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I don't really know how to attach a descriptor to this week. Some parts have just felt like a dream altogether, and some dreams have felt too real. Everything seems so surreal, and yet some things feel more tangible than they ever have. How do you describe what it's like to feel so alive that you get disorientated? How about the reason why the sun seems to shine brighter, the birds seem to sing better, and food doesn't even taste the same? What about the reasons why you can't sleep at night, despite how absurdly tired you are? Or why when you do get to sleep, you aren't even left alone then?

Yeah, it's been quite a week.

School's been strangely alright, despite what I tell people normally. Maybe it's the fact that the Uni internet is sucking so badly at the moment that I can't even play WoW or Dota without lagging badly enough to put me off it. I'm really going to need an answer to this one. Anyway, as a result (and also a mix of other factors), I've been managing to read up more from the textbooks and revise more regularly than I'm used to. The result? I actually seem to have some idea of the things they talk about in lectures now... Incredible! Could it be that... Reading up beforehand works!?

But honestly, not being able to play WoW (especially for the raids, where I'm actually needed) properly is not a good thing at all. I've tried a host of solutions, mostly to no avail. Lowerping (WoW tunneling), routing through a virtual machine, you name it. The conclusion is that NUS internet just EPIC FAILS. This leaves me with either: having to go to a LAN shop somewhere to raid (terrible, hate the idea, can't be bothered, my addons aren't there, my UI isn't done, my mouse/ settings/ keybinds aren't there, I have no idea where the nearest LAN shop is, how will I get back when raids end at 1am and still wake up for school?), OR, the alternative: Get 3.5G WiFi (Mobile wireless internet connection), for the low price of $40 a month. Huzzah. You can either die, pay 3 times the price I'm paying now just to play WoW, or quit. Spoilt for choice. 

Angsty rant inc. 

Ok, Hokkien classes are officially FAIL too. I honestly don't know what I was expecting when I signed up for them, but seriously I shouldn't have expected better than this. Hokkien is Chinese dialect, an alternative commonly spoken by the older generation of Chinese Singaporeans in preference to Mandarin, the common ethnic language now (apart from English). The dialect is coarse. It was made to be coarse, and always will be. Now, guess what happens when the lazy Hokkien teacher (who, by the way, is getting paid loads per lesson we take) decides to use her Mandarin notes to teach us Hokkien. Alright fine, since Hokkien is a spin-off of Mandarin, I gave her a chance. Guess what we ended up with? She doesn't have any teaching style whatsoever, other than to go through lists of words, telling us how they're said in Hokkien. Oh yes, and of course, repeating it back to her as a class. I love how helpful that is for us to communicate with patients in the wards in future (the entire point of this exercise). She then proceeds to go through politically correctly formed phrases and sentences (made for Mandarin students), and do a literal, direct translation to Hokkien. The result? Some extremely oddly formed, overly long and convoluted sentences in Pretty Damn Advanced Hokkien, and in formal narrative, completely inappropriate. Take for example this sentence in Mandarin (translated, of course): "Don't worry, there shouldn't be a problem. But you will be required to take further medical check-ups and examinations." The spoken Hokkien equivalent? "Nah, it's cool. But cya later." Oh, and did I mention the irritating habit of this old lady teacher of not pronouncing her words? She has this annoying tendency of rolling words off her tongue, such that the letters and pronounciation at the periphery, especially the first and last letters, are so muffled as to be indecipherable, except perhaps by lipreading. Given, perhaps the first and last letters aren't relevant in Hokkien (what kind of messed up language...), but still. You have no idea how irritating it is when she seems to keep changing the way a word is pronounced. Wondering if I should have bothered. 

Excuse the rant, but I had to get that out. 

Hmm, it's actually been quite a while since I spent my school weekends out and about and without express reason to, instead of in my room doing various things, including slacking/ gaming/ notstudying. But it was great fun... Really enjoyed myself, more than I have for a while. I forsee big lifestyle changes incoming.

Good night.