lainformacion.com - Medio Oficial de los Premios Bitacoras 2009
It’s been ages since I last wrote an actual entry for my blog! Shame on me! It’s true that I’ve been damn busy but it’s actually not a valid excuse. My experience here at LPC is unique and I don’t wanna forget it in the future…
From what I remember, the first big thing to talk about is Le Cirque du Soleil. Let me check my planner, that was on… the 16th of November! Well, actually now I’m in front of my planner I see that that same week on Monday I had two important appointments… the first one was the language department meeting, which I attended as the student representative. It was pretty interesting. It was fun to see the positions of teachers, how Hayley looked quite independent, Sophie tried to stay neutral while Linda and Michele (and sometimes Ana) formed a clearly divided group… the rest of the teachers stayed quite quiet (standing fact: Chinese teachers were even looked with commiseration when trying to express some really Chinese concept in their not-that-good English), although Jesus was slightly “attacked” (they were talking about how teachers are getting more and more work –i.e. more classes to teach- and it’s starting to be assumed that instead of X blocks they HAVE to teach X+1… anyway, this year Jesus is teaching two extra blocks (Spanish ab and B) and they see that as a little risky for their future. They also talked about passing questionnaires for student evaluation at some point during the two years. I didn’t do much but thought it was quite interesting and informative. Actually, Sophie asked for my opinion a couple of times… in general it was very good, I felt very welcomed (not as every other student representative, from what they’ve told us). I had to leave earlier coz I had the Spanish activity for the HK Outstanding Students Association International blah blah blah. I didn’t prepare much, so I just got there, wore my regional dress, played some guitar and some songs, showed them the ppt and improvised. They were quite happy with me, I think, and it was fun to get to know some of them, who really stood out when compared with the average HK student.
And yeah… that Wednesday we had Quidam! It was awesome, I ended up speechless and actually I still can’t find the words to express such aesthetical beauty, such elegance, such sense-appealing combination of image and sound… it was definitively the best way to spend the first money I earned from my job as Spanish tutor. In fact, it didn’t start very well coz Ema though the Cristina that signed up for it wasn’t me but the HK first year, so he asked her and since she wasn’t interested, he crossed me out of the list! Luckily I asked Emma about the news on the circus issue some days before the show and they could make it up and buy a ticket for me (same price than theirs… although Emma hasn’t given me my 42 dollars change yet). My seat was separated from theirs but it actually was much better… theirs was in the last row, and mine in the first of our seat category. I got to see the show better than anyone else and I didn’t mind sitting by myself at all. Besides, we bought the CD between 6 or 7 to raffle it and guess who got it. Yeah, I did!! I then burned it for everyone else + Hayley (she asked me if I could do it).
Then we had the Care for Children Carnival for Sound Travels. I had to present it and, since I improvised (coz we thought Simon and I could do it together but then he had to help with the sound) it wasn’t very good but I really didn’t care. Again, I didn’t feel I am the leader of the service, sincerely Simon is doing all the work and I’m just there to… to do what, actually?
Still in the same week, I went to the Jewish Film Festival to work as a helper. I got there late… and still before Howard, the organizer, who actually was really nice. Anyway… the whole thing was quite boring but worth the boredom, since I got four tickets for the movies.
Next week was crazy… everyday I had to go and clean my vial with the flies, because Tendai was basically doing nothing. He only cleaned them once and actually messed everything up, killed half of them and I’m sure didn’t get accurate results. Besides, on Wednesday I had TOEFL. It was alright, although the day didn’t start too well. The fucking test is really expensive (140US) so I didn’t want to risk missing it or being late or whatever. I set the alarm clock to 6:30 to have time to shower, have a nice breakfast and get to the testing center on time. That day, I woke up by myself (thank you, my dear biological clock!) at 7:30 and had to rush to the test center. Luckily I got there on time and finished quite fast. I still haven’t got my final results but the partial ones (a range depending on the essay) were very good. I got lost when coming back but since it was COP day that wasn’t such a problem. That day I had tutor dinner; we went to a Thai restaurant in Sai Kung and then had desserts in Honey Moon. Nice conversation with Sophie and lots of fun with my peers.
