★January Induction Programme

School in RJ started on the 14th of January for those who were from the RP. We all had to report to JC in our secondary school uniforms and majority of the talks during this programme were gender-separated. Most talks were about subject or school life introductions. There were also workshops you could sign up for but most of them had limited placing and I didn’t make it into many of them. Boo.

The workshops I made it in for were: Art appreciation and Cinema 4D. I also went for the China Studies talk for fun and ended up taking notes for Gracia who was interested in the subject but couldn’t make it to the talk.

I had received a red notebook with blank pages from my mom at the start of the year and I spent much of JIP doodling inside it. Here’re some photos of what I drew: (I’m too lazy to scan)

STILL LIFE

reflective surface- irritating

HANDS

OTHERS

yum, short hair

The Art placement test was on Wednesday, 20/1. I was so nervous! I wanted to get in so badly. I couldn’t pay attention during Math in LT1.

For the test, we were given 4 tasks to complete within 2 hours

1) Draw your hand, in any position.

2) Draw the still life setup in front of you. It consisted of 1 wine bottle, 1 wine glass, 1 masking tape and a crushed can

3) Draw anything you want with the theme “Time”. I drew a girl stuck inside an hour glass, about to drown as water poured down on her while she was chained to a huge clock with commitments written on it. Typical stuff.

4) Analyse and write about the artpiece that you are given. This was the artwork that I got:

WTF? Hahaha what do I write about that?

Anyway in the end I got into H2 Art so it’s alright (:

I WILL WORK HARD

There was Cinema 4D after the art test. Grace and I met Clarissa and we went to the computer lab. It was fun making 3D objects. The textures really help to make them look really darn real! I’m amazed.

Art appreciation on Thursday (21/1) was fun; I met Sarahong for lunch at MOS burger before we walked there. Unfortunately I felt sick throughout the workshop, sneezing and coughing. I ended up with a fever in the end and couldn’t go to school on Friday.

There wasn’t anything much on the next week save for SNAPP (some talk about relationships) so I spent the rest of the time playing downloaded games on a DS emulator. I played Cooking Mama, Pokemon, Zelda and this retarded BRATZ game that made me feel really girly and awesome. The Bratz game was the only one I completed. Hahaha.

★Over the Holidays

I got lazy to post, then I stopped.

Here’s what happened in between

Late November-Early Jan:

I got hooked on Maplestory. It was my brother and his girl-friend’s fault, they were playing so my little brother and I wanted to join them. We all made pirate accounts. It was fun, 4 pirates running around together. Then both of them stopped playing and it was just me and my little brother left.

We made Aran characters and trained together for a while before we went for our overseas holiday on 16 December. It was a tour package thing and Chan Brothers said we’d go to Germany/Switzerland/France. I daresay the Germany was a lie! We only went to the Black Forest for a few hours before crossing the Swiss border. Grr.

The plane ride was very long, about 12+ hours. I had my ***** then right on that day and oh god it was so unbearable. THERE WAS LEAKAGE. and I spent very long in the airplane toilet cleaning my jeans >_> !#@$% I, on that day, learnt a lot about airplane toilets however. They are very well equipped! They even have toothbrush sets! I also stole like almost their entire pad and paper bag supply :9

It was winter when we were arrived and I got to see falling snow on the very first day!! It feels so different from what you see on TV or in photographs. It’s so magical. Snowflakes are so beautiful. Every one of them looks so intricate and delicate. It was also very cold as a result and I wore like 5 layers of clothing: Long johns inside, T-shirt, vest, sweater, then my coat. Under my jeans I also had to wear tights. Seriously not a good thing when photographed. lol.

In Switzerland we visited cities like Lucerne and Geneva. There was one night we had a fondue dinner here at Interlaken and it was SO GOOD. SO SO SO GOOD. Melted cheese and chocolate- orgasmic. We also went to mountainous areas like a town in Zmutt valley where there was a good view of the Matterhorn. Lots of people were there skiing but I didn’t get the chance to… not like I wanted to ski though. In the evening I took a walk there with my dad around the paths which led into the mountains and the view was so gorgeous. I can never ever forget it. I took a video of it but I’m too lazy to upload it right now. :D

We also went to the top of a mountain (Titlis) via two cable cars and it was so darned cold up there. We bought ice cream and eating it out there in the extreme cold was awesome. My elder brother met two friendly Swiss guys who let him use their snowboard. Most people go there to ski, too. My little brother got a watch from the Swatch shop up there, the design was based on the Swiss flag so we knew we couldn’t get it in Singapore.

