First Mandarin Lesson...

Right, I'm only here to let you guys know that I just went for my first official Mandarin language class just now...

The lesson begins at 11am and ends at 1pm.

I was actually the first to arrive at the ICLS ( Inter-Cultural Language School ). I think I reached there at around 10.45am.

A few moments later, other students began to arrive.

And finally, at around 11am, our teacher arrived.

She's not as I expected, especially due to the fact that she's actually a Malay.

But despite that, she CAN speak Mandarin fluently. In fact, I think she can speak Mandarin better than Bahasa Melayu!

Well, we learned about Pin Yin consonants, vowels, intonation, and several complimentary words...

Then we moved on to basic phrases concerning introduction, greeting, and asking about names.

Later, we had to do some pair work. I teamed up with a guy named Hafiz Ramli ( He's 20 years old, if I'm not mistaken ). We had to practice with each other using the provided dialogue text. It was, well, kinda fun, I guess...

This is just the beginning of my endeavour to learn Mandarin.

There are still many more lessons to come. And in the meantime, I also have to learn the language from other sources, such as television shows, dramas, movies, et cetera.

But I've yet to actually communicate efficiently in Mandarin. Not yet, anyway... Soon...

I'm only familiar with a few words in Mandarin. I've still got literally hundreds of words to learn!

Well, that's it for now.

May the Force be with you...

Finally, a PlayStation 2!

Well, my father bought a PlayStation 2 yesterday night...

It's a Slimline model , to be specific...

Honestly, I wasn't really expecting him to buy it so soon!

Anyway, I helped to install the PS2. I have to say, I am rather disappointed with the "complementary" games that came with the PS2.

Thank goodness they provided "God Of War"! In my opinion, that's the only awesome game among all the complementary games!

My brother was all smiles. He got to try out "God Of War" on the PS2 first.

Frankly, I was thoroughly impressed with the astonishing graphics and fluid performance.

I mean, I never dreamed of owning that level of graphics on any of my PCs!

As for my brother, like I said in my previous post, it was a dream come true for him!

Take a look for yourself!

Well, Alvyn already scouted around on the Internet, and he came up with this list of awesome PS2 games:

1. Star Wars Episode 3: Revenge Of The Sith - The Video Game.

2. Star Wars The Force Unleashed

3. Star Wars The Clone Wars - Republic Heroes

4. Star Wars Battlefront 2

5. The Matrix Path Of Neo.

Well, that's the list so far...

Oh, he's planning to borrow "Star Wars Episode 3: Revenge Of The Sith - The Video Game" from his dear friend, Hadri this Friday.

It's supposed to be one of the best Star Wars games available for the PlayStation 2, due to its superb animation quality and intuitive gameplay / lightsaber combat system.

Well, I only managed to play the PS2 for like 15 minutes ( while my brother went to get a shower )...

Honestly, I have yet to truly master the skill of balancing on a wooden beam using the analogue stick in "God Of War"!

I think I died around 5-7 times before finally making across the ravine!

Okay, that's it for now...

May the Force be with you...

Year End Break 2010 has begun...

Today's actually the last day of school!

Yay!

The one-and-a-half month long, Year End school break has finally begun!

Well, officially, the Year End Break is supposed to start on the 20th of November, which is actually this Saturday. But school is closed on Tuesday in order to prepare the SPM Examination Hall, whereas there's Hari Raya Aidiladha on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

So technically, the Year End Break has started almost a whole week in advance!

Okay, let me recall about school today...

Ummm, I carried out my Prefect duty at the school gate, as usual. After that, I went upstairs to class...

Basically, I spent most of my time chatting with my friends, particularly Lee King and Sabrina.

I talked to Lee King about the PlayStations 2 and 3, the Nintendo Wii, the Xbox 360, computer graphics, console video games, et cetera. You know, "guy's stuff"...

After that, I read a bit of "Reader's Digest" before chatting with Sabrina. We chatted about all sorts of interesting stuff. My gosh, we talked about so many different topics that I actually forgot about almost all the stuff we talked about! Well, it's good to have someone to chat with when you've got literally nothing much to do...

I chatted with Sabrina until recess, if I'm not mistaken.

During recess, I was the ONLY Prefect who was carrying out "filter food" duty.

The other Prefects who were supposed to be assisting me with "filter food" duty were Kim Yen, Hari, Farhan, Sakthy, and Acap, but the 5 of them were nowhere to be seen. So I was alone...

However, because of that, I got praised by Theeban during the Prefect's Meeting afterwards.

Honestly, I didn't expect Theeban to praise me out of the blue!

But anyway, thanks Theeban! Your praise really motivates me to carry out my responsibilities as a School Prefect better in the future...

Well, that's it about school.

Okay, let's move on to Chess, shall we?

I'm trying to adopt the French Defense into my repertoire of openings for Black.

