The World Through Lenses

"hey there babe, care to join me?"
RM12.80 worth of skittles....handpicked into different jars.

now i know that the orange ones have the most and purple the least D:

i'm so gonna get cavities after this assignment...

i've never been truly proud about my photography skills before and think that i never would. Truth be told i rarely held a camera to snap pics until i came to TOA. Still, for the 1st time ever i kinda like the pic above. Although it was rejected for the self-composed final piece, nevertheless it's my personal fav of the lot. Uncle D said that it is cute but not too suitable lol. (fortunately he chose another piece composed with skittles too, that leaves me with one more piece to show him)

Just to let you in on a bit of info, i was never a strong believer of taking, or for that matter composing something for photography. i have this conception in me that finds framing things into a photograph 'fake' and 'lifeless'.

Still, i did enjoy my time with Uncle D and i feel like i'm gonna miss him very much when this sem ends. (hopefully i won't fail his class *whimpers*) He made me much more interested in photography and sort of change my perspective of it. Thanks to him i managed to pick up some photography jargons which i never thought possible for myself to know. His lectures might seem draggy to some but i find that i cannot not pay attention to him. He's like a grandpa teaching his grandson about the lessons of life.

i still have my reservations about photography but at least i can accept it better now. Time and knowledge changes a person eh? a good mentor might just do the trick too...

i wonder if...

...i am asking too much from myself.
i seek perfection in skills.
i seek to polish it to the highest degree.
i seek to accomplish it at the shortest time possible. [insert heuristic/greedy algorithm]

Why am i always racing against myself. Rationally i know that improvement comes with practice and time. Yet why am i so eager to prove to myself that i could, would and should reach perfection asap. Learning is life-long so perfection is close to impossible i suppose. There's this chinese saying along the lines of

"there is always a mountain higher than you, but do not forget that there is also a trail of mountains behind you"

i'm always willing to go that extra mile which stretches me thin sometimes, but still improvement comes too slowly or not at all. Is it because of the standards which i set too highly for myself? i'm not too sure, it just feels like i've reached a stagnant stage.

i know i was not born talented and i blame no one, but still it fills me with envy at times when i do meet such talents that require less effort than neccessary. Well, maybe i'm just disillusioning myself by only seeing the end result but not the things happening behind the scenes.

Oh well, i shouldn't be looking at it this way. Instead i might have other areas of specialties. (like my inherent skill to annoy those around me without effort)

Nothing much i can do about it i guess, except to continue to work hard and prosper. (hopefully)

Workaholic Sinkhole

i never used to value having to just sit down and listen to lectures, nod off, go home, rinse and repeat until the exams are suddenly here. Not until i stepped into the current hectic world i am in now.

True, time passes relatively slow when you are trying to pay attention to your lecturer droning away on the stage of his life. But realization dawns upon me now that i really missed that feeling. As the saying goes you never treasure something until it is gone.

Well, not exactly gone, since photography classes are basically lectures on cameras and i still have South East Asian culture studies. Still, i find the lack of such subjects now draws me to pay 120% attention in class. It's like an insatiable thirst which i didn't know i could possess.

The remaining subjects?

while ( kai_enrolled_in_TOA == true)
{
- Wake up early before 9;
- Go for a 3 hour class with almost non stop action at times;
- Pack home mountain-full of assignments;
- Moar work at night after a couple of hours of evening nap;
- Wrap up at 3 am;
}

it will be an infinite loop until i grad. (i think)

On the first day of orientation, our great principle T said that we were treated like we are already working for the next 3 years. i believe him then and still do now. i barely find time to rest these days. Rest feels more like a luxury now which is slowly turning into a rare delicacy.

And then when sem break arrives, it feels like a sort of emptiness whereby there is a sudden feeling that i have too much time on my hands (provided free-lancing jobs are not sought). It's like waking up feeling that i have to do some work or my day is unfulfilled. Some graduated seniors know this feeling very well whilst looking for jobs or even when the demands of their jobs are much easier than their study life.

