Cram me like you do (replicated from Facebook)

Mock exam is over. We rejoiced in entertainment (in particular, karaoke), games, movies, gathering. The impending one week break serves too well to relegate books to the bottom of priority list and alleviate us from the stress of exams before the ultimate blow: the A2. Do we deserve it?

This is debatable.

On one thought, we underwent double (if not more) toil to master the year-long syllabus in three months. Therefore the end of mechanics paper liberated us from the hurdle of exams. But have we prepared well? Or, rather, do we have sufficient time to prepare well?

First of all, syllabus completion is already a great deal for both lecturers and students, and at one point all of agreed that this cannot be done in just six hours of classes. Yes, A2 materials were partially covered before our AS, but little could be done when revision period sets in (a period when our myopic mind suggested us it was better to focus on AS stuff first to ace that exam). It was also not uncommon to find ourselves forgot those materials when the third semester came, forcing ourselves to revise those notes again. As mock exam drew near, lecturers would be like “it’s okay, you just have to ace the final A2” and we would be like “let go one subject to do well in the other three”, suggesting the gravity of time constraint.

As if these were not enough, we had admission tests like UKCAT, BMAT, IELTS, SAT (a.k.a. Stress And Tension), and essays (like personal statements and US college essays that potentially eat up your time). The tests aren’t easy: some are even harder than A-Levels especially for those without very robust language foundation like me. Don’t we find ourselves in pressure cooker?

The choice

It sounds like I have resentment at A-Levels, but I don’t. My point is, are we making right choice by opting for 18 months course instead of 24? Insiders know too well that the A-Levels syllabus is tailored for two years in UK, and yet most Malaysians went for 18 months. Why do we do so? Are we saying out loud that we are smarter than the Brits? Are we saying that the two-year-course is too relaxing and we should shrink to 1.5 years? What’s more, when we aspire for the insane 4A*s, fighting hard to be the top 10% in each subject, and eye on prestigious schools (like C or O).

Some may say 24 months course is “too relaxing that one may slack”, but knowing the academic rigor of A-Levels (especially CIE, the exam board under which we enroll for exams) I don’t think it can be relaxing even in this sequel. Rather, the extra time allows us to ruminate on the facts we learned on textbooks, and we don’t have to cram the facts hastily. The former gave the room for self reflection until we understand things completely, while latter on guarantees superficial comprehension, gained through perfunctory approach.

What’s more? We can involve ourselves in college ECAs. In Sunway we have ALSTAR, but since we have only 18 months and the last two semesters are for exams, can we remain active beyond the first semester? Furthermore, one course mate, enrolled under 24 months programme, set up his own club in Sunway. Do we (18 months fellows) have this luxury?

Regret or not?

I don’t know. I chose 18 months because of its popularity, and that only 14 people in our batch chose 24 months (as opposed to nearly 400 for 18 months) would make me feel “lonely” if I chose otherwise. It seems like the Malaysian culture is shaped like this: choose the fastest path if possible. I may not agree with this (especially after cramming facts for mock exam this time), but admittedly, changing public’s perception is very hard (if not impossible with only individual power). In this case I even “have” to join this predominant culture.

Having walked through 14 months of this arduous journey, what else should I do? Just work hard for the following three months and put in all effort into university applications (and I believe my comrades in my batch feel the same way too).

Midway

Here am I, stranded in the midway of the year, the quagmire of studies, and the toil of applications.

I attended my AAA (graduation for January/March/July 2014, an unwonted tradition of my college), but I have 5 more months before completion of course; I finished two rounds of SAT, but the results can never make me complacent (although this time the inscrutable nature of the exam successfully dissuaded me from another retake); I completed my AS, but there’s till A2 to go.

The relaxed past

I anticipated the upcoming (by then) month-long examination marathon just before the AS exams, but towards the end of it, the sparsely distributed schedule defused my paranoia. On the other hand I was right that the conclusion of my SAT equaled the release of half of my examination burden. More so when my writing papers for Econs and Physics were done, and for the rest of the period we just have to keep doing past papers to keep up our momenta.

We utilized these ample gaps not only to prepare upcoming papers, but also entertain ourselves: we marched into the cinema for three times (all of which were after the end of a paper), hanged out with old friends to KLCC (after an elaborate ride on Rapid KL and LRT), enjoying ourselves in mindless loafing. But the adventurous trip to KLCC was well-justified: I spent 4 One-Malaysia book vouchers (due 30 June) to buy books of my interest: math and writing (reason: these are the books that I didn’t find in the Big Bad Wolf book sales).

