//Piano exam’s result// My piano teacher handed me the mark form (=result) last Sunday. I passed… with distinction! (Didn’t see that coming, though…). Initially, I only hope I’ll pass (like around 100-110) but I never expected it to be 133/150! Nevertheless, I’m happy and feeling grateful to God and everyone who helped me throughout my exam-preparation. (So my decision to live outside the university campus as a non-residence has proved its worthwhile-ness …)
Dead link (ref:dsc09240.jpg)
//Amusing : “Yes, I must.”// I had an amusing conversation last Saturday during my dragon boat club meeting. There was a new member (meaning : just switched course). She didn’t bring any extra clothes so she wanted to borrow from this one girl (who didn’t join the activity/excused for I-dunno-what). I guess the girl refused to lend her ‘cos the new member asked me later on whether I encountered a selfish person (in university) before. I was thinking of those who’s selfish with their knowledge but apparently she meant the person who didn’t want to lend her clothes. I could see that she’s totally pissed off ‘cos she kept repeating the same issue. Secretly inside my mind, I was thinking what I’ll do if I’m asked the same question. And… I would do the same. I won’t lend my clothes to a stranger. I can’t just do that… unless I’m ready to mourn for my soon-to-be lost clothes. It’s my problem, really.. As much as I want to trust that people are naturally good, in reality, it’s the other way round. Anyway. I think she failed to see that not everyone can be as flexible as she is. But the amusing thing wasn’t this.
It’s this:

Her : So are you going this Sunday? [the lecturer said there’s no activity next Saturday but we can opt to go and see a rowing competition on Sunday]
Me : I'm not going.
Her : You have other activities...?
Me : Yeah. I'm going to church. [Thought : ..and I have piano class.]
Her : *silence*... You must go to church?
Me : *smiles awkwardly* Yes. [Thought : What the..?]
Her : What is your religion?
Me : *a little bewildered* Christian.
Then, moment of silence.
(The conversation was originally in malay & she’s not chinese or indian.)

Maybe not everyone will agree with me, but seeing it from my point of view, it’s pretty amusing.
//Study life so far…// It’s almost a month already. How’s my study going? Okay. So-so. Frankly, not so well. You know what? I finally get it. I finally see it. I understand why those in university can’t spare much time to blog (before entering university, I always blog-surf to read about university students’ life). One word. Busy.
It’s very overwhelming! Can’t miss class (100% attendance is compulsory)… Sometimes classes are cancelled… So you waste time waiting for that class (if you are informed last minutely) & you’ll have double (I can’t bear thinking of triple ones) doses of that class next (or future) week. Wow. Even my class-free day (Thursday) has started to be cluttered by substitute/lab/tutorial classes. Wow. I appreciate my weekends more now because that’s the only only days I can sleep all day. Okay, maybe not all day. I need study time too. Erm. Wait. What study time? I barely have time to study/revise. I feel really tired after class… no mood to study. *sigh* My “procrastinazy” (procrastinate + lazy, lol. Other people actually used the term too.) disease has re-occurred.
Well, that has to change this week. I need to allocate time for studying/revising… Oh, yeah. Funny thing I noticed : there are other math students who’s carrying STPM Pure Math book(s) everywhere. Are they using those STPM reference books as “reference”??? Fortunately, I didn’t throw away my books away. I can re-use it then.
//Group Hate (whining mode)// Group assignments, group projects – all that are so bothersome! The bigger the group, the crappier it become… It’s so hard to hold a meeting when everyone’s timetables are different. I want to work alone! I want my own working space!
//Extra thing... // I found my unspoken speech (done in 2007, when it was rumoured that one of us had to give a speech. Lol. Of course, no such thing happened). The written and then unspoken speech still exists…online. From @enilyram/Ren-chan's blog.

Inconsistence is my middle name!

Piano [practical] exam – July 16th, 2009.

I already had my GUILD music theory exam last year. But a practical exam is scarier because I’ll be communicating with the examiner!

I really don’t know how good (or bad) I am at playing the piano. I just depend on my teacher’s recommendation… and I don’t know if the examiners good words were for real or just to make me feel better because I made little mistakes here and there. During the last [practice] recital, the principal of my music school didn’t comment much on my pieces other than my untimely tempo (fast song played slow and vice versa)… Oh. Gosh. I really don’t know my level.

Anyway. I think I did the best I can do. It can be hard when other people have high expectations… so – regarding the piano – I insist on having fun. I’ll sit for exams but I don’t want to score high. I just want to have fun and improve myself along the journey.

