Books

Decided to keep my mind occupied by getting down to some serious reading...

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Losing balance

Life is a delicate balance of a couple of things, so many things to do yet so little time...so many parties demanding your attention yet the heart can't satisfy the needs of all, perhaps not even those of yourself...

Life requires you to channel the right amount of attention to the right things at the right time, but who is to judge or choose how much is right, what is the right thing and when is the right time?

I find myself, once again, losing this delicate balance and walking an uncertain path...not being able to think clearly, to prioritize and to exercise some discipline in doing things....simply letting the heart has its way around things, and losing direction. It feels like a hangover after a long night of wine and merry, only to slump into a bad stupor after the party is over, and staggering my way home.

Need to stand up and walk straight again.

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Lamenting...

And i guess you are most prolly right abt me being a :( person...

I came home today n was making a hell damn lot of noise abt the day...how banks make use of interns to fulfill their corporate social responsibilities thru doin' some random comm service project and then window-dressing it nicely as part of the internship package...*wow, your programme is so wonderful! It has comm service...*wow*....raaight....

n that's cos i just came back from a visit to one of the bank's beneficiaries and didn't getta see my sis off at the airport (she's coming back in another month's time...but tt's not the pt here). I mean these banks should rightly give damn good reasons why they are incorporating a comm service component into the internship programme. I'm in to learn abt the business n not to do those unwanted chores of yours. You don't really mean what you do anyway....this whole CSR thing has taken a totally diff meaning!

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And then i guess the 3-hr paper kind of shagged me out although i must say it's quite an easy paper (i better pass man) relative to how little i've studied for it. N it just seals my conviction that audit/accounting is really not interesting enuff for me. 2 more papers...no idea when i can ever find the time n energy to finish this long arduous race.

I really don't wish to speak in such a contemptuous tone but I think we all have the right to give feedback and question why we do things....whether it's towards our employers or towards ourselves. As long as we have a choice, we should be constructively skeptical about things, don't u agree?

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Ok sorry for all the noise.

I think I am really just lamenting...well u get home late at night after a long day. N then when u look back at what u did, u realize u dun get any satisfaction out of it n start cussing n wishing u had something better to do.

I don't think i complain all the time like this...but i've seen more of the negative side of myself of late, especially after the storm clouds started descending upon me. 人中鳥屎也沒有那麽甩！

As for me being such a : ( person...i guess i have my own way out of things...i'm not that pessimistic la c'mon...if i really am, how to do so many things like that ?? ...haha...

I guess sometimes there're things n pple who egg me on in my life..who truly make me :)...n these r the ones i shld really cherish n nvr let them go.


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After tomorrow...

After tomorrow, life resumes of course.

Can't wait for the ACCA paper to be over. Honestly I didn't put in much effort at all for this paper as compared to previous years...partly cos damn tired from all my back2back pursuits since start of the year..and partly becos the damn interest is not there anymore...like i know audit & accounting is something I really won't go into for a fulltime job lor...

And here's a great deal to look forward to after tomorrow with the exception of one spillover chore from an earlier engagement..argh

• Continue to work hard for my internship tasks and projects...well i must say my boss really thinks v highly of me, which makes me quite worried about not being able to meet his expectations. But so far so good...as he wanted, I've helped him doubled his productivity in producing his weekly research notes. I can't believe he hired me to tidy up his life! And he's so damn frank about it. That's like putting a knife into you, smiling at you and at the same time twisting the knife a little bit. Yea la...dun wanna lose the chance of a fulltime hire...so gotta prove myself somehow.
  

• WM book writeups (the Chore!)

• Gym....yes need to lose the flabs after staring at the mirror and being reminded of how i put on 8 scary kil0s over last yr's internship period....at least 15 km a week.. A MUST!...n i'm quite sure all this running will keep me going in every sense.

• Euro 2008...just subscribed the SCV channel like only yesterday...reckon i can't catch too many of the matches cos of work but don't care la...
  