On Friday my PGs were out… 45 ;) I was soooo happy. The whole school heard about it quite fast, it’s awful how everything spreads that quickly here at LPC. Anyway… we also had have a hug day, which was pretty good. Had Hug photo competition at break, took loads of funny pics with my friends. At lunchtime on Thurs, I filled in many hugs to send (we were sending horrible –but the only ones we had- badges). I sent them to my friends, roommates, Sophie, Hayley and Wendy. I got one anonymous back from Wendy (she wrote “superstar”, as in the PGs report, so that’s how I found out), really sweet, and then Hayley and Sophie were theirs and both said something. :D
On Fri I went to watch that movie (un año sin amor) which was part of the HK gay and lesbian film festival. The plot wasn’t bad, but some of the scenes were to explicit for my taste. It’s not that I disliked it but it didn’t passionate me. I went with Kiara, Alaa, Xabi, Sera-Leigh, Sasha, Amaranta and Chrys and there we found Julie and Marge (and Sylla… but he kinda avoided us, lol).
By that time I was already coughing quite badly… my “dog cough”. I spent the whole Sat on bed but at night I went to the cinema to watch “walk on water” (Jewish film festival) with Jack. Then we had some cookies and, since we were both broke, came back. It was pretty good to spend some time with her. On Sun I was so dead (sick) that I wasted my two spare tickets coz I literally didn’t feel strong enough to get till Wanchai and come back after one or two movies.
Last week… had a Genetics test (another one in Bio, yes) that was quite a challenge (too much theory to learn) but didn’t go badly coz it was MC and a couple of short questions. The long questions are coming this Wed :S:S. On Wed I got sick leave, since the previous night my cough didn’t let me sleep till 4 or 5. I still went to the college meeting, quite interesting with the working week proposal, but missed the block activity (bowling). Studied a bit for both my Bio and Chem tests and tried to sleep throughout the day. On Thursday I had quite a busy day, after school I had yoga (Hayley joined us), then Chinese Painting and then Condom Packing, to celebrate AIDS day. It was actually quite fun, and we got free condoms from Hayley :P After that, GIF on Bird Flue, quite informative.
More good news arrived… I was nominated for the Alberta UWC scholarship, together with Tasha!! (one more step towards my ideal future ;))
On Sat I finally went to immigration to pick my adult HK ID up… I was scared to death because I was late and they supposingly throw the IDs if you don’t pick them up on time. Luckily it wasn’t the case and I still had time to do some shopping before my Spanish class. The lady gave me 2000 $ as Christmas present and still paid for the lesson! I was stunned… I went there completely broke and went out rich!
As soon as I got back to school I came to my room to pick up my guitar, went to the canteen, took a boxie and got up to the bus, towards Pinehill open day (as part of Sound Travels). It was quite boring. Besides, I was supposed to play guitar but I gave it one try and had to give up, it was horrible. I hadn’t practiced since ages ago and couldn’t even remember an entire song. When I got back, the sweetest thing in ages happened. I was walking towards block 4, trying to get rid of the dizziness caused by the bus trip, and came across Lisa and Attiva. Attiva was walking with her new bike. I stopped and started to play with her. After a while, she grabbed my finger and brought me to her home (Hayley’s flat). She made me take my shoes off at the entrance and started to show me all her toys. She got me to read her books, make a puzzle, see her stickers… and called me je je (big sister in Cantonese) all the time. It was so so so so cute and sweet. When Hayley went out of the room she was puzzled, because Attiva is usually quite scared of students. Then, when we left (coz they were going to the gym), she grabbed my finger again and wanted me to go into the car with her.
On Sunday I studied quite seriously (well, as seriously as I could) for my Spanish oral on Monday. Besides, I finally tidied up my room, which now looks really really nice.