The intense future

Now that the third (and final) semester starts, and we return to our studies after a paltry of one-week break, because the whole world knows we (as 18-month students) will be rushing for syllabus frantically. And can anything be more hapless than that we have learned only partially on a chapter or two out of 15 stipulated in our coming exam? Main reason was our ravenous need of revision for AS previously, and consequentially the normal 6-hour slot for each subject is no longer enough.

More so when cumbrous application requirements approach us like tides, i.e. essays and some more admission tests (you feel it when you apply to institutes of different countries, each demanding different set of tests), and the idea of retaking left us in quandary: should I sacrifice my extra time for these? Meanwhile, since we had few months to race through our college essays, we have to collect the essence of our thoughts and exercise every drop of flair into coherent piece of work, about 600 words each. Just imagine the writing topics deluging us amid our formidable A2 exams: this proves the semester as tumultuous.

Resolution

Having come so far, there’s no reason for us not to remain gallant (remember the prerequisite to secure our scholarships). Yes there’s still more to go, but the progress I have can already force a smile out of me. Although I didn’t meet my target for SAT, one year ago I would have considered my score today as “high”, if not “brilliant”. And I’m fortunate to have done this by second semester: the preliminary preparation started in last September (memorizing words), the time when I had a luxurious amount of time to do so.

Abrazar la Aventura: a quote I would like to remind myself not only for the rest of the year, but also for the rest of my life (by the way, this is the theme for this year’s graduation, meaning “Embrace the Adventure”). Also, not forgetting “I’ll move on” by Olivia Ong, whose lyrics depict how the feeling of turning away is then replaced by the determination to move on, knowing that she has come so far.

Surpriiiiiiiiiise!

It’s three days before AS pure maths paper, but given my past papers marathon schedule I was doing my Physics paper 2 instead. The SAT on the day before left me jaded, and regardless of the countless naps I had, I still felt lethargic. At 10:20 pm, I tried to maintain my mental vitality by watching a 20-minute-video while doing the papers, but I relinquished into my bed at 11. But massive aberration occurred an hour later: I was then wide awake, and noticed that some housemates who typically sleep at 10 or 11 were still meandering around the dining area. There’s also some female noise wafted from the corridor, reverberating my eardrums sporadically. I didn’t care much and attempted another hypnosis to myself again, but I can’t…

It wasn’t even two minutes when I heard repetitive knocks on my door. With my mind ruffled and eyelid sagged, I lumbered to the door and turned the knob, greeted only by Yi Heng with his (feigned) stolid face and the dark vicinity.

Then Zeno held a cake (or two? Couldn’t trust my eyes) with candles illuminating the dark surroundings, followed by an influx of people and the concomitant concerted choir force singing “happy birthday”. I didn’t know how to react, except laughing non-stop.

Everything next followed full procedure: make a wish, and blow the candles. But before I cut the cakes (which I temporized it for fun) the crowd demanded me to remove the candles orally, anticipating the scene when someone tried to push my face into the cake then. Too bad, I realized the force pushing me into the cake and resisted it fast enough (so I doubt if I was really in blurred condition) 😛

It’s two, not one.

It’s buffet session, and the guests when into hectic “snapchatting” activity (I don’t have one, but I know they do). Some questioned me whether I could “detect” this surprise, and one joked that he heard an “alarm striking from my room at 12”: I denied it vehemently, showing my aggravation on this false “accusation”, only to realize later that I shouldn’t have taken it literally. Later, these friends unveiled some previous mysteries layer-by-layer: when three friends chased me out of their rooms the day before and said they were talking about “personal matters”, they were discussing about this birthday plan. Nevertheless, I conceded to Zeno that I sensed irregularities when accidentally saw a Whatsapp group “Anzo watch **rn” on his phone when he asked me questions on a math problem, when he asked jocularly “guess what’s the secret group for the other housemates”.

The party ended soon with a group photo, and with clock striking 12:50, I thanked the guests and said goodbye to them (reminding that some have papers one day away), with subsequent repartee “hey let’s go, the host is chasing us out”. I can’t describe how humorous these friends are.

That’s all. That mini-banquet was over. I fell into my bed at 1:10 after cleaning the mess (thanks to my inept cake cutting skills), leaving a thud for Zeno to tease with later. But I found myself in whole night insomnia out of euphoria: this sensation was just too fantastic!