• Books...need to seriously pick up some books to read....how abt Prozac Nation or The Bell Jar to begin with....so much about going thru a depressing time now huh

• Movies...old movies....wanna really take the time to appreciate some of those good shows I've kept with me all along...Seven, Arizona Dream, Mulholland Drive, Magnolia etc etc

• Travel...read up on new places in Taiwan & HK cos i'll be going these places for holidays after my internship. Better stop wallowing abt how I gave up the opportunities to go Japan or Europe...no turning back anyway...can only wish those who're going bon voyage, have great fun and take care of themselves...will be quite sad too cos some of those going are really some of my closest n dearest friends in SMU.

• Need to do some Cleanup of my life as well..need to throw away alot of stuffs in my room, take down those outdated posters on my wall, give my walls a good scrub, etc etc

• Thinking abt signing up for CFA...everyone's doin' it already....I know I would most probably wanna do it for career reasons...so why the wait....n then have to reconsider whether to finish up ACCA and continue with my jap classes which i'm totally not catching up. Sigh the rat race never ends. So piah for what?

• December plans...a third OCIP? haa..i tink i'm nuts...if got vietnam i would surely sign up for sure.
  

Need to think of more stuffs to spice up my last official summer in SMU!


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Sometimes I find it hard to forgive myself for the mistakes I made.

大家平安就好。

It's bad news in the family one after another. Just less than a week after my granduncle's demise, my god grandma suffered a heart attack and was warded .

God granny, or in the teochew dialect "Lao-Mm", is my dad's godmother. She loves my Dad more than his own mother loves him. And perhaps that's where I felt the attachment towards her, even though we hardly met.

And there she was, her 94 yr-old body lying calmly on the hospital bed in SGH corononary care unit. She was awake and alert, thankfully. Unlike her usual self, she spoke little. She had no appetite for anything. But when mom fed her cherries, she reluctantly took a few.

Her organs are failing, and it would pose greater danger for her to undergo a bypass surgery. So she's living on medication. It's a painful struggle. But she is brave. As we were leaving the ward, mom assured her she'll be fine. And she finally spoke.

"別管我，大家平安就好。"

For a long time after we left, Lao-Mm's words kept ringing in my ears.

Death in the family

Last week saw the passing of my granduncle. He was a good man.

I guess he fought hard to the very last beat of his heart. I was reminded again about how short life is.

Why am I still doing things that I will regret?


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Top of the Gulf Sailing Regatta

And yea, a considerable amount of time this past semester was spent on keel boat sailing, after I got selected to go Pattaya for the "Top of the Gulf" regatta.

I was very grateful to some very very nice fella SMU sailors for giving me the chance to go for a race and dedicating time and effort in getting me fit for my role as a bowman on the boat. I have to say the role requires both physical and mental strength and a great sense of awareness towards the surroundings. I guess I've picked up quite a variety of skills there.

The Pattaya waters were scarier than Raffles Marina waters (like duh..). The boat I sailed on was named Amanda and was signed up for the race-cruisers' class under keelboat category. And we got first! All the time and effort spent training with my team mates - Alvin, Jacq, Richard, Muiyi, George and Yunfeng paid off! The boat went out of control a couple of times though when we sailed downwind to the finishing line. Like who among 7 of us will ever forget how the tiller broke cos the winds were so damn strong.

The trip was really good albeit intense and the whole regatta was indeed quite a high profile one. We getta party, eat and drink and watch fireworks almost every night. And I guess what made everything more memorable is the wonderful company of 30 other fella sailing enthusiasts. Really looking forward to sailing with some of these guys again soon...

A bigger picture

I always rem Harvey's last words of advice to me before he left for uPenn for exchange. He said i should stop micro-managing...and I didn't quite get what he meant back then. But everything seems to be pretty clear now.

What I've been thru' this semester have most probably gotten me to think further and broader. Two major screwups - one job interview and one midterm exam - got me to re-examine the way I view things and the way I go about getting my goals. Although I haven't exactly figured out how to reduce the incidence of my screwups, those weaknesses of mine would never have been uncovered had I not made those earlier mistakes and learned some valuable lessons from them.

I was glad to be able to turn things around in the end, achieving my best semester GPA in my time in SMU so far, as well as securing a summer internship with Merrill Lynch. So i figured...in life when you can't have the best of everything, go for what is more important in the long term and don't let small setbacks hold you back for too long.

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