~The Road Less Taken~

Sunday, September 7, 2008

ok mckk reflection time, as promised, although slightly later than originally planned.

it's hard to reflect when you also need to study for eoys.

and mr teo, if you're reading this by any chance, you can consider this set of posts a reflection. ^^

saturday, 23/8:

we left for mckk, with our two hastily done cultural posters in hand. since singapore didn't really have a dominant national culture (if we did decide to say it we might just get blasted for posting hurtful remarks about singapore's multiracial society) we figured it would be best to talk about things such as singapore's scenery, or if we wanted to talk about the races at all, all 4 at the same time.

resulting in 2 posters, lots of paper, even more colours, and few words.

but other than our fretting over our cultural exhibit and, at that point, a non-existent cultural performance, everything was going very smoothly indeed.

so after a pretty uneventful first morning (and spending half of the travelling time from penang airport to mckk talking to abhi about rafflesian spotlight stuff - hope you haven't forgotten what we said, abhi) we eventually reached the college at around noon.

the first thing which struck me was the location of the college. it seemed to be located just away from the centre of a sleepy little town called kuala kangsar, a departure from singapore's hustle and bustle, but it gave the place a feel of serenity and peace, which of course was soothing to the 4 minds so well drilled in singapore's stressful and always-on-the-go way of life and school.

the next thing was of course the size of the campus. i believe it's about 2 times the size of ri's campus, although a good chunk of it seems to be boarding. still it was pretty huge, and the school tour on monday would certainly verify that.

but the main question on my mind was where we were going to stay. not surprising, since the basketballers had gone on at length about the living conditions of the dormitories, and their stories, while colourful, left a few niggling doubts in my mind.

haha but all those were dispelled once we entered our living quarters.

our apartment was sparsely furnished, yes, but better than the scene i had imagined given the b-ballers' words of encouragement. anyway it was a good experience, since my parents had always talked about how living conditions were bad in their time and how they needed to strive to get to where we are now - i think i fairly took a few steps back in going through what they experienced.

for one there were squatting toilets only (which resulted in an indescribable feeling every time i stood up again. i believe my legs became slightly stronger after this trip. =D) and there was no shower head in the bathroom - just good old-fashioned buckets of cold water. refreshing indeed.

still, i'm not complaining. anyway i take colder baths than the rest of my family so it's not too much of a change.

and to ryan, elias and weekuang, thanks for your words of wisdom, but i'm afraid they weren't too useful this time around. xD

there was one other thing we hadn't yet experienced about this apartment - but we soon did.

august is the time where rain cascades down on malaysia/singapore like ri teachers dumping homework on students. it just keeps coming every day.

and so it did, big time in kuala kangsar. and halfway through this rainstorm (and i swear this has nothing to do with my being in hullett) we experienced a blackout.

so basically we were shrouded in darkness for about half an hour (before we went out for dinner) but the other half of the school was still lit, because the palace is on that side of the town and so naturally they don't have as many blackouts (read: better power line) over there.

haha but it was rather fun using candles in the apartment to get around. reminds me of my old flat in bedok reservoir where we used the same candles when it went dark.

but luckily enough the power came back after we returned from dinner (treated by mr fairuz at the rest house in kuala kangsar), so we could sleep in peace! (not that we need lights to sleep but still it feels more secure)

the blackout and the candle we used in the living room.

sunday, 24/8:

today was when the international participants were supposed to come in, but they would only arrive in the afternoon, so we had the morning to ourselves.

oh i nearly forgot to mention carrey hall. it's the oldest building in the school (it's an original, which means 103 years old) and they have a really special system, where about 15 students are chosen every night to eat on a raised platform Western-style, with cutlery and chairs and all. the rest eat with their hands at normal tables.

we had the luxury of eating there twice, and we were seated on that raised platform. haha a little scary, even though none of the students were around.

so after breakfast it was off to the town for some sightseeing!

kuala kangsar is the royal town, which means a really important sultan calls it home, and so none of the buildings in town can exceed the height of his palace (4 storeys). which might explain why it felt so different from singapore, where if you don't see a building more than 4 storeys within 500m, someone will probably feel compelled to build something there.

the sunday market in town is really big! a few streets long and all kinds of things on sale (from food to clothes to accessories - you name it) and a bit like a pasar malam.

the sunday market.

nothing interesting really happened until the afternoon, where the participants started to come in - as always we weren't really very familiar at all with any of them and so stuck together in a singapore group for quite some time - and we got to know our apartment- and room-mates! i had 11 people in my 3-room apartment, and 4 in my room, all of different nationalities.

after interacting with them in the afternoon, it was time for dinner, a welcome briefing and icebreaking games!

shan't say too much about anything except the icebreaking games, that's where the fun was all at. =D

the first "game" we had was to draw our own face and write one characteristic about ourselves. and this was also the time i realised i can draw faces using more than 3 strokes! (yes juan! this is a major improvement!) xD

haha it still looks rather unprofessional though. but given my history of drawing my way to a near-fail, i'd say it's a pretty good effort, no?

the other game was a mass playing of musical chairs! they would remove 5-10 chairs every round so it was a mad scramble for the participants! abhi went out after 3 rounds, and i followed suit after the next round. =(

but rashidi, a.k.a stitch (this was also the first time i knew about his nickname) and syafiq a.k.a coco stayed in pretty long (last 6 people in the game)!

unfortunately they both lost and a girl won. how magnanimous of the gentlemen.

ok i'm starting to write rather incoherently so i'd better wrap up for the first two days!

i'll be picking out main events from now on so it's less taxing for me and for you. yay getting there! =D

I stopped to rest at 11:30 PM

Two roads diverged,and I-
took the one less taken...