—

In the party, I didn’t explicitly say how grateful I was; instead I flippantly said “thanks for ruining my plan of waking up early for a good swim tomorrow”, and “I can sleep finally” after the guests dissipated. The reason of I doing so is to reinforce my eccentricity (I wrote this before: I have never been normal and I will never be), and to show how I lost my words during the party.

The fact was, these friends deserved more than just a gratitude from me: who can expect them to throw a surprise just for me when exam was impending? Everyone could have studied in his/her room and enjoy quality slumber. Instead they planned all this not only to commemorate this special day of mine, but also to break the tedium of exam month even before the exam commenced.

This post is specially dedicated to you all. To add on, thanks to all the wishes, including one good friend who phoned me from Taylor’s College. Finally, thanks to my parents too (they have been celebrating my birthday for 18 times already, isn’t it?)

*Photos: credit to Jean and Zeno.

9 exam dates

Personal reminder

May and the first half June will be redoubtable months for me, exasperated by that my birthday falls in the former. It was mid-term in May for the past 11 years (excluding 2014 when I was not enrolled in any educational program), but it’s real examinations now. And these exams will decide my fate later.

I’ve never imagined that, just after we collected our marked papers of mock AS exams we are so close to the ultimate testament of our (supposed) hard work in these two semesters. More excruciating is that lecturers have to continue teaching topics for the remaining of our A-Level programme, and we have to count on ourselves for most revisions. That subjects in A-level cover multitude of topics, with examinations requiring skills and knowledge beyond what transcribed in textbook, consumes a lot of time from lecturers and students. Can this verify that 18 months of study is indeed rush?

It seems legitimate to ask myself how I should be whining about these nine days of exam– after all, I had been through SPM and internal school exams, in which we have more than 20 papers to sit for. But the problem is, AS and SAT exam are just too enormous to think of (even more so than SPM). Fail the threshold for one paper, and here gone your grades.

The only reason these examinations are so preeminent that nobody dare to spend a thought of failing them, is that, we are prizing for universities that use these as benchmark for admissions (as a prerequisite to secure JPA scholarship). As we marshaled more and more information on the universities we aspire, we know that good grades are often necessary but far from being sufficient. While there are many other admission criteria, why allow ourselves to lose this primal battle? Looking at the entry requirement for UK schools, and the admission rate cascading rather uniformly with every dip of SAT scores for US institutes, our onus of working harder is smitten even more deeply into our heart.

Meanwhile, I need another venture into SAT for application into US universities. This exam (except maths section) is so toilsome that those who have never seen SAT papers will never know how hard they are. As the International Office University Placement officer in our college said its English can be some problem for students, it’s an euphemism. It’s huge problem for me when I look at it, no matter how many times I do so. Despite doing innumerable practice tests, analyzing a multitude of answer explanations, I still don’t get why reasoning tests play with recondite language in front of us students and obscure answers, making kerfuffles in our mind while waiting for the answers to crystallize. I already knew that I have to retake this exam in May ever since I started preparing for January SAT, and the extra months of ordeal are simply decimating my brain cells.

Before I entered college, seniors portrayed A-Levels and IB as the hardest courses to study, while SAT as the most abstruse admission exam. I started feeling the agony as I entered the programme, substantiated by my course mates who were converted from other programmes like AUSMAT and foundations that they could afford outing to KLCC regularly before entering A-Levels, shorter course period notwithstanding. This stressful feeling, however, hasn’t become so immense until these examinations are near–when AS and SAT are juxtaposed in dates, the only thing we can realize is that the amount of time left from these exams are disproportionately miniscule compared to the amount of materials we have yet to peruse.

Good luck to all candidates, and may we stay indomitable regardless of challenges and fetter ahead us.

PS: While I inveigh AS+SAT as torment, how about in October/November with A2+massive university applications? I welcome you to speculate.

The first third of A levels

Officially returned after some time of blogging respite! Reason: bombarded by the seemingly obnoxious semester exams. This was exasperated by the news (or it really is) of how hard the papers are, and how about being pulverized by the papers?

Let the article start now.

There’s a reason to choose Sunway College, mainly: the hostel (offered FOC to bursary students) allured a lot of people. Single room. Looked like great temptation, or, rather, interpreted as these scholars need undisturbed study environment. Looked like A-levels are for nerds.

