and is grammatical and logical when in fact we say 读书. The term actually could be traced back to decades but Sarawakians insist their's correct. Haha it's indeed interesting.

For bottles, Sarawakians typically and normally say 水瓶 or 水壶 while Penangites say 水罐. Neither is wrong, just the preference is noticeable.

By the way everything in Kuching become much more expensive, and if the price retains then the quantity shrinks. Citing petrol price or Chinese New Year as excuses, I think. What about GST next month? Hmm....

Newspapers here remain interesting. The Star remains preposterously difficult to find or buy. The Borneo Post is nice but lacks articles while New Sarawak Tribune has articles but lack news, and entertainment. But I still prefer New Sarawak Tribune because articles is what I look for in a newspaper. Local and international news could be read online for free, while some articles can't.

Anyway, hopefully life in Kuching gets better and better.

Sunday 8 March 2015

Growing Up Is Not A Choice

You realise you have to grow up when you have lost so much and lost something you couldn't possibly regain them.

I do not know why this happens to me, but ever since I was in form 3, I knew one day secondary school will end, and I know by that time I would dearly miss my secondary school life. This single reason prompted me to study form 6 without even considering any other options out there. And so I did, extending my secondary school life for another one and a half year, before officially ending it for good.

Secondary school life, or a school life, is something that once you lost, you could not regain it. I love my secondary school life. It's a life with minimum responsibilities, with greatest and abundance of joy, and with guided journeys to walk.

With increasing freedom comes increasing responsibilities. Graduating secondary school life has its advantages but these come with a price I do not wish to pay for.

Two years on and I still pine for secondary school life. Can't blame me, I lost something I fear losing since many years ago, and it doesn't take short time to forget the wonderful times I had. I miss secondary school. I miss it a lot. And I miss all my friends.

To those of you still in secondary school, treasure your remaining days/years. You'll miss it.

Thursday 5 March 2015

Semester 2, Year 1

How I am doing? Fine so far, weather in Kuching is much better and less torturing than that in Penang.

Right now I want to complain about the courses I have.

Professional Engineering
Not bad. Nothing much to comment for now as I have not learned much. The hand-sketching is quite fun, can't comment yet on other aspects.

Structural Mechanics
Second worst lecturer in the universe is teaching us this ridiculously tough subject and I do not see how I am going to survive this semester. This lecturer exhibits no desire to learn, seems antisocial, afraid of crowds and do not know how to engage his audience in the sense that 1) he has no confidence in himself and constantly doubts himself thus making himself looks stupid in front of his students and 2) he is extremely monotonous and 3) his English is terrible.

I'm dead.

Engineering Mathematics 2
So far so good. My lecturer is from India and she speaks with a very strong Indian accent. It's still acceptable and I can still hear what she says so it's okay to me.

Material and Processes
Restudying Chemistry at the moment. Simply a revision of STPM annoying Physical Chemistry. Thankfully I am spared from all those annoying Equilibria and shape of molecules. But new stuffs are coming and I'll judge which is harder then. My guts is STPM is the toughest no matter what I am going to learn. New stuffs may be tough in the sense that the concept is more abstract but as long as you get the concept, you can ace everything. The problem with STPM is that the concept is easy but the questions are preposterous. And right now thinking of STPM still makes me shivers even though I am now in university.

MPU
Stupid subject. Not worth my time talking.

Bye. Gotta be busy.

Sunday 1 March 2015

Year 1, Sem 2

I am now back in Sarawak, ready for the commencement of new semester.

I have deliberated arranged my timetable so that I am extremely and ridiculously busy on Monday and Tuesday, and largely free on the other days.

I will have also a very busy semester because to maintain my current scholarship, I need to get a full 4.0.

So pardon me if I have been unaccounted for for a very long time.

That being said, it's time to get busy. Bye.