Little Things of My Hometown

Never thought much about my hometown since I haven't been staying there since a really young age. However the recent trip back in the recent new year has made me appreciate it more. Realised that the very things that I enjoyed are actually found there...Kinda amazed (& ashamed to some extent) that I had missed it all those years when I visited. Guess that shows how much (or how little) I took note of my hometown.

The little things that I had missed out in the many times of my visit:

1) The night coach back to my hometown made me realised how pretty & brilliant the sky was - one that can never be spotted in Singapore. It was so captivating that I just couldn't take my eyes off the sky even though I was in an awkward position that my neck was kinda strained....At that moment I wished I wasn't on the coach, but lying on the fields that we pass on the way, admiring the dazzling sky...........................

2) Grandma's place is a quite a large compound. Never really ventured further out into the backyard and beyond as I usually prefer the upper floor and the front of the house where it's cooler. By coincidenc, I crossed the personal boundaries this time and spotted the little animals which I could not have, in the urban city in which I'm staying in now. 4 different types of birds which I've never seen before and a squirrel was what I spotted while I was hanging around there for about half an hour. If only I had a good enough camera to capture these spottings.

In the past, I was pretty much neutral, at times even bored to my hometown visits. But I guess with my new sightings, there's more to look forward to the next visit. Hopefully I'd be able to spot the same, if not more on my next venture out into the backyard ;)

Collector's Joy

New additions to my personal board games collection:
- Guillotine (this one is about beheading as many royals as possible in order to win)
- Saboteur (this one is about taking the role of either a miner or saboteur; the former's goal is to get to the hidden gold and the latter to thwart the former's plans)

Random browsing online shopping sites that led to the delight of a collector: 2 games at 40bucks! A price that would not have been possible if bought off the shelves from the game shop ;)

My list of collection thus far:
- Vocable (very similar to Scrabble)
- Guillotine
- Saboteur
- Monopoly
- Mastermind
- Go (magnetic board version)
- Blokus Classic
- Uno (Harry Potter version)

IT-unsavvy teacher

As science teachers, more often than not, we do include drawings of apparatus set-ups, biological drawings etc., in our teaching slides. Being an IT- unsavvy person like me, I was frustrated at having to surf the internet for free sketching software to draw my lab set-up. Of which mostly were softwares to draw set-ups of more advanced chemistry like fractional distillation set-ups & reflux set-ups. Until I found this page that gave step-by-step instructions on how to draw simple lab apparatus.

Check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:How_to_draw_a_diagram_with_Microsoft_Word

Wikipedia never fails to amaze me as always.

5Cs of a girl

5Cs expected of a guy from a materialistic girl (in no particular order):
1. Cash
2. Career
3. Credit Card
4. Car
5. Condominium


5Cs expected of a guy from a simple girl (again in no particular order):
1. Character
2. Common values
3. Caring Nature
4. Communication/Conversational topics
5. Charisma (subject to individual preference)

Emotional Mannerisms??

Had lecture for counseling elective this morning. My lecturer shared with us which is something that has never struck me before; this is as follows:

"To hide your feelings from those you love (be it siblings/students/parents etc. etc. the list goes on...) is an impolite thing."

Might I have been impolite to anyone??

赤壁II

赤壁的首映日- 很感激一位好友千辛万苦的买票让我们能今天就看这部电影。 =D

观后感：

1）羡慕诸葛亮对一切常识的“略懂”； 欣赏他冷静、沉着的性格；敬佩他精通， 并且巧用战略打败曹军
2）赞扬周瑜在战场上的 “君子风度”
3）欣赏孙尚香那“女中豪杰”的精神 - 让女生们引以为荣
4）看贬曹操那小人之心的阴谋
5）欣赏小乔温柔、贤淑的气质， 并赞扬她那爱民如子的宽阔心胸

对于这部戏的评语， 一个字：“赞”！

Triggered Memory

Was watching a multimedia show made by a classmate during tutorial today. The show contained photos of us while we were conducting our outdoor lessons and activities at the nature reserve for the students of the welfare organization last year.

The photos of the flora and fauna made me felt that it was a pity that I didn't have my Fuji-camera for the times I was at the nature reserve (I had to loan it to the kids for their trail). The rare glimpses of the animals that I saw at the reserve could only be imprinted in memory and not captured on camera. Sigh~~

As I thought of this, I thought I should probably make a trip down to the reserve someday since I now know more of what flora & fauna to look out for. Well, the only point putting me off is that the location is rather inaccessible by public transport....

Anyway, I shall indulge in my own little fantasy...the chance of walking around the beautiful nature reserve again, hopefully with an SLR to capture really nice shots at the reserve when I do get to the reserve some day. Till then.

Strange stranger gaming experience perhaps???

My first workshop of the year - Game designing concepts organized by the school's board games club. First part of the workshop was dedicated to a board gaming session to get everyone familiar with variant game mechanics. It was an interesting gaming session I must say, especially the games were those that I've never tried at the board games cafe & the fact that I was actually gaming with strangers whom I'm meeting for the 1st time!!!

Let's start with the games that I tried for the first time during the workshop:
1) Ticket to Ride
2) For Sale
3) Take 6
4) Dividends
5) Cartagena

The more interesting part of the gaming session was the human interaction during the session. We gamed with people whom we don't even know at all...Used to think that it was possibly not comfortable or uneasy gaming with people you don't know...because you don't know each other well enough to play strategies with or against unlike with friends. Also probably less fun since people tend to be more polite and reserved with strangers or unfamiliar acquaintances.

Well, my thinking was proven to be way wrong during the gaming session. I guess it takes one gamer to click with another gamer - *grins* Right from the first game, the human dynamics was way beyond that that I could imagine; enjoyed ourselves while we played to the best of our possible abilities each move, be it getting our wins or sabotaging others.

It was equally just as fun gaming with these new acquaintances as with friends. I guess perhaps these people were just keen board gamers like myself =D

Second part of the workshop, we learnt elements of a game & designed our own board games for our own teaching subjects. Talking to other teachers at a workshop like that, plus the fact that we all enjoy board games, it was an amazing session. I was actually amazed at the fact that how the many interesting ideas for lessons could be bounced off one another during the group work. Synergy I'd say?? =D

On the whole it was a good experience:
1) to get to know about some of the other games which I've yet to try from other gamers
2) to bounce off lesson ideas with other teachers ;)