Some others are: oh yeah Aeon (Sunway Pyramid) is within our turf, so that we can have outing as many times as we want (not what a nerd does) and attend weekly trading campaign to swap money with goods. Last, but not least, this college is estimable in its A-Levels (one of three with Fellowship Centre Award!) Despite all its plus points, there are two speckles that made me huffy (as listed below).

A short orientation in July (which I practically missed some of it) before I returned from the fantasy of IMO to take the 18-month-challenge. I now remembered, during the first week of my return itself I already heard grudge from my housemates, “class test tomorrow!” Umm…A-Levels are really marks orientated, I thought, significantly disquieted by this system after habituated to the quarterly assessment system in high school. My situation was no better as well, since what I faced was surprise test! (Luckily that’s maths). Legions of tests and exercises before September because of the policy of sending results to our parents. That’s all to say.

Classes

Timetable is the first spot. Looking at the timetable of my class, (Group 12: Double maths, econs, physics (12A)/account (12B)/chem (12 C) ) you can easily get yourselves disgruntled. Why? Mainly because of imbalance (8 hours on Wed while 5 on Mon) and breaks in between (that we had to stay back for N hours before the next class). In contrast, those pure science students have consecutive lessons in a day, and, concomitant early dismiss. Well…this is not my main grudge since I’m OK to spend some idle time at school. It was the other aspect of timetable arranging. As students from 9B attend 3 classes with us (1 with 12A, 2 with 12B), it turned out that we could hardly squeeze in any replacement class in the normal 8-5 slot (except for Fri we stop by 3:30pm). This happened to us for Physics class and we had to use up the time beyond 3:30pm, which may curtail the plan of some classmates of going home. Bygones be bygones, but please arrange a better timetable for us for the following semesters.

As for classes, we received the most stress from mathematics, partly because of us being Further Maths students (this explains why 80% of our class tests are from math). While it’s inappropriate for me to complain to my friends (their ammunition being “shut up, IMO gold medalist,”) still, it is imperative to have a balance of workload between 4 subjects (actually, we finish math before starting further math, which would alleviate this situation compared to our friends in other colleges). Nevertheless, it is good that I learnt quite a lot during the incipient of this journey: how mechanics link maths and physics together in A-Level syllabus, and the beauty of calculus: all maths people know that integration has no chestnut formula. Don’t believe it? Try to integrate ln sin x dx from 0 to pi/2–credits to Justin who showed me (you will get nowhere in finding its indefinite). Of course, differential equation in general is a conundrum for me now (excluding those with directly separable variables, and now, complementary function which, somehow has the remnant of quadratic equations)

Physics is enjoyable, many thanks to my lecturer, Mr. Kingsley. He is exacting in complete and specific definition and explanation, like density of any sample of an object, and using relative velocity instead of relative speed in the textbook. Meanwhile, he brought us into the world of intricate models like electrons and molecules, and think of them squirming in this special world. “Put yourselves in their shoes,” he added. This enhances our understanding, and I found my physical mind unlocking gradually 🙂

Econs? Well, its “right and wrong” nature makes things elliptical, leaving me flustered. As a game between human and resources, it concerns not only on resources appropriation and allocation, but also psychology and geopolitics (at macro level). Knowing the distinction between Keynsian and neo-classical is too parochial; somehow we have to muse on the reasoning behind the proposal, and think “which makes sense”? Unfortunately, the A-Levels doesn’t provide such thinking box in the textbook, where we only learned more through the presentation period the lecturer granted to us (besides the debate between the two guys with different economical ideology, both who have tonnes of knowledge).

Extensive Xtermination And Massacre (EXAM)

Really that ruthless, that students got into higgledy-piggledy? Not really, if you do not care at all. But if everyone treats every mark as important as wealth, and believe the rumour (or, possibly real news) that the paper would be inaccessible, I guess the whole crowd would reduce into brouhaha.

Pure math: Let’s start with this killer paper, consistent with the adage saying “eat that frog”: do the hardest first. Being a combined paper running across P1 and P3, we were given 2 hours 30 minutes to grab 100 raw marks. When I opened the paper……eye transfixed, amazed at how the lecturer expected us to play with algebraic expressions. It worth noting that how I stared at a 5-mark-question for a minute or two before the key idea in-fluxed into my brain. 50 minutes left as I finished the paper, and luckily I fixed a major mistake on graph, along with some other typos. “That’s amazing, as others who managed to finished the paper have less than 10 minutes left,” my friend responded while listening to me saying. A hearsay about the reason on the hard paper: to prepare us for Further Maths, “and terminate your hubris.”

