I wish I could express properly the exact feeling of having finished IB. The odd mix of feelings, thoughts, the words of friends, the memories playing by...
I cannot.
But nonetheless, I will try.
It was only recently, though rather late, that it dawned upon me that this wasn't simply an ending of 2 years of IB. It was an end of 6 years of ACS. Of perhaps, one of the most life-shaping six years I've been through.
Just the other day, we went to renew my passport. I looked at the picture taken six years ago, and wonder at how much I've changed. More knowledgeable, maybe more mature, and hopefully, a little more wise.
Same shirt though. Somehow, even after six years God still has a sense of humor with my life. How the heck I still have and actually wore the same shirt I did six years ago for the same passport amazes me. (Or was it three years ago? Hm...)
But the point is, despite all that I've been through, despite what people may say about the education of Singapore, of IB, of the world even, there's no denying that its something all of us have gone through. So even as I look and sigh at the ideals of a perfect school, of the possibilities creative teaching and the irony of teaching creativity...in the end, as I walked out of the school and looked back at the clock-tower, I suppose there is still only one thing I can truly say:
That I'm proud and blessed to have lived six years of ACS. Because what defines a school, learning, development, is not the knowledge you've gained, the grades you received, the projects you complete.
It is the life you have lived. Because learning and living are one and the same.
And turning away from the clock-tower, I see my friends, all smiling and waving and laughing at the end of the exams, walking down the ramp together. And I know that in many ways, in the trials I've taken and the people I've seen, in the teachers that blessed me and the mistakes I made; that these six years were a life well lived, and a lesson well received.
So to the IB Cohort of 2008-2009, this is all I can say. To take heart and soar on, on Wings like Eagles, with the Lord as our Anchor. To be the Salt of the Earth, a Scholar, Officer and Global Citizen.
And though the first path is over, may we always remember-
-the Best is yet to Be.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Monday, November 2, 2009
Parasyte
Common concept of a creature living in another creature, absorbing their nutrients and abilities without given anything in return.
I don't need to elaborate I think.
Interesting how interesting some parasytes first appear to be. Many a colorful fungus or worm has a curious shape. Its almost as if a brightly colored or interesting looking exterior facilitates the infestation.
So the parasyte mimics the behavior of the host, and discerns what the hosts find "interesting". Thus the host picks up the parasyte, and gives nurtients of its own free will.
I wonder how the parasyte feels, needing others to survive?
Parasyte, parasite.
The worst sort of potential a person can have is wasted potential.
Sloth is a potent sin indeed.
I don't need to elaborate I think.
Interesting how interesting some parasytes first appear to be. Many a colorful fungus or worm has a curious shape. Its almost as if a brightly colored or interesting looking exterior facilitates the infestation.
So the parasyte mimics the behavior of the host, and discerns what the hosts find "interesting". Thus the host picks up the parasyte, and gives nurtients of its own free will.
I wonder how the parasyte feels, needing others to survive?
Parasyte, parasite.
The worst sort of potential a person can have is wasted potential.
Sloth is a potent sin indeed.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Styles
Look ma! I can toss words around like them weird juggly people in the circus!
Ma? MA! MAAAA!!!!
In today's news a woman was found dead when a hyperbole crushed her organs to death. Massive internal bleeding and cranial overload were cited as reasons for death.
The orphan is now at a school for disabled youths, learning the perils of over-using flowery language.
This News 3.14 tonight. I am David Craws- I mean David Steve. Have a nice day.
Ma? MA! MAAAA!!!!
In today's news a woman was found dead when a hyperbole crushed her organs to death. Massive internal bleeding and cranial overload were cited as reasons for death.
The orphan is now at a school for disabled youths, learning the perils of over-using flowery language.
This News 3.14 tonight. I am David Craws- I mean David Steve. Have a nice day.
Friday, October 23, 2009
525600 minutes
The power of Art lies in understanding, that we may feel what others do feel, and grow closer because of it.
Even with all the complexities, subtleties, genres and styles- the ultimate aim is simply for mankind to know itself better.
Even with all the complexities, subtleties, genres and styles- the ultimate aim is simply for mankind to know itself better.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Creative Engineering
I sit at my desk at 12 midnight, having just finished supper and a good read on the net. My bag lies next to me, packed with schedules and worksheets, books and papers. On my desktop are several folders, or which two stand out to me:
One labeled "EXAMS", the other, "IDEAS"
Oh, and a little document with lots of lines of text and numbers, a nice little DnD character I made with exactly 2.1 million gold in equipment. I feel quite proud of that.