Okay, back to the story. The examiner was really friendly (& seems to like chocolate.) He went  into the waiting room during tea break to get some chocolates and asked the “steward” to put one in his coffee. He offered us (the examinee, there’s also another girl waiting) the chocolates and I readily took it (lol) because eating chocolate helped lessen my nervousness. I thanked him and he returned to the exam room. Then more exam-takers came… The principal also came (maybe to give us moral support…). I was the first to come in after the tea break was over.

Nervous! Nervous! Even more nervous when he himself came in the waiting room to bring the next student (me!). Oh. Gosh. Then I adjusted the bench before sitting down, opened my book at my 1st piece… and he asked what I want to play first. I started with scales… & when he asked me to play broken chords for F major, I misheard him and played F Major scales instead. He stopped me when he realised my mistake. I said sorry and continued playing the broken chords.

Scales over, now it’s the 3 pieces’ turn. I played my 1st piece with a bit mistake but I kept on playing (as my teacher told me to do). Then 2nd piece, a slow one (I tried improving my tempo at home with the newly-bought metronome)… Okay-lah, I think. Then, the 3rd piece! I paused before starting. For your information, this piece is my most problematic piece among those three. During lesson, whenever we reached this page, I would gasp and my teacher will sigh, “Oh, no. That again.” The thing is, I always play this piece too fast, too slow, too unhappy, or not too springy. I kept got corrected by my teacher. *sigh* So, I played my 3rd piece, it sounded different from the one I always played because I kept in mind to make it more jumpy/springy. When done, I think I did okay. Whatever. Then it’s the examiner’s time to comment. “That’s the best version (for that piece) I’ve heard from KK.” (referring to my 3rd piece… and I may recalled what he said wrongly.) “Huh?” I thought. He approved of my problematic piece? That’s so sweet of him! I guess he’s just being nice because I’m an adult beginner (I’m so old!) taking a Grade 1 piano exam…

After that it’s sight-reading. I was lucky. I got a piece without flats and sharps! Then aural test. Clap. Clap… okay. I’m never good at that guessing the beat part. Then singing (I love this part!). I messed a bit with the last parts… to identify changes of rhythm and melody in pieces. Then, it’s the end. I thanked him and went back to the waiting room. The principal asked me how was it and I answered her wrongly because I was still recovering from my nervous state.

That’s it.

My first piano practical exam.

Update : Results.

Finally posted.

The 1st week of kuliah (classes?) were mostly introduction week (July 7th- 11th) for the courses I’d registered. While some lecturers were absent (“Digital System” & “Art Appreciation” Lame trans. I know.)… mostly just straight away went down to business - “Okay. For this semester, you must form group and do this and that…” – and  my Math programmes are the best! Brief introduction and then class! Math class. Multiple math classes. I can’t wait for more…hahaha.

I finally had the opportunity to register for the course I missed. But it didn’t go well in the beginning. Ignorantly, I registered to a non-existent class. When I reached the class, it’s dark and lifeless… then I entered a class where (no offence!) the students didn’t look like the MUET Band 4/5/6 type.  They were speaking to each other rudely… and two of the boys just finished smoking (smoking isn’t allowed in the campus). I knew because I could smell the hateful smell. Okay. Smoking’s unrelated to their MUET results… but trust me on this. It didn’t look like the class I’m supposed to be in. My suspicions were confirmed when I overheard the girls telling each other their MUET bands. Band 3…. and also when the lecturer came in and introduced the course’s name. I went out quickly and were lost among the classes. Next day, I looked at the notice board and saw that the class I registered to was cancelled.

“Sukan Perahu”, – which I realised later is related to Dragon boat – was… kind of fun. No, we haven’t started rowing yet… but it does sound fun although I don’t know how to swim! I chose this because I can’t register to the co-curricular course I wanted (Netball!). I never involved myself with water sports before so this was like a big joke in my family. But, whatever. We’ll see what happens at the next meeting. I might change my mind about this water sport thing. 

The university  should’ve  Sky Diving – I will totally go for that. ^_^.