Applied math demanded less thinking, but more circumspection. I remembered getting frustrated in fixing 5 or 6 errors throughout the paper (hopefully that was all).

Physics: “Let’s sweat together,” by head of physics prior to the exam. Indeed, the lecturer who set paper 2 for us this time came out of a killer paper that deprived a lot of time from candidates last semester, and even the best among them managed only 3/4 of it. “Damn we are going to hell,” the whole physics crowd turned into salvo. It turned out that we over-hyped the paper as the originally difficult paper was moderated, but still, time was tight for us-with one hour for Paper 2, it means that for 60% of the questions we have to write within one second after reading the question.

Econs, perhaps, was the seemingly easiest one as the questions relied a lot from A-level past years (provided you studied past years before the exam). TS was even incredible: the teacher just recycled the entire paper from the past semester paper! I didn’t know whether I was lucky that I didn’t get to look at the semester paper beforehand, but that’s not important anymore-I’ll probably drop soon.

Now allow me for my pent-up second grudge. The teachers have a tacit with students on NOT to privy past semester papers. When I stepped into the college, I already found the library incomplete not to have past semester papers. It turned out that, the papers are hermetic that we aren’t supposed to know from A to Z. A possible rationale: they wanted to reuse some questions. So what? Is it that hard to devise a new set of questions, or at lest, cull from the past years (or better still, from other boards)? The problem to students, is, most past years actual paper couldn’t measure up with the difficulty set by school teachers (esp math and physics). Don’t we have a right to have a picture on the difficulty of the papers? If they are to continue the practice, please, give us sample questions to solve our pre-exam fret.

—

Back to the question, are we nerds? This is true if you are to compare with other Pre-U programs in the college. E.g. my friend (who transferred from Foundation to A-Levels) cited that, there was a convivial party session, opened to all students in Sunway College, which garnered support from every programme except A-Levels. Corroboration with the general perspective of we being nerds. But, studying aside, we do have social activities, mainly contributed by student ambassador and volunteerism. This is good as we are not complete nerds yet, and we know how to take actions in the margin. After all, its one-month break now. “Enjoy your break, because you will be in the hell when you return next year”, says Ms Amy, my Applied Math teacher. Time to “unnerd!”

Food carnival: Eat, work, repeat.

There’s a reason why I write this: no joke, that was the first time I have ever involved in organization of activities like Canteen Day (so you can imagine how “active” I was in my uniform body: KRS in my alma mater). Another reason was, this required stupendous amount of investment of time, even as ordinary member like me.

This is the activity of A-Level Student Ambassador (ALSTAR) of Sunway College, and Food Carnival is part of it. Considering how time-consuming it can be, the committee (ALSCO) knows best the pressure they are carrying, while members like us are not having much leisure either. Fortunately, the burden is meted out among us.

And that’s how it began: no stalling please.

As the committee mooted it and consigned the job to us, we started it immediately. Dishes decision, cost-cutting, materials needed, all steps were jotted down into the meeting minute. Following this, we planned out an experiment session on making foodstuff on a Saturday, and had bonanza of honeydew sago, chocolate mashmallow and chocolate cornflakes for ourselves (something to learn from others, considering the dearth of my cooking expereince)! We then came out with a complete list of cost and budget, and presaged that the honeydew sago would be the pay dirt for the team. As the day soon drew near, we held some tutorial session on precaution and techniques: never let a drop of water to mar the hot chocolate, ratio of 1:2:2 for sugar, coffeemate and honey-dew. Unfortunately, that was the moment when we were thinking of flagging down the sales of corn flakes, considering the disillusion of potential customers. We carried on, anyway.

10/10/2014

An aberration to what I did previously, I woke up at 6:15am and entered canopy walk at 7, just the moment when it opened. Why? To help my leaders to set up. As suggests, eat and work, I had nasi lemak as breakfast to support my comrades in other team (and because I rarely have nasi lemak since I enrolled in this College). It turned out that I really eat while work for the entire day: this was the only way for me to dispose my coupons piecemeal, considering my epic-failed technique of coupon selling (I tried some effort, alas, most of which was halted by response “I already bought”, while some slandered us, dourly and jocularly, as “money reaping”).