...sad isn't it?
It used to be that I would write poetry and stories like a man breathes air. Bus rides home, evening walks down the street; ideas would come and flow into me, an endless river of inspiration I thought would never cease.
But such rivers run the risk of floods, endangering the village. And thus a dam was set up, to curb the tide, to control the flow, to channel its fury and raw majesty into tame, useful energy.
Examinations. Studying. Revision.
All goals I should be achieving. Am achieving, to an extent.
Yet how many geologists have looked at once mighty Nile and sigh at the small stream that trickles its way across the sand?
Nowadays, the MOE, government, people of this generation. Leaders, if you will, have realized the importance of creative talent. Of dreams, of lateral thinking, of uniqueness. And so they sought to harness it.
Yet I suppose, like a butterfly in captivity it doesn't really work out, does it?
After the river passes through the dam, drained its roar, what's left for the crops, the land, the sea?
One folder has not be updated in months. The other is being constantly filled every other week, with documents I barely read. I feel like a traitor, as though not reading them, not exercising my so-called fullest ability is a crime.
It is a crime, I guess.
I wish this post would have some massive insight. Some message I could impart. But I find I cannot do that now without sounding hollow. To preach, hah, to preach is to feed the masses what they wish to hear. To say what's already been said, that's preaching.
To teach, my friend, is a different story altogether.
So what am I, if not a writer? If not an engineer of words, a researcher of society? I look and think and watch it all seems so...easy. A giant stage, a giant act. So easy to just drift along, follow the ladder, take the golden hand.
I can tell myself anything, and I'll believe it. I am the greatest hypnotist and the most gullible fool. Self-delusion is a weapon, a potent tool one uses to fit in with society, to achieve things we would otherwise never do.
I ask myself, am I teaching or preaching? Are these ideas or exams? Am I truly exploring, or simply testing the market, the readers, the people of their conscience? Testing their lives?
It can be either way. I can choose. I can choose so much its frightening. And thus I become afraid to choose. There is understanding and there is understanding, the true understanding, where the implications and consequences of a certain action or property dawns upon you. Its so easy for the modern generation now to complain about dreams, about death, about hypocrisy and disillusionment and war. But do we understand it? I doubt I do.
There is a feeling that comes with understanding. An emotional weight, if you will. One of potency and heaviness. Like the feeling of a good racket in your hands, or a nice, heavy apple. A sensation of the rightness of it all.
Back to the dams. When power is harnessed, it can be controlled. And somehow, that takes away its power. Certainly, the Nile possesses its great physical power, its rushing waters, potential energy, kinetic energy...yadada...
But what happened to the other sort of powers? The gods, the worship. The power to inspire, to intimidate. To frighten, to awe. These are powers too, in their own right. But unlike the waters it is people they move. And in doing so, move the world.
It feels like creativity ought to be something more. Ceremony might be pointless in the view of efficiency, but it serves a purpose of its own as well. Sometimes, the existence of something is the effect unto itself. There is no cause, not root, simply the existence of that process that causes an effect.
And engineer solves problems. And a writer is simply an engineer of imagination. His bricks are the dreams of man, and his lightning is their drive. He builds a machine from the whispers and sighs of each generation, gathering the cast-off shells of their lives, the tiny after-image we leave where ever we go, welding our thoughts together, oiling the gears of passion.
And so, forge a new world? If only it were that simple.
Teaching or Preaching? So hard to say. It depends on the audience, like how the strength of a river depends on the land. One shapes the other, as the other shapes it back. And it is this dance that is renewal, is creativity, is the joining of ideals, new and old.
You cannot compartmentalize it. You cannot say: these are our writers, they will dream for us. You cannot hush an engineer's secret desire to fly, a lawyer's love of fruit pies, a simple worker's talent for humming. All of them dream, all of them dance. But it is the writer who looks from the balcony above, to chronograph it.
To understand something means it must be understood by you. By you. Not by the writers of the textbooks, not by the teachers in their classes. By you and you alone. Your understanding.
And then the writers can too look upon your dance and see it not as a shadow of a lesser dancer, but as a pattern of glory in its own right, sending ripples through the surface of the lake behind the dam.
One labeled "EXAMS", the other, "IDEAS"
Oh, and a little document with lots of lines of text and numbers, a nice little DnD character I made with exactly 2.1 million gold in equipment. I feel quite proud of that.