The French Defense is characterised by the moves 1. e4 e6.

This opening is renowned for its solidity and resilience. The solid defense achieved is stable, extremely difficult to break down, and is not easily compromised. The idea is to create an impregnable defense, particularly concerning the normally vulnerable f7 square, weather the ensuing White assault, and finally counterattack the enemy position.

Yeah, I am aware that I have a reputation of being an aggressive, attacking player.

However, I'm actually becoming more and more interested in the idea of "hypermodern" openings and the fundamentals of defensive and counterattacking gameplay.

For instance, I've started using my once favourite White opening, the Benko Opening ( 1. g3 ), and utilised it to great effect in many of my recent games.

Of course, I won't totally abandon my roots in classical Chess gameplay.

I don't intend on completely ignoring my central, Classical openings, such as the good-old King's Pawn Opening ( 1. e4 ), or the venerable Sicilian Defense ( 1. ...c5 ).

The reason why I'm delving into the concept of defense and counterattack is to merely "broaden my perspective" in Chess. In other words, I can't just stick to only one playing style and cling on to that for the rest of my Chess-playing career, can I?

Point being, my interest in the hypermodern fundamentals serves to ensure that my repertoire of openings remains flexible, as well as improve my performance in all aspects of the game as a whole...

Okay enough about Chess...

Besides that, since my brother achieved 5As in the recent UPSR Examination, he might be receiving a PlayStation 2.

Well, good for him, I guess! It's kind of like his dream to actually own a gaming console!

I'm keeping my fingers crossed ( Because I also want to play that PS2! )

Haha!

Well, that's it for now.

May the Force be with you...

Uneventful Day...

Okay, I'm here...

Yeah, I know, I haven't updated this blog for nearly a week now...

But that's because there really is nothing much to blog about nowadays!

No trips, no interesting stuff, no exciting happenings, nothing!

Well, I'll still try and update whenever possible. I won't just let this blog die.

Andrew Ho is NOT a quitter! [ smiles ]

Anyway, school today was kinda boring. A lot of people went to the badminton tournament at Dewan Adang...

Very few prefects were present at school today. In fact, Hari and I were the only two Prefects who were on duty during the assembly!

And during recess, only Hari, Jas, Hazwan, and I were on duty!

I was unbelievably bored in 4 Epsilon ( 4 Beta was technically abandoned! Except for Iqbal... He slept in there, I think... ).

So, I played Chess with Ashman, Aizat, and Hazwan...

That's basically it actually...

After two games with Hazwan, I went to get my Biology paper from Pn Hamirizan. Then me, Evo, and a few other students listened to Pn Hamirizan's comments and tips regarding the Biology papers, especially Paper 2 ( Subjective and Essay Questions )...

At 1pm, we all went back home...

See? Nothing exciting or interesting, right?

Oh, I forgot to mention that my body was literally "aching" throughout the whole day...

It could be because of the intense and strenuous exercises I had to go through on Tuesday morning. It's "olahraga" training, and it's NOT as easy as it seems!!!

Well, I only went to try out just for the fun of it and see how it's like! I'm not actually intending to qualify for anything!

Oh, and for the Primary Six students who are going to receive their UPSR results soon,

Good luck, you guys! I hope you all get excellent results!

Well, that's it...

May the Force be with you...

An Exhausting Morning...

Okay, truth be told, I'm utterly exhausted!
This morning, my school organised the Form 5 Graduation Ceremony at the Dewan Bukit Jelutong.
We Prefects, as usual, had to carry out our duties to make sure the whole ceremony goes on smoothly...

All of us had our own respective duties to carry out.
I was part of a group of Prefects ( consisting of Aleef, Syazwan, Vivek, Yusof, Aiman, and myself ). We were personally hand-picked by Theeban and tasked to manage the main stage in the Dewan BJ, especially concerning the VIP's seats, amplifiers, et cetera...
We also had to help out with the other Prefect's duties wherever applicable...

Throughout the morning, we just hung around backstage, waiting for the VIPs to finish their speeches, and maybe completing a few miscellaneous tasks in and around the facility...
When the VIPs had cleared the stage and proceeded to the special seats in the audience, the six of us had to remove the speech podium, chairs, tables, and flowers on the stage in order to make space on the stage for the students' performances.

After the traditional dancers' performances were over, I had to help Mukhzin with his amplifier.
Man, it was heavy!
I had to carry it on to the stage and set it up so that Mukhzin could carry out his musical guitar performance.

Soon after, the ceremony was officially over, and the photography session had started.
We had to help Cikgu Azman stack up the chairs in the main audience area.
We also helped to clear the stage, pack up the many bags of graduation gowns, and load the lorry with school property for transport back to school...

Overall, it was a tiring and exhausting morning, but I think we all did a great job!
The Graduation ceremony went on smoothly, and I'm personally proud to have done my part[ smiles ].