The shopping wasn’t exactly very awesome because you know, European countries, super expensive.. We went to visit a Christmas fair which had tons of food on sale from various parts of the world. I had this huuuge German sausage with mustard and ketchup for dinner. Yum.

At Geneva we passed by and stopped near the UN Building and the Red Cross HQ. The UN HQ had many many country flags lining the gates. It was so grand! We also stopped at the huge three-legged chair (The Broken Chair) sculpture outside the UN building.

We spent a couple of days in various parts of Switzerland before heading to Paris on a coach where we spent 2 nights. There we first took a night cruise along the river that went through Paris and boy is this city gorgeous. We passed by the Louvre and the Eiffel tower amongst other things. The tour agency then arranged a CHINESE dinner for us which I did not really approve of even though the food tasted good. I don’t get it, why are we in FRANCE to eat CHINESE food??

The next day we had like Thai food or something. It tasted wonderful but I still don’t get it. That day we went to see the Versailles palace. Having learnt about the place in History and about its last occupants, it was truly a wonderful experience. There were so many paintings inside the place, each one truly a masterpiece. So detailed. So perfect. Ahhh ♥ The whole place was also very lavishly decorated. Perfect place for a lolita photoshoot!

We didn’t get much time inside the palace unfortunately (Makes me regret tour packages) and in the evening we were dropped off at this huge French department store called Galleries Lafayette to buy souvenirs. It was near Christmastime so the decorations were extremely beautiful. It was free and easy time from then on so we took a subway to visit the Notre Dame cathedral and my god is it grand inside at night. It was like a scene in Diablo II, but in real life, almost as if hellish monsters could pop up any time. Sooo awesome.

Then we walked around and tried to find the Louvre. We didn’t have time to go inside (I could cry!) but at least we could go to the building and I could stare wistfully into the windows and wish I were inside. I will be back!!!

Then we took the subway home and it was rather scary because it was so late at night and our tour guide had told us many horror stories about pickpocketing. I was so paranoid i held my bag inside my coat, looking like a ginormous person- larger than I already am at least.

The plane ride home was very long as usual. I watched 5 movies- About a Boy (It’s funny) , Being John Malkovich (It’s so weird it’s awesome), Kamome Diner (Japanese movie set in Norway, it’s super sweet), Juno (lol) and Coco before Chanel (movie about Chanel’s founder) and 3 TV shows- two episodes of The Big Bang Theory and one documentary about how products are made. I didn’t sleep on the plane at all and we touched down just in time for Christmas~

So back in Singapore, I continued my Maplestory addiction, training and questing with my little brother everyday. I also went out to buy acash so I could buy nice equipment for my character. Orz.

This went on until I received my horrible HCL O level results. It was so terrible it caused me to break down in the KFC at plaza sing in front of Muni. She was very nice about it however <3. Then when I went home I deleted all my computer games.

So this was my holiday.

★11-18 Nov- Arts Fest & Shopping

I’ve been too busy having fun to post !
11 Nov Wed- HCL O levels were over but we still had to go back to school to prepare for arts fest and to clean up the classroom. About half the class did not turn up, which left us rather short-handed during class cleaning. The low attendance rate was rather disappointing actually; Last Friday most people mentioned that they liked the class and will miss it etc. but then they chose not to go to school just because there wasn’t anything interesting going on, which makes it rather hypocritical.

Poupee- The party event was awesome! There were donuts and a wine glass was on sale, my poupee above’s wearing the retro party set accompanied by the wine glass.

12 Nov Thu- Arts fest day 1! All students were told to dress up for something artsy for the occasion, so I turned up in a beret, t-shirt, shorts, black thigh-highs with rainbow legwarmers and carried a sketchbook. Crazy art student! O:

Everyone gathered at the parade square first where there were opening speeches and performances by the sec one batch and cheerleaders. The mass dance by the sec ones was rather cute and those by the cheerleaders were awesome.

