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I believe that existing in the world is a rough sort of karma, a merit system that metes out justice with meticulous reference to past deeds. I also believe that some of us come to be known by screw-ups. These are more than ordinary screw-ups; the very magnitude and impact of the screw-up itself is of course undebatable, but eventually the shadows of said events come to follow us, who desperately try to eke out honorable lives thereafter. They haunt us and draw attention to us in our finest hours, in our feasts and debaucheries – Shakespeare’s Banquo springs to mind.
So perhaps what I’m going through at present moment is a moment of this grandeur – Macbeth himself would be proud. There is no tragedy so sweet and cruel as this: the successful hunt of a quarry in the face of inevitable doom, followed by futilely fighting to retain said quarry, failing miserably and dying. I am fighting time to hold on to what I obtained by illegitimate means and I suppose Macduff is arriving soon to put an end, only biding his time. He has all of it.
I’m taking on a brief stint tutoring a Sec One SOTA (woah) kid in Lit. I’ve no idea how you tutor someone in Lit. How does one write well? or for that matter read well. I’m 17 and I’m still trying to find out. I’m only lucky that in the past I loved reading with a passion that was excessive to a fault. That was why I was good at Lit. And I don’t like reading as much now. That is why this isn’t the case anymore. – And no, contrary to popular belief, being ungracious and pessimistic does not automatically make you better at ‘practical criticism’.
He can draw really well and he’s awkward but actually pretty folksy. I like him already. I lent him a copy of A Wrinkle in Time and asked him to do a 500-word book review. To do well in Lit, you have to read and write, and have an opinion. To be a tutor, you need to pretend you know what you’re doing. On both counts I managed satisfactorily.
One thing good about GEP was how they gave us books from as early as P4 and asked us to analyse. I’m not sure what actually counted as analysis – my Lit texts could pass off as new, if not for the occasional underline or two and the scores of age spots that dot their weathered leaves – but I quite liked Lit then. No pressure to scrutinise every word and phrase, no onus to scrub them raw for glimpses of marginally useful insight. It was all in the feeling – “I liked him and he shouldn’t have died”, “I hated what she did at the end” – and yes yes the subtleties of the language does make a hell lot of a difference but don’t you think lit should primarily be taken at face value..?
There’s a decided sense of finality lingering in the air at school, but I can’t seem to bring myself to do anything of note over the “holidays”. This is the time to try something different and perplexing and I understand it, though I don’t feel it. How does one balance the precariousness of delving into something unexplored with the staidness required to sustain existing commitments? It always feels as if it’s one or the other, these days. When James and John threw down their nets to follow Jesus they didn’t have the added burden of having to tend to the nets as well as to the souls of men. (I had a bad joke about de-livering fish here but I think it was a testament to my judiciousness and propriety that I removed it)
On another note I have an unfortunately prodigious knack for offending people. In some cases the offense is hardly uncalled for and truly “poor” on my part; in most others the offense comes without warning or provocation on my part. It seems as if everything is zero-sum these days, there isn’t a better way to shatter someone else’s happiness than to pursue your own. So since I’m feeling more than usually happy at present moment it only reasons that a group of people are seething away. Now this is more than mildly surprising. One of the key aims in my life had been to go through it without offending more people than I could help. This may explain why I’m so impersonal with so many people – getting personal is the best way to hurt – but it also makes it all the more bewildering why I should still be capable of causing distress to others. The bulk of the problem must thus lie with them, not me, so I’m not going to waste any time concerning myself with the insecurities of others.
The past few days have been jawdroppingly revolutionary. I’ve misplaced my priorities (somewhere on the floor, along with the spectacles, the cable remote and the crushed egos of former foes) and found them, only to lose them yet again in a mad flurry of 2D MMORPGing. I can only hope it wasn’t Maplestory, but I fear that it was. Ah well, I was young and foolish.
But I think all we JC students need a priority check. I’m sick and tired of guys around me walking around moping about girls, thinking girls to be the be-all-and-end-all panacea to their general failure in life. What we need to learn is that girls aren’t everything in life!