Oh the sadness. On one hand we complain about how busy we are but when there is actually time to take a breather we feel out of place. My sensei told me once that most of the japs feel these way and have no clue on how to spend their hols. They have to hire assistants just to plan on how to spend their breaks. Habitual workaholics. Sadness.

Not sure what is in store for me in the future. Truth be told i have no idea what i'm gonna come out to be. i aim to be a tutor and maybe proceed to be a lecturer. But it might seem a little far fetched for me with my skill level. i'm working hard towards it and lets hope that by the time i graduate in about 1 year+ time i'm up for it. Hopefully, tutorship gives me more freedom and confidence to hone my knives.

Back to some happy time with the workload i have. And my parents and acquaintances wonder why i'm still single...

Learn Respect

Saturday classes.

i wake up each Saturday morning loathing to take a 30 min drive to college for a less than 2 hour class, and then take another 30 min drive home. i find it extremely difficult to make myself get up from bed each time, and with intentions to skip class entirely to catch a few more hours of sleep.

Sadly, i got to play the good student role for a while more since i'm heading down to Singapore in another 2 weeks time during the weekends. Just for those who didn't know, TOA is a damn strict biatch with no exceptions when it comes to attendance. Skip more than 2 times and see you again next sem.

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Ok enough of long-winded unrelated rants. Let's get to the point. As much as i hate having Saturday classes of South-East Asia studies, i learn to tolerate it. i keep telling myself it isn't the lecturer's fault to choose having classes on Saturdays. (Thanx to TOA for over-committing to the enrolment of new students)

Today, half-way through lecture, SB suddenly yelled in mandarin to the back of the class,

"WHO SAID SAU HAI"

and stared with popping angry eyes. (note: lecturer's name is close sounding to that and leave it to students to come up with creative vulgar names for lecturers)

I got a shock and wondered what happened. It was only after class i got to know that some punks at the back of the class had the guts to say out loudly "Sau Hai" (which means skinny cunt in canto) while he was lecturing.

Come on people. Learn respect.

Bad enough today most of the students dozed off, occassionally having SB still humor them with turning off the lights for them to rest. There's only so much a person can take. How much further must they push the boundaries of tolerance before its limit is reached.

You might hate a lecturer for whatever reason, but there is a reason why he/she is the lecturer and not you. Take your dislike elsewhere outside of the class out of the lecturer's scope of sight and sound. You can do your bitching during lunch hours, on the phone, on msn, or even on blogs but please, not within range of the lecturer.

They are human too. You stab they bleed. You think they are happy teaching a bunch of uninterested students like us? They have families to feed too mind you.

Learn your place in the world. Learn respect.

My Girlfriend is the President

My my, interesting what ero games come up with these days.

Moe school girls for president?
Another moe school girl as the Tsar of Russia?
Pope as the Sith?

Yes we can....YES WE CAN!!!!

i'll try not to laugh myself to death xD

This is another reason why the japs are so f**ked up.

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On an unrelated note, i passed up the halloween pic i did in the previous post for one of the imagination pieces of simplified figures. Comments i got from my tutor SS?

"try not to make it so manga style...." ~SS

i don't blame him as my other piece was a futuristic catgirl leaping from buildings...xD

Still, i tried to make it realistic-ish but as another lecturer/tutor LW once said,

"style is hard to change overnight, instead why not improve it further using simplified figure techniques" ~LW

i wish i could but the industry is especially cruel to visuals done using manga style orzlll

The general public has been brainwashed by westerners all these years that they feel much more comfy with the western style. Manga style is seen as low culture instead. How can i blame them? Tom, Dick and Harry these days can churn out [manga/NarutardxSasugay/SnapexHarryxDumbledore] art with little effort. i dare say it is over-saturated.

The irony is i'm beginning to see western cartoons moving towards this style. (e.g Ben 10, PPG, Avatar)

so i'm liek wtf?
screw you biatches ima doing what i like and you're not gonna stop me. i can foresee a bleak future for myself tho....