...sad isn't it?
It used to be that I would write poetry and stories like a man breathes air. Bus rides home, evening walks down the street; ideas would come and flow into me, an endless river of inspiration I thought would never cease.
But such rivers run the risk of floods, endangering the village. And thus a dam was set up, to curb the tide, to control the flow, to channel its fury and raw majesty into tame, useful energy.
Examinations. Studying. Revision.
All goals I should be achieving. Am achieving, to an extent.
Yet how many geologists have looked at once mighty Nile and sigh at the small stream that trickles its way across the sand?
Nowadays, the MOE, government, people of this generation. Leaders, if you will, have realized the importance of creative talent. Of dreams, of lateral thinking, of uniqueness. And so they sought to harness it.
Yet I suppose, like a butterfly in captivity it doesn't really work out, does it?
After the river passes through the dam, drained its roar, what's left for the crops, the land, the sea?
One folder has not be updated in months. The other is being constantly filled every other week, with documents I barely read. I feel like a traitor, as though not reading them, not exercising my so-called fullest ability is a crime.
It is a crime, I guess.
I wish this post would have some massive insight. Some message I could impart. But I find I cannot do that now without sounding hollow. To preach, hah, to preach is to feed the masses what they wish to hear. To say what's already been said, that's preaching.
To teach, my friend, is a different story altogether.
So what am I, if not a writer? If not an engineer of words, a researcher of society? I look and think and watch it all seems so...easy. A giant stage, a giant act. So easy to just drift along, follow the ladder, take the golden hand.
I can tell myself anything, and I'll believe it. I am the greatest hypnotist and the most gullible fool. Self-delusion is a weapon, a potent tool one uses to fit in with society, to achieve things we would otherwise never do.
I ask myself, am I teaching or preaching? Are these ideas or exams? Am I truly exploring, or simply testing the market, the readers, the people of their conscience? Testing their lives?
It can be either way. I can choose. I can choose so much its frightening. And thus I become afraid to choose. There is understanding and there is understanding, the true understanding, where the implications and consequences of a certain action or property dawns upon you. Its so easy for the modern generation now to complain about dreams, about death, about hypocrisy and disillusionment and war. But do we understand it? I doubt I do.
There is a feeling that comes with understanding. An emotional weight, if you will. One of potency and heaviness. Like the feeling of a good racket in your hands, or a nice, heavy apple. A sensation of the rightness of it all.
Back to the dams. When power is harnessed, it can be controlled. And somehow, that takes away its power. Certainly, the Nile possesses its great physical power, its rushing waters, potential energy, kinetic energy...yadada...
But what happened to the other sort of powers? The gods, the worship. The power to inspire, to intimidate. To frighten, to awe. These are powers too, in their own right. But unlike the waters it is people they move. And in doing so, move the world.
It feels like creativity ought to be something more. Ceremony might be pointless in the view of efficiency, but it serves a purpose of its own as well. Sometimes, the existence of something is the effect unto itself. There is no cause, not root, simply the existence of that process that causes an effect.
And engineer solves problems. And a writer is simply an engineer of imagination. His bricks are the dreams of man, and his lightning is their drive. He builds a machine from the whispers and sighs of each generation, gathering the cast-off shells of their lives, the tiny after-image we leave where ever we go, welding our thoughts together, oiling the gears of passion.
And so, forge a new world? If only it were that simple.
Teaching or Preaching? So hard to say. It depends on the audience, like how the strength of a river depends on the land. One shapes the other, as the other shapes it back. And it is this dance that is renewal, is creativity, is the joining of ideals, new and old.
You cannot compartmentalize it. You cannot say: these are our writers, they will dream for us. You cannot hush an engineer's secret desire to fly, a lawyer's love of fruit pies, a simple worker's talent for humming. All of them dream, all of them dance. But it is the writer who looks from the balcony above, to chronograph it.
To understand something means it must be understood by you. By you. Not by the writers of the textbooks, not by the teachers in their classes. By you and you alone. Your understanding.
And then the writers can too look upon your dance and see it not as a shadow of a lesser dancer, but as a pattern of glory in its own right, sending ripples through the surface of the lake behind the dam.
Friday, October 2, 2009
I have Fallen...
Zomg RO2 died to a poring stupid melee enchanter build doesn't do shit (curse swear mutter)...
My life is slowly draining away in a shower of pixels and cutesy 3D graphiks;
My life is slowly draining away in a shower of pixels and cutesy 3D graphiks;