Life after Bellerbys College

The Happy Ending

It is now August 2009.  It has been almost two academic years since I first started writing blog entries here.  I am happy to share my life and stories with people.

Now I am about to say goodbye to this blog as I move onto my second year of university.

I have to say that the first year of my college was pretty much about suffering.  I can’t remember how many times we had lectures from 9am to 6pm and how many times we slept in the central library to discuss and finish our project and coursework.  I never had such kind of experience before.  Of course, it depends highly on the subject you choose as I mentioned before.  So if you are not very well prepared to accept loads of work, think twice before choosing subjects called “engineering”.

Compared with this, life in Bellerbys was relatively relaxing.  Honestly speaking, I didn’t realize whether I liked Civil Engineering or not until I started learning it.  I had considered about changing a course, but then I didn’t and I stayed and endeavored.  I recommend that people who are going to university should gather as much info about the course syllabus as possible before the course begins.  Now I do believe that studying the subject you really like is quite important.

As the syllabus in our department has been changed this year, we had to learn a few more subjects and as there isn’t much past paper for revision.  Many people thought we would fail the first year, but then we struggled and finally survived, nevertheless, almost 30 people actually faded out in the exams this year, which takes up almost 30% of the first year civil engineering students.  Anyways, I am happy that I passed the finishing line of my first year and moving to the next stage.

Although I have graduated from Bellerbys for more than one year, I still keep my “student data” up-to-date.  Recently I have been saying “congrats” to plenty of people.

I want to say congratulations to those who have bearing fruit from their own efforts.  I am so glad that they are able to enter their ideal university and fulfilled their dreams.

Congrats to Lily, Sharon, Henry, Dennis and Zhibo whose offers from Oxbridge have been confirmed!

Congrats to Vincent, Yi Fen and Christie who succeeded in entering UCL!

Congrats to Jun, Woody, Yuka and those who have achieved their goals!

I wish all of them a merry summer holiday!  And keep on fighting after they enter university as there are a couple more challenges out there in the future for you.

I am now ready to say goodbye to this blog.

May you, all those who have finished their time in Bellerbys have a bright and shiny future!  And I would like to thank Bellerbys especially Mr. Stephenson for giving me this chance to share my stories with them.

Hope everyone has a happy and healthy life everyday!  Au revoir & Sayonara.

Be A Child

Have you been wondering where I have been these days?  Haha, if your answer is no, that’s ok.  If yes, let me tell you now.

After the second design week in our department, we were set free.  And since then, we were busy relaxing.  We went to Cornwall for five days where we cooked and played by the sea.  We rented a cottage for a week.  It was near to the sea and a cliff.  The public transport there was awful although the taxi service didn’t cost much.

Six of us went on the first day.  It was a thrilling trip as on the first day, Qing overslept before the departure.  I was looking after “Sis Huang” (A nickname)’s luggage. Sis Huang, who previously dropped her luggage rapidly and went to look for Qing.  By the time they came back, the train was about to set out and there was only one min left.  The conductors and train assistants didn’t check our tickets and “shouted”, “Go! Go! Just go! One minute!”  Sis Huang rushed into the gate leaving her luggage to me… But I’ve got my luggage in hands and could not have a spare hand to carry hers.  I was shocked and astonished.

We ran impressively fast like a rocket to the train.  I didn’t drag or pull my luggage, but just ran, lifting the luggage.  The train conductor then blew a whistle to tell us hurry up.  Just a few sec after got on board, the door shut and the train moved.

When we all got on board, I passed the ticket of Sis Yellow (Huang) back to her since she gave it to me when she left to look for Qing.  But now she said, “Hold your own tickets.”  I was like “What? But they were yours.”

That was our first day of the journey and it was dead exciting already.

The house we lived in was pretty nice and even nicer than any host families I’ve ever had in Brighton or London.  It was well furnished with lots of amenities as well.  There was a large lawn at the back of the house.  We could sit on the benches there and we could play football and volleyball on the grass.  Besides this, there is a farm nearby, so we were surrounded by many plants and crops.

We went to the beach when we wanted, but it was a long distance from where we lived.  No matter where we went, we had to call a taxi.  But a good thing was, when we consumed more than 25 pounds goods in Iceland, there would be a free home delivery.  This sorted out the stomach problem.