After the opening ceremony we headed to the hall where there was a “surprise performance” which turned out to be a teacher’s band. I can’t really remember the songs that were performed but I remember there was “You belong with me” by Taylor Swift…yeah.

After that was a jazz performance by R(I)JC’s jazz band. There was a mini-skit in between each performance that made the entire thing seem like a story. They introduced various forms of jazz and it was rather educational, except that I can’t remember much now.

My experience in the hall was hampered, unfortunately, by a couple of people beside me who just couldn’t shut up. Even when the band was playing, they continued talking loudly about things that weren’t related to what was happening in the hall. So annoying.

When the two items were over we were given some free time. Gracia and I went to check out the sec 2 ACP booths at their classrooms and ate their free food :D We were rather late however and some classes had already run out or had limited food left. We also walked about the school and checked out some of the exhibitions, like the art one in the KS Chee or the literary one at the pavilion.

At about 12.30pm I met Clarissa and Muni outside the library and we took 190 all the way to Chinatown :) I needed to get buttons for a coat because one of its original buttons was lost. Halfway Clarissa had to go, she was feeling rather sick and Muni and I went to Macdonald’s. We both got extra value meals for the monopoly thing (my first time!) and we each got a free food item each! She got a snack wrap and I got apple pie <3 I have yet to claim it.

13 Nov Fri- Day two of Arts Fest! I wore my class T-shirt with school culottes because it was the last official day of school, I wanted to wear something at least school uniform-related.

It was raining so the school could not have morning assembly at the amphitheatre as hoped. Everyone went to the hall instead and there were dance performances by some Malaysian students here on an exchange trip as well as a jazz performance by some visiting music teachers from a school in Australia.

Later there was yet another jazz performance by Rani Singam, who was an alumnus of the school. One of the songs that she performed was “Time after time” and it made me so happy~

We then were given some time to prepare for our sec 4 busking item. 413 was situated at the mini-amphi which was really, one of the worst spots. It was tucked away in a corner and barely anyone would come by if we did not solicit people. The band performance by my classmates were great though~

Muni and I took 132 together and she kinda overshot her stop so she came over to my place for a while. We watched skits by Japanese comedians on youtube until I had to go for RGS nite. It was at the UCC in NUS which was really darn far so I had to leave earlier.

Met TG at AMK and headed to Clementi station from there. Hanged out at the shopping centre nearby for a while for dinner and then took 96 there from the interchange. 96 took ages to arrive and by then there was a long queue comprising mostly of Rafflesians. It was rather funny, the bus was packed with people talking about GPAs.

The UCC was rather grand, the concert hall was able block out my handphone’s signal while I was inside. The programme booklet was glossy and the image I drew for the banner was on the cover. Inside, the layout also used some of the elements from the main image, like the background. Pretty cool.

The concert began with a series of performances by the various performing arts CCAs in school. Most items were performed by a mix of CCAs. There were also two guest singers. I’m being unspecific because I’m too lazy to fetch my programme booklet from the display cupboard in the living room (my mum put it there).

After the intermission was the musical. It was about 5 girlfriends’ lives as they reunited in Singapore after a few years of being separated and taking different paths, most having left the country. I quite enjoyed it although I wish my seat wasn’t so far back (second last row). I would have liked to see the performers up close.

The whole thing ended rather late at 10+pm but my dad agreed to fetch me back. Phew.

14 Nov Sat- After having seen the array of prom-able dresses that were sold in the shops in People’s Park Complex at Chinatown on 12th Nov, I convinced my mum to go down to Chinatown with me to search for a dress to wear for our Farewell Alma Mater (FAM)

The first shop we went to already had a nice selection and they had larger sizes for people like me too x: I tried on a few and spent quite a long time there and finally decided on one that we would keep in mind before checking out the other shops, since that was only the first shop we went to. The shopowner was a very nice lady and I really appreciated the help that she offered so readily. She didn’t appear angry when we decided not to buy anything just yet after I tried on more than 5 dresses either.

Little did I know however that whatever I saw or tried from the other shops I would compare to that dress from the first shop. So… we went back and bought it. :D In between my mum bought a pair of pinstriped pants for herself to wear to work. lol.