Well, that's it for now.

I'm rather tired and I think I'm gonna go and get some R&R...

May the Force be with you...

Final Exam 2010 is Over!

My End-Of-Year Examinations are finally over!
At long last!
2 months of non-stop studying has come to an end!!!

Anyway, in my opinion, the Final Exam wasn't as tormenting or stressing as I originally thought it would be...
Maybe it's because of the harsh experiences I had to go through during the Mid-Year Examination ( which FYI, represents the first time I ever sat for an SPM-standard examination ).
So, I guess I now know exactly what to expect in an SPM-standard examination...
[ sigh ] No more 180-word essays...
No more fully objective History papers...

Yep, it's an SPM-orientated exam style from now on...
[ gulp ]
Now I realise how EASY the UPSR and PMR Examinations really were! [ smiles ]

Okay, enough of my ranting...
Let's cut to the chase, shall we?

Uhhh, let me see, I'm planning to learn how to speak Chinese, particularly Mandarin, maybe around a week from now.
Hey, I mean, Chinese IS my mother-tongue, right?
Anyway, I've got around a month or two ahead of me. Why not use the time to pick up the language that I'm actually supposed to be able to speak?
Well, hopefully, come 2011, I'll finally be able to speak Chinese...

The new Headmistress for my school has finally arrived.

Her name's Datin Aisyah, if I'm not mistaken...
Anyway, this morning, we had an official assembly to welcome her arrival to SMK Bukit Jelutong.
And guess what? When everyone stood up to sing the National Anthem, there was a malfunction regarding the PA system, so the music was barely audible!
Talk about bad first-impressions!

Lastly, I have to follow my family back to my hometown of Malacca at the end of this week, if I'm not mistaken.
So, yeah, I'm just informing you guys about it, that's all...

Alright, that's about it for now...

May the Force be with you...

Family Vacation At Sitiawan, Perak...

Alright, I'm supposed to be studying for my End-Of-Year Exam right now ( which is only like around 1 week away!!! ), but since I just came back from a vacation with my family, my parents were lenient enough to let me blog about it! [ smiles ]
Anyway, my family and I went to Sitiawan, Perak for a 3 day, 2 night stay at the Best Western Marina Island Resort...

Well, honestly, I wouldn't call this particular family trip a "holiday", actually. In my personal opinion, I refer to this trip as a "food vacation", because we spent most of our time there hunting for the "famous" and "recommended" food outlets that my mother and brother researched online!

Right, I really don't have the time to provide you guys with a lengthy explanation about this "food vacation", so I'm afraid I'm going to have to break all off it down into point form. Simple and easy for you and me, no? [ smiles ]
My father and I took a whole lot of pictures during this holiday. 56 pictures, to be exact! This beats the previous record of 40+ pictures! ( the 2010 Prefect's Dinner, if I'm not mistaken )
The pictures were taken using my very own camera handphone ( 3.2 MP ), my father's handphone ( 5.0 MP ), and my family's Fujifilm FinePix A340 Digital Camera ( 4.0 MP ).

Well, let's not waste any time, shall we?
[ Oh, PS: I won't be annotating the pictures below, yeah? There's too many of them, and I need to go upstairs to study my Physics! ]

DAY 1:
1. Depart from Setia Eco-Park.
2. "Bak Kut The" lunch at Chai Chin Restaurant.
3. Arrival at the Best Western Marina Island Resort.
4. Explored the Mariana Jetty Terminal.
5. Hunt for the famous "James Cendol" stall near the Maha Mariamman Temple.
6. Back to hotel. Rested for a while.
7. Dinner at Ah Pek Lee Kou Hock Restaurant.

DAY 2
1. Breakfast at hotel. Lazed around in hotel room for a while.
2. Searched for the Sitiawan Cheong Cia Gong Pian, famous for its "Gong Pian" biscuits.
3. Headed to Yee Si Restaurant, famous for its "siew pao".
4. Headed to the Pasar Awam Kampung Koh to eat some famous "loh mee" for lunch.
5. Went back to hotel. I successfully completed my Additional Mathematics homework!
6. Went to the Lumut Jetty Terminal and Lumut Waterfront.
7. Dinner at the Villa Seafood Restaurant.

DAY 3
1. Breakfast at hotel.
2. Lazed around in hotel room. Checked out at around noon.
3. Lunch at Pun Chun Noodle House, famous for its duck noodles.
4. Arrived back home in Setia Eco-Park.

Well, there you have it.
Yeah, I know. There are SO many pictures!
But oh well. I'm an amateur photographer at heart, and I just LOVE taking pictures with my beloved 3.2 MP handphone camera! [ smiles ]

Okay, I've gotta go and study my Physics now... Bye!
Oh, and wish me luck for my End-Of-Year Examination, kay?

May the Force be with you...