hit the ground running.

Monday, January 23, 2006

More Than Just a Student

I've finally decided to write. There've been a lot of things on my mind recently and it's taken a while to clear my mind. Not that I've solved all my problems, not by a long shot I haven't, just that I've managed to get myself sorted out enough to confidently say that I've got my priorities righted again.

Behind every act of a person there has to be a driving force. For some, it's money, for others, it's the love for another person. For too long I've allowed myself to be driven by my own selfish ambition to do well and to beat others, rather than focus on what really mattered to me. I've never been one to blog about religion, but it's about high time I did.

Why so? Well let me tell you what my religion - that's Christianity, for the uninformed - means to me:

Everything.

And yet I've chosen to push it behind so many other things in my life, studies, relationships, money, the works. It's only fair then that I recognise now what an impact it's made on me. It provided me with much of my motivation last term, not only in studies but also in serving in various fields. This year though I felt like I'd lost my focus and motivation to do any work, hardly ever opening my textbooks or reading up before lessons, and it could really be linked back to my drifting away from God. I received 2 copies of the same book, The Man in the Mirror, as Christmas presents. I don't think it's a coincidence, but an indication that it's about time I reflected on my own life and started doing something purposeful with it again.

I shan't dwell too much on the subject though, but if any of you want to hear more from me about it, feel free to ask.

- - - - - - - - - -

Anyway, I've finally begun training regularly for my tournament, and symptomatic of the resumption of field trainings is the appearance of mosquito bites on my legs. I really never cease to wonder how powerful the mosquitoes at Turf City (and Bishan Park) are, seeing how I still have the remnants (sic) of bites that I'd got 3 weeks ago at Bishan Park. Not to be outdone, the mosquitoes at Turf City (known in some places as Ruralaysia) gave me hell too, and I've got a weird bunch of bites on my tummy (I would say abs, but..) which itch like a baboon's bottom.

Meanwhile, resisting Chinese New Year goodies, which in previous years proved to be rather much harder than it is to eat them Chinese New Year goodies, is not going well. My mum, having ever the keenest eye for a good bargain, spotted an offer at Takashimaya, which offered 3 bottles of birds' nest soup for every $188 spent. Never content with stopping at 1 (or 3, for that matter), she went on to spend a princely $400, much of which was on the aforementioned CNY goodies, much of which also ended up in my tummy (yes, abs, I meant).

It suddenly occurred to me that CNY really is an odd festival. Everytime it comes around you pig out and get fatter than you'd ever gotten before, and then when you do your visiting relatives invariably ask you why you've lost weight (and of course, if you've found a suitable girlfriend, or won the 4D lottery lately). Well yes, true, all in the name of small talk, but surely small talk has to be based on fact! I mean, you don't start talking about the weather if say, there wasn't anything particularly conversation-worthy of the weather. And though that's a really bad example, you know what I mean, don't ya.

Also, holidays in universities (or at least in SMU) are really anything but. What it really means is that your lesson on that particular holiday is postponed to a convenient later date, more often than not on a day when you've got something important planned. No longer are holidays celebrated like they are in Junior Colleges. Now, they're just greeted with nonchalance, and the occasional sigh.

For now though, I just look forward to the end of this week, hopefully by which I would have started my running regime (though 'regime' would hardly be an appropriate word to describe it) so that I can not embarass myself come IPPT day. Yes, you heard me right, I've got to take the cursed IPPT again, and more upsettingly than 'losing' the extra $200 if I don't get that gold, I'll have to rip off them IPPT Gold badges on my uniform, which will leave an unsightly piece of velcro - the surefire way to tell who's had a gold before and couldn't keep it. Not that I'm really expecting to get a gold, of course, 9:44 is rather out of reach for a struggling, unfit pseudo-student. 11:40, for the silver, might pose a challenge too!

For now though, I'd much rather just enjoy my bak kwa.

10:04 PM