How about selling? Seemingly docile during tutorial, I still needed to consult my duty partners regarding the modus operandi of preparing the fresh foodstuff. Anyway, the following is the results when the Carnival was called a day: locally, our prognosis went perfectly accurate, whether the honeydew sago was best hit at its enticing price of RM4, while the corn flakes was at its stalemate; globally, the fruit stall finished its business before time, while team selling fried rice, due to over production, met an impasse and had to reduce its price to cleat stock. As the stock clearing technique itself went arduous, some attributed the dire condition as “factor other than price” (I get the joke as I study econs in A-Level), just like our corn flakes. Fortunately, I devised the gimmick of “buy rice and get corn flakes for free”, which somehow duped the consumers successfully (with much promotional work).

In conclusion, from a member’s point of view, the committee really did an exhilarating job, and overcome all possible insolvency to the fund-raising crusade. As of me, I was glad to be involved in it, even though what I did was just a little fraction of the work others have done. This, though, wore me out that I granted myself an amnesty and took a siesta the day after, after my return from a volunteering activity.

The dark

The blackout during poll count in GE 13 still lingers in my mind, as it created uproars nationwide. While blackout could be inconsequential at times, at the moment when you terribly need lights and fans, the effect would be awesome.

This happened the night after the Moon Cake festival in Sunway Monash Residence.

I could recall vividly at 11:15 pm, my body ranted for its lethargy (thanks to some soporific homework) and I went out of room to brush my teeth. While I was turning into the bathroom, out of the sudden, all equipments and amenities in my room turned black, as if they vanished in alchemy. The only exception was my phone, reminding me that it was off from the power source. “18%. Connect your charger,” it begged.

Blackout happened.

While adults usually find it depressing and devastating, we, however, acted as if adrenaline shot into our brain and sprinted into dining hall to see what was happening. To our misfortune, the whole residence went into ominous darkness, together with Monash University.

Adrenaline continued to fill my head, and this time the whole residence was apparently hosting a post Moon Cake Festival Party. Torchlight supplanted conventional light bulbs, and apart from that some SMR residents devised some other sensation of the night: playing with artificial torch, screaming like people recently escaped from asylum, amplified volume of MP3 songs, and having “live concert” with guitar accompaniment, making a girl shouting unabashedly in the public, “are you singing for me?” The whole unit of A03-04 went nuts, and this happened to most other units which the residents I’m familiar to, too. As a result, one of my housemate (who was awaken by our intractable behavior) went irate and denounced the whole noisy crowd on Facebook.

It was not until the midnight when the condition went censorious where some residents treated the rules and regulations profanely. Some threw ignited matches onto the parcourse of the residence, while others adulterated it with papers and toilet rolls, causing some residents to yell “f*** u” stridently at them (more of a prank, though). As expected, guards took action by scrutinizing the whole block, and detect any wrongdoing as soon as possible.

The sensation of the night then reached its climax when two international male students did more than this: running and star-jumping naked in the parcourse. More or less, this incident changed my belief of illegible behavior being only available on *o*n website. Having our balcony just above the parcourse, we, innocently and accidentally, witnessed the whole unfortunate scene, from the moment of them running into the parcourse to the moment they disappeared. They began to stop their flippant act after some other residents mischievously made it overt, using the torchlight. Nevertheless, they gained notoriety as “naked runners”.

The party environment began to cease when we were bored with it, and I realized that all our scream and ebullience were pointless: in spite of my apparent enjoyment of screaming, there was awkward emptiness in my heart gradually filled by worries: worrying for my phone battery; worrying for my unfinished IELTS reading practice paper (due next morning :O ); worrying how I was going to sleep.” I prayed hard for the electricity to resume, and utilized the torchlight to finish my work. The effort proved futile and I finished only 1 of the comprehension paper, giving myself the benefit of doubt that the tutor wouldn’t have time to discuss the other passages. 12:40, time to sleep while betting for the resume of electricity.

10 minutes later

While I was trying hard to get into slumber, a thread of brightness penetrated my eyelid, followed by the double-click sound of my phone. I then realised that whole incident was quelled and again, I screamed out of my joy until my housemate reminded me not to do so. Heart relieved, and finally I earned a good sleep.

—

This incident showed the eccentricity of teenagers, except a small portion which behaved in proper decorum. People may treat us as mad students, at least for a night. But as long as we were within the rules, should we abjure ourselves from enjoying life for a short moment? But frankly, one night was more than enough for us.

Ps: In adjunct of this, there was a carrot fight 2 weeks after, creating “ping pang” noises in the midnight (no blackout). Eventually carrots abounded the parcourse. Is this another form of eccentricity?