It seems though that getting 200 CIP hours is indeed everything in life, and as luck would have it, they are also arguably more attainable than the average girl (depending on who you ask). I’m just 195 hours away – so all I have to do is organise random overnight camps. As we all know, CIP is all about elevating the community to approach your level of affluence and material comfort, or discomforting yourself to the extent of the community (by depriving yourself of, say, cable TV, since African kids don’t watch cable TV. What pretentious assholes.), so what camps lack in acts of service and goodwill to the community, they more than make up for in self-mutilation, mental BDSM (don’t even ask) and sleep deprivation. I’ve come up with some rough ideas for possible camps for 2010, so if you’re interested in organising any with me, feel free to give me a ring.
1. “How People Survived In The 90s“ Camp – For boys 12-16. Gameboy Colors are dispensed to camp participants, who have to survive seven days on just two meals a day and Pokemon Yellow. Parental advice advised for those interested in participating. Red Cross members stationed in every room.
2. Racial Harmony Camp – All ages. Participants are grouped into small snug OGs such that there’s a nice mix of races in every OG. On the first day the OG sits in a circle and teaches one another how to say Hello and Thank You in their native tongue. On the second day OGs run around playing station games which are cleverly fixed so that the strengths of each race are demonstrated. Tentative station games are: “Pin the Qi Pao on the Petite and Pretty Chinese Lady”, “Speed Ketupat Sewing”, and “Shoplifting”. Racist jokes are prohibited during the camp, and any participant found guilty of this offence will be expelled at once.
3. Emo Camp – Participants turn up to a campfire, where they share about their regrets and disappointments about the camp.
4. Camp Camp – Guys only. Participants frolick around the campfire energetically, moaning about how the ends of their hair are frazzling up because of the heat.
5. Befriend A GEPper For Three Days Camp – Non GEPpers only. Every participant will be assigned a GEPper buddy, accompanying him around the campsite to help him through different station games that serve to push his faculties to their fullest potential, such as Kick The Ball At Least Two Feet In A Decidedly Forward Direction and Boiling A Jug Of Water And Carrying It Ten Meters Without Spilling It All Over Your T-Shirt And Groin In A Highly Embarrassing Manner. Points will be awarded based on the GEPpers performance in these station games. On the final night, the GEPper with the lowest score will be tied to the campfire stake and simultaneously stoned and burned. His buddy wins an iPhone.
Apparently the verdict as pronounced during the Parent-Teacher Meeting today is: clever dick, which means exactly what it reads: clever, but hopelessly and recalcitrantly dicklike. There’s room for resentment because I’m definitely not a dick and I do try to be down-to-earth and humble most of the time, except that my inordinately otherworldly intelligence often gets in the way.
Nevertheless, it’s not that bad. I mean, if you think clever dicks are being pretentious, you should look at clever dildos!
to my ordinary readers:
back from the dead! promos were ABBBBsolutely uncanny; life is boring; ihc was cathartic; confused matthew is confused
otherwise:
i’ve got three words for you and all of them are “QUANDO” (i might be wrong, but i don’t think it’s a matter of “if” anymore..?)
neither of the above:
whatever was in the past stays in the past!!!!!!!!!
I’ve learnt over the past few days that the key to absolute and unadulterated momentary happiness is pretending you’ve learnt from your mistakes. How are we to be happy if we felt vulnerable to the pitfalls from before; on the other hand, how are we to be happy if we were wholly wisened to them?
I haven’t been blogging lately. I feel less and less interesting daily, and anyway what do I have to blog about anyway? Do you know how it feels to fret yourself to death over problems and issues, only to meet with someone who has far more pressing and dire problems but who is facing them with resigned equanimity?
Like fretting over Dean’s Lists and H3 choices when there are people still unsure of promotion, that sort of thing. It makes you feel really, really foolish. But then again I think it is merely human to invent worries when there are none to be had. It’s almost comforting to have something pressing on your mind, since it affirms our humanity and makes us less jarring people to live with.
I love Facebook! Every now and then people post photos from bygone eras and we laugh at our sallowed/puffy young selves with impunity. Humour is the only utility of the past~
Patty looks highly unappetizing. Who’s that buff guy who’s trying to mask steroids as puberty?
Edward looks exactly the same. Jaryl looks like he can fit into tight corners.
OMG THE ENIGMATIC BEN NG HAS BEEN IMMORTALISED IN A FOTO. His legendary crop of hair had already been accumulating.
OMG HOT STUFF, FRIEND.
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