We also went to People’s Park Centre where there was a large shop called CK Departmental Store or something. I got 3 pretty T-shirts and a pair of jeans there. They were all quite cheap! The T-shirts especially, each was about $5 to $6.50 and naturally I only pick shirts with pretty designs on them. XD

They also had underwear for $1.90. It’s super comfortable! I love it! Totally gonna buy more hurr.

Poupee: Limiteds were released! Balloons for the ribbon section and party-poppers for the jewel section. I got the balloons and one party-popper, it spews hearts and streamers lol.

15 Nov Sun- I went to church today, first time in quite a long while. I attended the adult service with my parents. There was a sermon in which the pastor mentioned how our credentials could become liabilities in the eyes of the Lord because many of us put the surface-level, earthly things in priority, like in how people stop attending church because of their studies. I felt bad I:

After church, dad drove us to Turf City to look around. I hadn’t been there in a long while so it certainly brought back some memories. We went to the Giant there to buy stuff, my parents bought a standing fan and I managed to convince my mum to buy a lot of snacks P: There were two tubes of pringles in weird flavours- shrimp and soft-shelled crab. Both taste nice but I like the shrimp ones more! The crisps are pink in colour.

16 Nov Mon- My mum took half-day leave and she went to Suntec city mall with my little brother and I in search of a treadmill since there was an AIBI outlet there. She also had free movie tickets for a theatre there so it was a on-the-way kind of thing.

We met at AMK hub and had lunch at Macs. We got a long row of monopoly game tabs but there was no free food item! Instead we got two $10 off for every $50 purchase at Toys r us instead. geh. It could be useful to buy presents for Starlene with though. (That’s my baby cousin, her name is quite unique. A search on FB with her name yields 619 results)

We then took a MRT to City Hall and got our treadmill. While browsing through the treadmills rickroll played once on the radio. After getting the invoice for it we went to Eng Wah cinema to watch 2012. 2012 was like the typical disaster movie- mass damage, suspenseful, lots of CGI and of course, the protagonist’s family will survive and no kids will die.

After the movie we went to Bakerzin and got $1 macarons! I got two, Chocolate and Rose. I think chocolate tasted better, rose was a bit too sugary-sweet.

17 Nov Tues- I ordered some items on taobao through an agent, who sent me an email saying that my stuff had arrived a few days ago. We arranged to meet at Raffles place at 1.30pm to collect the items.

I went to Raffles place earlier to hang out and have lunch with TG but he woke up late so I walked around the area by myself first. Being at raffles centre square reminded me of how much I would love to work there.

We had lunch at some Japanese place. I had teriyaki salmon and he had oyako don. I think it’s rather morbid actually, oyako don. Putting chicken and egg together and calling it Parent-and-child don. Eek.

Collected the items at Outram Park instead as the agent had to meet someone else there earlier and I was early as well. He handed me two big packages and one small one, I had ordered from three stores. One contained sneakers of various colours, one contained bags and purses and the small one contained stockings (: I went home a happy person.

I dumped the items in my brother’s room first because he had the air con on. There I unwrapped and took out all of my loot. I spent the next hour or so tying the shoelaces on all my sneakers- there were 8 shoes in total and another pair for my brother.

Pic of the loot (:

US flag high topped shoes <3

Heart purse! <33

18 Nov Wed- One day before FAM, all sec 4s had to report to school at 9am in the morning to collect our Options report and testimonials. I ended up coming to school at 9.30am ): I hadn’t expected that 132 would take so long to come or that the traffic would be so bad.

I got 4/4 for all three of my Options modules but my testimonial had my name spelled wrong… It’s not the first time I had my name spelled as “Jazyln” and I don’t get it. Which one looks like it makes more sense, “Jazlyn” or “Jazyln”?

Anyway because of this I have to collect the corrected testimonial in school next week. I have to go all the way to school, located 1 hour away, just to get a slip of paper that wasn’t even my fault to begin with. ): I guess I could conveniently go to Orchard from there but I’m broke.

After that Clarice, Clarissa, Muni and I arranged to go for karaoke! Whooo! We could leave at about 10+am but the karaoke room was booked for 1.30pm.Clarissa had piano lesson and Muni had drama practice in between however so I hanged out with Clarice till then. We had lunch at Tori-Q in paragon- one stick of chicken and rice. So economical :P I wondered why the rice cost so much however but it turns out they add seaweed and pickle toppings.

