The time-gap between my posts is getting longer. Well, it's not like I have readers who check on this site regularly anyway. But here I am, trying to breathe some life into this place. Or type some life, in this case. This is an awfully long post, by the way. 

I think I ought to post about the Writers' Festival before I forget. 

Stella and Ms Gamar managed to get tickets for us for three of the events held during the Singapore Writers' Festival. I chose to go for 'Balancing the Books: Creativity VS the Bottomline', a panel discussion about the compromise between writing and money. Two writers, Michael Chabon and Joe Haldeman, were present and answered many questions which were raised by the moderator and from the floor. I was amused by their frankness and witty remarks. The writers also made clear the difference between writing for money and writing for passion. I'm not sure if I'd ever be a novelist, but one thing's for sure: I do hope that my writing would bring me money in the future. 

I also bought a book 'The Catherine Lim Collection' that features at least four stories written by the Singaporean author. Because I got it from the festival, there was a discount and an autograph from Catherine Lim on one of the pages. This is the first time I'm getting a signed copy for a book! I've read the first story in the book so far ('The Serpent's Tooth') and it's pretty interesting. I never knew that the traditional Chinese way of treating backaches was to make the patient swallow (yes, swallow, not chew!) newborn mice wrapped in salted leaves. I'm not sure of the reason, but the mental image alone is pretty morbid to me! 

We later had lunch at Plaza Singapura when the panel discussion ended. It's seldom that we get to eat as a class. Well, it wasn't really a class actually, since all of us broke up into three groups to eat at McDonald's, Long John Silver's, and Yoshinoya respectively. But I got to eat with Yvette, Hazel, Cong Xu, Chuan Ying, Zhao-yi, Annzy and Zi Wei at Yoshinoya. It's rare to eat with them - except Zi Wei of course. In fact, I just ate dinner with Zi Wei at the Somerset branch of Yoshinoya just a few days before the panel discussion. The time after lunch was spent loitering - DTVM's best at that - or in Internet slang, 'trolling'. It'd be great to go out as a class again. Even if it was a fairly short 'outing' that was somewhat just an extension of going for the panel discussion at SMU on a Sunday. 

Other than the Writers' Festival, there really isn't much to post about. I highly doubt that anyone would be interested in the research papers and concept paper I have to do for my CAs. Oh but I hear that the first CA for my journalism module might be a debate! Sounds a little intimidating yet fun, doesn't it? 

Oh oh oh, and I just got a new dress and a pair of casual shoes over the weekend. It's a beautiful blue dress and I can't wait to wear it! It might be too formal for school but I think I'm going to wear it on my birthday nevertheless. I'm the birthday girl after all! As for the shoes, it's this pretty shade of pink that reminds me of cotton candy! I think Mummy has spent quite a lot on the dress and shoes but she said that they are my birthday gifts! 

To be honest, I usually feel excited for my birthday when I see Christmas decorations being raised in the shopping malls and streets. It's usually an indication that my birthday's coming near since the decorations are usually put up a month and a half before Christmas. Unfortunately, maybe it's because my CAs have taken up so much of my time, I've not gotten the chance to see much of this year's Christmas' decorations. Maybe I ought to make a trip to town soon! 

I've been terribly lazy lately. Well, I have been posting about stuff but I just didn't publish them on my blog because I preferred everything to be in chronological order. And the thing is that, my post about the LEAP camp is an awfully lengthy post on its own. I've not even ended it yet. That's the reason (or excuse, depending on how you see it) for the absence of any new posts or updates on this blog. 

Anyway, I've just decided that I shall post about post-camp events first, at least till I've completed my post about the camp. By then I'd be able to shock you all with one of my longest post ever about a camp. Well, not really the longest, since the one about my trip to South Korea was so long that it covered four posts. I think I'm just a pretty long-winded person. And since this blog kind of doubles up as my personal journal sometimes, albeit with all the bitching and ranting taken out, bear with me, if you can. 

To be honest, I didn't do much after I came back from the camp. I fell ill and spent a good part of the last week of the holidays just being home. I tried to watch more dramas to be able to write my reviews but it wasn't exactly good progress since I couldn't find a few episodes so I couldn't follow the plot properly. Then there were also my stories to tackle. I rewrote a paragraph or so but that's all I did in that week. I should really find time to write a new chapter at least. I'm such a procrastinator, aren't I? 

I also spend a lot of time sleeping. The cough syrup that I took had a drowsy side-effect on me. I vaguely recall dreaming of a few great stories while asleep. But the problem was, I couldn't remember anything when I woke up. Except the fact that it was a really good dream. How do people keep dream diaries? I seldom remember my dreams. Well, I only remember a few particularly vivid parts, or maybe a vague sense of what it was about. 

Anyway, my camp group (we named ourselves 'Shaka Laka Bung Bung', 'Bung Bung' for short) met up on the last Friday of the holidays. It was a little strange initially, seeing everyone out of their camp clothes and talking about things other than the camp activities. We went to town and I got to go to the new H&M outlet there. I must say, the baby clothes are pretty over there! It's as if those little tots you see on the streets have their own haute fashion cult too! 

I didn't get to stay with them to play pool at night, since I had to attend ACER's teambuilding session the morning after. I took the train home with Syafiq and it was nice talking to him - I didn't get to speak much to him during the camp. He told me about his course and if not for him, I wouldn't really know DADP is actually about. I was quite surprised that Syafiq enjoys writing stories too!

The next day was mostly spent in school, where I met the people in ACER for the first time. We played icebreaker games to lighten up the atmosphere. Michelle also told us about the objectives of ACER while the senior told us how to deal with the different types of students they encounter. I wonder if I'll ever be able to be as good as them. I sometimes clam up in front of unfamiliar people (just like how I did in camp). If only I could be myself with friends and strangers alike - just like Matin and Joey who can be so comfortable and affable with everyone. It's funny that I was able to do public speaking before, but when I need to talk to a small group of strangers, I freeze up unconsciously sometimes. 

Anyway, it was altogether a cheerful and fun session with the ACERs and although the seniors offered for us to join them for lunch, I decided to head home. My mum was cooking, after all. I chatted with Syuhaidah on the way back. It's nice getting to meet Syuhaidah again. She was in my group, Masquerade, for CASS FOC. We got to talking about our courses and school in general before our stop eventually came. 

After the weekend came the first week of the second semester, of course. It was exhausting having an 8am-6pm Monday for the first day right after the holidays. I got to learn about the technical stuff, like the camera and we even revised about the different types of shots. Unsurprisingly, I slowly dozed off when we came back to the lab after trying out the big camera outside. It was pretty bad of me since Mr Esman and Ms Gamar were trying to carry on with the lesson despite us being half-dead. We were barely surviving the seven-hour module. 

But otherwise I guess the rest of my modules are pretty much fine. After the first week, I pretty much got used to the timetable and the classes. I mean, I even enjoy VPPP (Video Productions, Principles and Practices; the seven-hour module) now. I still think handling the camera and directing talents could be scary sometimes, but it's really fun editing it and then seeing the fruits of your labour on screen. I'm hoping that I'd be able to do well for my modules though. This semester's modules seem so much tougher with a lot of research involved. There's also the conceptualizing, pitching and script-writing to worry about now. It's not just stories and articles anymore.