My least favourite course is TITAS. Because it’s basically history. I’m so bad at history. Tamadun Islam dan Tamadun Asia. (trans: Islam Civilization and Asian Civilization. @Peninsular Civilization. :-P )

New things I noticed about this new ‘phase’ of life…

1. Notice Board Alert. Must know where the notice boards are for the courses I’m taking to get information – cancelled classes, extra classes, etc… – and always visit  them because you’ll never know what you’ll miss.
2. Living outside is not a bliss. It’s not easy living outside the campus. I’m aware it’s a bit far from home (I even ruined the routine my family had in the morning) but my problem isn’t that. I’m worried if I missed any announcements (esp. regarding PTPTN matters and classes…) during my absence. And here enters number 3’s importance.
3. “What’s your cell phone number?”  - Getting phone numbers of my coursemates suddenly becomes important to me. Everyone needs everyone’s numbers!
4. Group VS Individual. I’m talking about assignments and projects. I’ve always prefer working on a project alone to working as a group but it’s so unavoidable now! Working with strangers (=someone I just know in class) irk me. I just wish we finish everything early and say our goodbyes. One thing that amused me is the way the lecturers want our groups formed – must be 1Malaysia-themed. Must have “Malay, Indian, Chinese and/or Others.” This is nothing new to me (& I expect the Sabahans and Sarawakians think the same too) ‘cos we do it all the time since primary school. In fact, I think I care more about the genders rather than the races.. “How many girls?” “Want any boys?” It seems apparent that a different thing is happening in Peninsular schools… it’s like the ads I saw on TV. [What’s wrong with you people? Sabahans and Sarawakians are Malaysians as well! ]

 

That’s all I have to blog about today. Duh. Lame last words.

(See the rowing boat image? I’m trying out the Zemanta plugin I installed for Windows Live Writer… actually my posts were mostly words, no images. So I’m going to decorate a bit starting from this post. Not too much though, that will take forever to load~)

 

Image via Wikipedia

On 5th of July, I tweeted “U Orientation : I enjoyed it but mostly I hate it.”

Hmm… Let me recall what happened. *thinking* It was okay the first 3 days but as the real orientation period started (June 30th-July 4th) – I started to hate it. On the 1st day (June 30th), I was stupid enough to sit near the big speaker in The Hall. So, I ended being shouted at. Okay, everyone ended being shouted at. I really couldn’t take it when the seniors shout on the microphone to order us to do this and that! I was like “Why are you shouting?”… and he even shouted at random times, startling those who weren’t ready for erm… a shout (including me). That truly made me upset for days. I kept fighting back my tears (not because I was homesick but because I don’t like loud noises).

On the same day, there were briefings related to the university all day. Because I woke up early for a “Moral class” (Kuliah Moral), I kept dozing off when the important people in the university were delivering their speeches. It was embarrassing but I couldn’t care much anymore because I was too sleepy and tired. That was the one and only “Moral class” I’d been to. I was absent for the rest of it (3 days of “Moral class”). Actually, it was more like a motivational class (which I think was okay), but I refused to sacrifice my sleep for that.

The next day (July 1st), we spent the whole day with our schools. I had a much better time than yesterday but I was still always sleepy. My sleepiness became worst at night. The seniors kept us from returning to our dorms because we still couldn’t sing the university’s song properly. They were preparing us for a big event for tomorrow.

On July 2nd : Big event in the morning. We officially became a part of the university. Ikrar and Aku Janji. I slept early because I purposely missed the riadah activity at night. Oh, yeah. It was on this day that I finally had enough and burst out crying as I called home. Homesick? Computer-sick? Piano-sick? Above all, I realised I hate the dorm after all. I hate staying there. I refuse to like it. I refuse to adapt to the life. I refuse to be under their authority. (I know. Spoilt, spoilt girl!)

Course registration was on Friday (July 3rd). Haha. I still don’t get these university terms. Initially, I was thinking : “I’ve registered for my course (university registration) already why am I registering my course again?”. Oh. Actually what I was registering was the “subjects” I’m going to study throughout the semester. Okay. Everyone was early – we had to use the computers at the library to go online for that purpose – and when there’s so many people lining up already inside, the library staff informed that the computers were in hang mode. They told us to return in the evening. But it’s no use. The computers’ still unusable till Saturday.

There’s a cool performance at night at The Hall. It was performed by students from the Art school (dunno remember the real name). I tweeted about it but I don’t think my tweets did justice to their performance. I need a video to prove it. Haha.

On Saturday, we were supposed to check in to our permanent dorm. I was desperate to get out because of my piano exam (last minute cramming!) so I didn’t care much about my courses registration. When I finally could log in to site to register (in the evening, I kept getting my password wrong. I realised in the end that it’s a 12-character password. My original password was 13 characters long) – I’m short of one course! It’s full! & now I don’t know what to do!

 

What a week.