Met muni at cuppage plaza, which was where the karaoke studio was located. We went in first and well the room we got was smaller than usual, strangely enough. Clarissa joined later and we spent a total of 5 hours inside. Hooray for free extensions! Karaoke is mighty addictive.

★06-10 Nov Farewell Assemby and HCL Os

6th November was the last “official” day of school where everyone gathered at the amphitheatre forthe  Sec4 farewell assembly. The sec 4s first had to gather in the KS Chee and march in to our seats while the instrumental of Viva la Vida played in the background. It was rather grand.

The assembly was mostly about handing over and passing of gifts to the form teachers and CLE teachers of each class while they passed our graduation booklets and rings to us.

After that everyone went back to their class for class party. My class, for once in a long while, brought tons of food. I think the highlights for me were Clarissa’s salsa and Angie’s mini-potatoes. Ahaha, they taste so good!!

During the class party we also had a small reflecting session. Everybody sat together and everyone had the chance to say what she thought after having spent 2 years with everybody as a class. The general consensus was that although we were a very quiet class with little presence, the silence was in the end what we got used to and grew to like.

After everything was over I stayed back in the library to study for Chinese until 6pm.

I can’t believe I’ve just sat through my own farewell assembly. For the past three years it’d been for my seniors, who had always felt infinitely older than me at that moment. That day, however, it was my turn to grow up. These four years had felt arduously long and yet also amazingly short.

Anyway, here are some of my old blogs in which my time spent these 4 years in school have been documented electronically:

First half of sec one: Jazzo’s everyday life Observe how annoying my typing was. Good lord if I met a sec one like that now I would want to smack her.

Second half of sec one and most of sec two: OMG it’s jazzo’s blog In which I grew up a little. There are some art pieces inside.

Sec three:  &That’s what she said Most of the posts are doll pictures or rantings. I still use my livejournal account to participate in communities.

and the current one, this one. Full of poupee pictures. Observe how my first three blogs all have graphics that were done by me (except I just drew over the picture for the first one, that’s pretty stupid) and yet this one doesn’t have one yet. I’m so lazy now, haha.

7 November,

8 November,

and 9 November

were days spent studying for Chinese O levels. Long, Chinese-filled days.

10 November was the day of reckoning.

I got to school some time before the paper began, entry proof, NRIC card and stack of chinese notes in tow. The first few classes got to take their HMT O level paper in the hall but there wasn’t enough space so the other later classes, mine included, had to take the paper in the classrooms.

Paper 1 wasn’t so bad, I did the gong han (formal letter-writing) and newspaper report reflection questions. The gong han was about teenagers and computer addiction in general whereas the news one was about Family Day Out where families were encouraged to go out for outings and were given free tickets to various attractions.

Paper 2… I’m not too sure how I will fair. On one hand it was definitely easier than the prelim paper I had in school (In which I got C5, eep) but on the other I am not sure if my answers eill be correct either. There were quite a number of personal response questions. I guess the only thing I can do is wait for the results and see.

There were a couple of rather annoying things that happened during the two papers, however. First, there was NOISE. There’s a construction site near school where a condo is being torn down in order to make a higher-rise tiny living space which people will snap up for millions of dollars and they continued their work during the paper. Another was that the examiners kept walking about and it was distracting, especially when two teachers stood in front of my desk and whispered to one another for quite some time about who knows what. What on earth? It was really difficult to pay attention to my paper.

After the paper was over.. it was PARTY TIME! First I went up to class to collect class photos, then Clarissa, Sarahong and I went to plaza sing. We went to Daiso where I bought two doll-sized yukatas for Kayla and a pink lacy door knob cover for my brother because his door knob stinks. We also checked out the scrapbooking shop to marvel at the beautiful scrapbooking materials and its exorbitant prices.

We lunched at KFC and then headed out to the streets for Bras Basah Complex. On the way we passed by the Singapore Art Museum and encounted two GB seniors who had been sec 4 when we were sec 1. Time really flies.

At BBC (hur) Clarissa went to Popular to grab stuff for her sister and Chinese tuition teacher (personally I’m not very close to mine) and then on the way there was this art shop that had a bargain area outside. It sold laminated signs for a dollar each and I bought two: Beware of Dog to stick outside my brother’s door and Private- Keep Out for my own.