On the 2nd day, we went to the beach, but didn’t dare to swim as the sea water was extremely chilly although the sun was burning.  But I fell comfortable in the sun although I didn’t use any solar oil or sun cream while others all did that.  So I continued doing that the next day after and we even had a BBQ.  In the evening, I got a serious sun burn and started rescuing my hands by cream.  Unfortunately, it didn’t help.  Not long after that, the skin on my hands started falling off.

Although I have aesthetically devastated my arms, it was still a pleasant journey.  And then we went to the Isle of Wight.  Due to a lack of in-advance-research, the journey wasn’t well planned.  And we kept taking the wrong bus or getting off either too late or too early.  Sometimes the bus even went to the destination and returned without stopping.  For instance, bus No. 7 has at least three routes, so we had to check out the final stop to see which way the bus is going.  And the bus sometimes reached the final stop around a by-pass and returned immediately.  The two guys who came with me slept on bus while I was awake.  Anyways, we got lost and wasted plenty of time on bus.  It takes us almost one hour to travel from the host family to the sea front.  Basically, the so-called “Needles” was nothing to see.  But at least we had a feast near a tiny beach.

On 27th, we were “driven” out of hall by the college as it was the last day of the contract, so we had to stay in our friends’ place.  Living in such a big city like London, finding a good and cheap place to stay is almost impossible.  But we have to find one.

On the July 1st, Peter and I carried tones of luggage with us and left London for home.  The plane to Frankfort was ridiculously delayed, and almost everyone on board spoke German, which I couldn’t understand at all.

I couldn’t tell how happy and moved I was when I saw my father standing on the side of the road waiting for my coach back to HZ.  This year at university wasn’t an easy one, not like the first two at Bellerbys.

During the time at home, it was hilarious when all the kids came together.  This time I wasn’t a super nanny.  As there are so many relatives around, each year at least one new face will turn out.  We went to do some Fluid Ride and swimming since the sea water in England was far too freezing for swimming.  When you saw almost 20 kids playing together, it does look like a kindergarten.  And if more than 2 cry at the same time, the situation will be even worse.

This year many friends and relatives came over to grandpa’s to pick fruits near the pond.  I have seen some lovely kids as well.

Having taken a short internship on the site of the construction of a bridge, I learnt a bit and realized that it wasn’t the right time to take an internship since I haven’t got much in my mind yet and there wasn’t much construction going on in HZ, so now I am learning driving instead.

It was full of fun learning driving although it was horribly hot outdoor.  Sometimes the temperature could reach 46 according to the thermometer inside the car.  But the thing is I had a chance to meet people from diverse family background and sharing the life of each other decorates our world.

Maybe, I am also one of those in kindergarten, but this is the kindergarten of society.  I still have much more to experience.  Be a child, maybe I will learn more from that.

One Day of Smiley in Brighton in June

Today I would like to write a third-person blog entry.

It was June 10, 2009, Mr. Smiley got up around 8 a.m., after breakfast, he went to the South Kensington to catch a bus. It was the 2nd day of the London Underground strike in 2009. Perhaps in England, people have got used to the strikes. In our eyes, this seems to be an annual event or even called the celebration. What for? I don’t know. As we know the ticket price for the underground has been raised a few months ago. In such a recession, what do the workers still want? Inflation is too high maybe even in this recession?

Smiley doesn’t often go to college by bus or tube, but it was special that day as he needed to catch a train at London Bridge Railway Station to Brighton. Somehow, but Smiley doesn’t know how Ivan didn’t get the cheap ticket he recommended to Ivan a few days ago. They could have bought a return ticket for 5.95 pounds knowing that they all had a young person card. Then the tickets were bought for more than 13 pounds. And as Smiley and Ivan don’t live near to each other, Ivan had bought a ticket to 3 of them who were going to Brighton together. So what’s the point? Ivan suggested Smiley to go to Waterloo Station to collect his own ticket so that he could leave at Victoria Station while Ivan and his “daughter” could leave at London Bridge. Things started becoming confusing. We’d better not talk more about this.

As Smiley wanted to depart earlier just in case of the traffic jam, he left much earlier than the website had suggested. When Smiley reached the Bus Stop, the tiny piece of land was stuffed with passengers awaiting, much more spectacular than can usually see. But that was to be expected as the tube strike would doubtlessly cause some chaos above ground since more people who were going to work or school would have to drive, to walk or to take a bus. Moreover, there was some roadwork going on around the corner. What a mess!