This week has also been a busy one. On Monday, I had my oral. I was actually the first one and I don’t regret it coz I was very nervous. It went OK though, I got to choose a fragment from La Celestina (which I preferred) and then talked for the required time without problems. Jesus told me that it’ll most likely grant me a 7. Then I had to work on my Bio presentation on genetics… the preparation was quite good. Wed was COP day, I slept till late and spent the day writing my Eng commentary (the one for unis), which took me a long time but ended up being quite good. Let’s see what Hayley thinks. That same night, while I was trying to get started with my Alberta UWC scholarship application, Mopati came by the room. We ended up both lying on bed, side by side… it was nice and uncomfortable at the same time. I still feel quite ambivalent about him, sometimes I just want to make up with him and have someone to hug and feel loved by and some other times I feel I don’t really love him and starting something wouldn’t be emotionally good for me… I talked to Bego about it, she said whatever happens will be alright coz basically I’d always wonder “what if I hadn’t done that?”. Oh well… we’ll see!
On Thurs… I overslept and missed both Bio (including presentation) and Math!!! I was afraid Wendy would be mad at me but she was awesomely nice! Then I started talking to her, asked her if she was feeling bad (coz she looked terribly sick) and she confessed me that in the whole week she had only got 8 hours of sleep altogether. Ppl in blks 1 and 2 are very noisy at night, she can’t sleep, this is affecting her relationship with Brian and her health, a lot of students are being caught interdorming when she tries to shut them up… she was really angry and depressed and even told me that she’s doubting if she’s going to sign her contract or not. That same day the issue was brought up in the house meetings and discussed afterwards in student meetings. Everyone behaved quite reasonably but I doubt it’s gonna last for long. Such a pity. In block 2, Wendy collapsed and ended up crying and, of course, everyone was very impressed. She cancelled the block after breakfast of Fri and told me it was the first time she got enough sleep in ages. That morning, from 8:30 till 10:15 Tasha and I had “interview” with a guy from Alberta university. The day before I got to finish my application, Sophie went over my essay (which is crappy but, I’m sorry, I’ve written too many already and simply don’t find a motivation any more), both Hayley and Wendy handed in my references, I translated my transcripts from my old schools and got Jesus to sign them as accurate… done with that, at least! We didn’t have football so I went out at 3 willing to start (and finish) with my Christmas shopping. I went to MK, first of all paid for Morgan’s deposit at his hotel, then went into an electronics shop and got myself a really good camera (mobile phone size, cool design, good quality and prize, nice features – pics, video, voice recording, MP3 player, 512 MB memory card, DVD quality movies showing…). Then, went to the Ladies Market and tried to get something for everyone. Quite disappointed with Vio’s stuff, couldn’t get her bag, couldn’t get her trainers… she’ll be mad at me for sure! I hope it’s not that bad in the end, I’ll buy her something nice back home. Then, I went to the Night Market and finished with all the stuff (really didn’t feel like going back, I was exhausted!). I even got to speak some Cantonese while bargaining. From there, I head Central, where I joint some more latinos. We went to Taco Loco (Mexican restaurant in SoHo) and waited for Stefani to get Marimer there (it’s her b’day on Sun). We had quite a nice dinner and then went for some beers to a 7/11 and stopped in the middle of some stairs to drink them, sing and dance (latino mood). We got back at 1, on the way we scared hundreds of locals by singing and dancing really loudly on the KCR. I tried to tidy up a bit and then went to sleep.
This morning I got up quite late, did my laundry and tidied up the room. I tried to do something productive but didn’t feel inspired at all. Luckily we had South Asian CE. The food was quite OK, my outfit was nice (I wore my real Indian sari). I got a bit disappointed trying to use my camera (which is not as wonderful as I thought but still takes nice videos). The show was pretty good and funny, loved the teachers’ participation and also the plot. Before that, I worked a bit on my EE, which looks more and more horrible to me as time passes. Still, I haven’t finished my second draft (the final one is supposed to be due next Friday). So, tomorrow, I have lesson in the morning, I’ll hopefully be back by lunchtime and then I’ll have to work on my Princeton application, my Bio, my Chem lab and my EE. Sad perspective. Besides, there’s European CE meeting after check-in. We had the first one last week. It’s gonna be crazy (and probably crappy), we’re far too many ppl (about 60). Anyway… it’s 1 now, my period’s just came and I have to wake up early tomorrow so I better go to sleep. Cheers!