We then went to SAM, where entry was free for us since our school was listed. There was a Mexican and Southeast Asian art exhibition which we checked out. It was worth the time spent.

★01-05 Nov Ending

Instead of studying for Higher chinese Os which is about a day from now, I am writing this up! To be honest I still don’t feel prepared for the two test papers at all but I doubt there is anything I can do to increase 我的华文程度 anymore.

1 Nov Today was the last session for my Chinese tuition, after two years of having to go down every Sunday afternoon. Endings always feel so awkward.

Today I also sent an email to a taobao shopping agent to order some items from various taobao shops. I’m buying stuff from 3 types: one sells stockings, one sells shoes and the other sells bags/wallets. The total cost of everything so far is more than $100 but I did order a lot of items! <: I expect shipping to be a bitch, however. How I envy people living in China for their cheap 国内 shipping!

2 Nov I stopped taking the school bus to school, so my dad drove me there. I got to wake up one hour later than before! There was a talk about Higher Chinese in JC held and after that I had to go for a  Critical Thinking test. The test was meant for random selected individuals and well, I got to be the lucky one.

Turns out Sarong was selected too and after the test we had lunch at Subway. I suggested walking to Orchard since I hadn’t done that in a long while and the sky seemed cloudy and perfect for walking. It rained heavily while we were making our way there however. #@$#% We had umbrellas but it was storming so everything was wet anyway. Sarong took her shoes and socks off in subway, it was a little gross xD

After that we walked around Far East and ION, then she went home and I went back to school since my father was going to fetch me back too. I actually arranged for him to fetch me so that I would only go home at 6pm, spending the rest of the time studying in school (Although it didn’t quite work out that way, eh)

3 Nov There was a RJ matriculation talk, telling us about the various subjects and the options and paths that we could choose. Honestly I still am not 100% sure of what I would like to study in JC, I only know that I want to take Art and well, Math (since it’s compulsory) I wanted to take Econs at first but after some warnings I’m having second thoughts. However I feel that I shouldn’t let those warnings influence my decision. I should just take whatever I want to take and stick through it! (but what I really want to take is what polytechnics offer)

4 Nov Last session of Chinese. Laoshi bought lots of chocolate snacks from us and it made me feel really bad. My Chinese class is rather, well, silent and some people blatantly sleep through it. He doesn’t even get mad when people sleep, he just asks if they’ve been up late doing homework (obviously not sometimes)

There was another talk after Chinese and this time it was regarding Arts Fest. Arts Fest is being pushed into our faces, I swear. It’s Arts Fest this, Arts Fest that and amongst a lot of students it’s starting to give off a negative vibe. It’ll be an awesome two days but I think I’m rather sick of hearing its name being repeated every single day for now. I look forward to RGS Nite but I really don’t want to hear it being mentioned all the time prior to that, especially when it’s spelt “Nite”.  Might as well make it “Nyte”, haha.

Lots of people are working hard for Arts Fest and it’s really obvious, seeing from how the people involved in it in my class are always not around or from the artists bent over the huuuuuuge pieces of work draped over the canteen floor.

5 Nov Infocomm farewell was today. There was pizza. 10 boxes of them, thanks to a misunderstanding amongst the lovely juniors. 10 boxes, however, appeared to be just nice as everything was polished within minutes and the boxes were then later stacked up to form a leaning tower of pizza. Later the tower became the setting for a Romeo and Juliet act and Romeo (Pepsi bottle) and Juliet (Coke bottle) were then thrown in the trash after some frantic photo-taking.

I hadn’t been appearing for sessions this year due to service learning clashes and H1N1, so I hadn’t seen much of the people in the club. Most of the juniors got along very well (could even be too well) and it made me a little envious. I mean, I know some of us in the sec 4 batch pretty well but there are very few who are regulars (heck I’m not actually a regular, considering) and there was only one person in the batch that was a year our senior. Which makes me wonder, if I were born a year later/earlier and was part of a different batch, a different group of people, would I be very different?

Anyway there were a bunch of games played and they were fun. It made me forget about the pile of Chinese worksheets I left on my desk. Infocomm used to be pretty dead but now it is lively and has lots of members. Next year, they will be the ones setting up the booth for CCA orientation. They will draw the stickers. I hope they turn out well.