Smiley, as a student of civil engineering thinks that that might be what they would be doing after they graduate as roadwork seems to be more common than new construction.

Smiley walked closer to the information board at the stop and checked the route of the bus. It seemed to be going to the right direction as the end of route was the Elephant & Castle. Smiley lives somewhere near to the Fulham Road, and as he thought, the London Bridge Station should be somewhere to the north east of his residence, so he took the bus moving northwards. The bus moved towards the Exhibition Road, passing through the Science Museum and Imperial College. Ah! Now he knew that Bus 360 went around the college. The bus kept moving and passed the Royal Albert Hall. Then it experienced a left turn into westwards direction… What? Smiley was still not aware of anything. Not long after that, the bus reached the Holy Trinity Church which is near to the Beit Hall and at the rear entrance of Imperial College. Oh la la! Smiley was dumb and then driven off the bus by the driver since that was the last stop.

This appeared to be the first time for him to take a bus in the opposite direction. And there seemed to be a few more of passengers who were being silly as him as well. Now this “360” really took him for a joyride around for 360 degrees from one end of the route to the other. He was annoyed although he had won a chance to stay longer on the bus for the fixed amount of cash he had paid.

It started raining heavily outside the bus and it was about 9:30. But Ivan asked him to meet up at 10:30 at London Bridge Station as the train would leave around 10:45. What could Smiley do? Basically nothing. The bus from South Ken to Ele-castle would take at least 40min (it turned out to be one hour on that day), and then it would take at least another 16min to reach the station by bus. There was no way he was gonna make it. The transport in London was hopeless. The more modern a city is, the more vulnerable it might be as a huge international city like this would highly rely on the tube for a public transport.

The bus is an alternative, but for many people, the bus system couldn’t take to everywhere you want and it is pretty slow compared with the tube. So we could say that the tube kind of has monopolistic power. That’s one of the reasons why the workers dared to go on strike. Since people rely on the tube too much, every time the tube stops working, thousands of commuters would be affected. According to the Evening Standard, 150k workers failed to get to work due to this strike although some parts of the lines were still working. I ain’t an economist, so I wouldn’t be able to estimate how much damage this might cause to the economy. Some could argue that this was an irresponsible behaviour to the society which leads to negative externalities. Of course, some attention should be paid to the tube workers as well. But it might be better if a beggar isn’t greedy and doesn’t ask for more when he’s already been given a lot.

So why did they choose this day for travelling? On the previous day, the official spokesman Ivanski pronounced that “forecast light showers on 10 and heavy showers on 11”. In other words… the day with fewer raindrops were chosen, but why not pick up a day that was forecasted to be sunny? (Well, Smiley always has too many questions.)

The bus stopped every 5m, and saw a traffic light every 50m. 50min later, Smiley got off at the EC stop after which he wanted to catch a bus to London Bridge Station. Then he realized there were ABCDEF…S… couldn’t remember how many of them were there. The people waiting at the stop were not helping, but after reading the map at the stop, he figured it out soon by himself.

The bus was really creeping on the way in the cats and dogs rain. Smiley didn’t even know which stop to get off as the screen didn’t show anything useful. Luckily the old man standing next to him was getting off at London Bridge as well. The old man spoke with a London accent and he was quite humorous and kept making jokes. But Smiley was told that he wouldn’t be able to reach the station by 10:50 which made him worried. Smiley was a bit desperate, he sent Ivan a message, asking him to leave and he would probably buy another ticket. When he finished texting, he turned to the man next to him,“I hope this msg travels faster than this bus as I’ve heard that sometimes the msg won’t reach until the day after.”

“People came and went and walked away”. By the time the bus reached the London Bridge bus stop. Smiley took a look at his watch. It was 10:47 already. The old man again made fun of Smiley, “I think your watch is too fast. Mine is just 5 to.” Smiley couldn't stop smiling stupidly as usual, and then he pointed to the clock outside the train station. It was telling exactly the same time as his watch. The old man then hunched his shoulders, “There you go then…” with sympathetic look on his face.

After saying thanks to the old man, Smiley ran across the road towards the station which was pointed out by the man previously. Luckily the train didn’t come until 10:56. Ivan did a great job as making the meeting time sufficiently early saves lots of troubles especially when people arrive late. (Well, although Smiley wasn’t always late)

By the time they entered Bellerbys Brighton it was 12:50. And a security guard was sitting at the entrance, which there was none when Smiley was studying there. Lily said this all happened after Smiley left and since then the safety level has risen. Was it Smiley’s fault? Did he have that power?

 

The first person Smiley wanted to see was no doubt Pat, the librarian. He hadn’t seen her for more than half a year by then. Remember every time Pat tried to help him sort things out when he was in need? She always tried to comfort him when he felt stressed. Pat said if he wanted, he could always email her even in uni. Without her support, the harsh A2 (not quite compared with uni) life wouldn’t have passed so smoothly. She is not only a great librarian, but also a psychologist and friend.

Smiley tiptoed towards the A2 students he knew (actually most of the students in the library), and this made them shocked and some even screamed. Nobody would expect him to revisit the college. Sharon, Joanna, Lolita, Lily, Betty and Vincent (almost everyone) seemed to be revising hard for the Physics exam in the afternoon. Yuka and Yifen were revising for other subjects.

Smiley couldn’t remember how long he had been staying in the library. But then he went to say hi to Dr. Butcher, Mr. Dixon and Mr. Bentham in the Maths Faculty. He was pouring out the “bitter water” about the uni life there, but he kept giggling. The teachers then laughed, “Well, you can still smile in such a situation. That means you are happy about it.” “Well that’s (what) his name (is about), isn’t it?” Well, “Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened.” He is always like that. You suffer you cry and flush away the sorrow, purifying your mood and the sunshine is on the way. That seemed to be the essence of Smiley.

Unconsciously, Smiley started mentioning the stuff he learnt about civil engineering. Gradually, a salon seemed to be launched inside the maths office. He mentioned the design week, and then the teachers started discussing mathematics, structural mechanics, and materials and so on. This was an unexpected lesson for Smiley and he benefited a lot. It seemed that Smiley had caused a civil forum. Probably this could be called the “civilisation”. He continued to giggle, and no wonder people remember his name wrong as “Smiley”.

Dr. Butcher’s way of teaching has altered slightly as he used to use an OHP (Old HP?) in the lesson, but now he started using new HP which is more efficient. And printing out notes written down from the handwriting pad is definitely faster than photocopying films for OHP. Moreover, he can now prepare lessons in the office and no need to stay in the classroom.

Then Ivan and Smiley went to see Mrs Chris, Paula, Sioban and Mr. Bowen (He still has the teddies and gorillas with him for the Jungle Concert).

After saying bye to Pat again, they went onto the long march to the Regency, where they could exploit their appetite. They started talking about relationship. Then after dinner, they took a walk along the beach. Then they started looking for beauties on the roads. As we mentioned to Chris earlier, Ivan was busy “hunting”, but in the end he ended up accumulating or adopting daughters. Does it mean he is now more maternal? Can we say? Not sure. But there is one thing we are sure about. That is now he has something that Uncle Gary, Papa Bear and I don’t have. That’s called the Mothers’ Day!

   

Walking in the rain with the setting sun on one side and the grey sky on the other, it seems that there was another sky. “Bang, Bang!” The painter of nature, seagulls high above in the sky dropped their gifts and aids on our umbrellas sending their great wishes after which they flew away. And the colourful umbrella now looks more colourful in addition to the “fragrance”.

The sun played hide and seek with us going all the way westwards. The Brighton Pier was then gilt into golden with a fabulous rainbow crossing over pier and connected the ocean to the city of Brighton. Tourists stopped, stood and began to take photos. After a while, the second rainbow came into air, emerging outside the original one. They shared the same centre and appreciated the same blue sky. They leaned against each other, supporting and protecting each other, demonstrating the harmony of fusion in nature. This is how the civil engineer of the Mother Nature built remarkable bridges in the air. If only the great double rainbow extends her hands of tender to China, sending my care overseas to those who care about me! I wished you could enjoy the same rainbow with me at the same time. Or we could even ramble on the bridge of rainbow, overlooking the whole universe with the company of the shining sun, the twinkle stars and the tender moon. Let the whole universe including all the galaxies even the aliens witness the one beloved… (N.B. this has nothing to do with the Pride Parade)

 

“Stop daydreaming, Smiley!” shouted someone. At the same time last year, Ivan and Smiley were walking in the same streets and along the same beach, single! Now one year later, they still remained single! What does this tell us? Oh yeah, right! They longing and yearn for liberty and freedom.

On the way back to London, Smiley could have taken the train to London Victoria, where there was a direct bus to his residence, but he preferred travelling with friends, so he took the train to London Bridge with Ivan and Alex. So now he needed to change a bus. Ivan said he could walk Smiley to the Waterloo Station where direct buses to the hall could be taken, but in the end considering Ivan’s daughter’s safety, Smiley made up his mind to take a bus from the nearest bus stop to Waterloo Station after which he could get a bus home. (Ivan should have thought about this, shouldn’t he? A mother should always take care of his/her daughter, shouldn’t she? Is it one the reasons why he keeps having daughters rather than girlfriend? Hope not.)

It was raining again and it had become a bit gusty. Standing at the dim corner by himself, Smiley missed a bus when he was checking the bus route… He stood there for a long time, but no bus came. Loads of taxies passed, but none of them seemed to be in service the light above the windshield wasn’t on. Smiley was thinking that if the bus didn’t come in the following 10min, he might take a taxi if he could see any in service. Not long after that, there was really one “taxi” coming. So he was about to stop it, but then he hesitated. When the “taxi” came closer to him, he was speechless. Guess what? He saw a word “Ambulance” in the front at the light… The ambulance couldn’t have looked more similar to a taxi, especially at night, when the light of a car blind your eyes which make you unable to read any words written on it. But it seems that the light of ambulance shines sharper than the taxi.

In an international big city like London, things will surely be different. Some people might find it funny if they like shopping, clubbing or drinking. For others, London might seem to be dull. Initially, many people may have a thirst for the adventure to London to open his eyes or whatever, but what will be waiting there are not only about opportunities and fun, but also about challenges, frighten, anxiety, temptation and so on. If you are not yet ready, probably it is a better idea to stay in a smaller city, or even at home for a while as “Home is where the heart is”, and then try to get yourself prepared. Some people may laugh at you. But so what? Who cares? Trust Shiny: Keep smiling, and you will find your life enriching.

Surveying Nightmare (Although It Might Sound Funny)

Surveying is the practice of measuring angles and distances on the ground so that they can be accurately plotted on a map. Or it is the technique and science of accurately determining the terrestrial or three-dimensional space position of points and the distances and angles between them. (Wikipedia and Dictionary)

As you may have seen above, today I want to talk about what we did in the May, the month of exams. Imperial College Civil Engineering first year students 2009 were divided into 2 groups for the surveying. I was distributed into the 2nd group which started the surveying week on 4th to 8th in the Silwood Park Campus of Imperial College, London. This campus is mainly for research students, but sometimes, although very rare, undergraduate students may need to come over to do some experiments or coursework. This campus is near Heathrow Terminal 5 (actually not). It takes you about 50 min to get to the campus from our South Kensington Campus, but the Travelodge we lived in was more than half an hour away from the Silwood Park. So it doesn’t seem to make much difference.

 

Our objective was to use surveying to collect information about the topography and the boundary for the given field so that we could build a road along that area to connect two places together.

The first few days were relatively relaxing. We were separated into 4 teams A, B, C and D, each of which was divided into 3 subgroups corresponding to the site number. It was said that the Site C and D were the most difficult sites for surveying since the topography was a bit complex with steep slopes. What we did on the first day was to get used to the equipments we were going to use for the following days including the theodolite, the level, the prism, detail pole and so on. There was a limited number of equipments, so 2 groups were doing the Traversing process while the other two would do the leveling. And on the second day, we swapped.

Since I was told that we would not have much time for sleep for the coming days, I went bed quite early for the first 2 days. The surveying work finished at 8 p.m. everyday, so by the time we reached our hotel, it was nearly 9 p.m. the hotel was so dim inside the rooms. There was a TV and a strong air conditioner in every single room, but there were no telephones inside. Not even a simple internal extension. I was so sleepy that I went to take a nap. My roommate went to take a shower. After finishing his shower, he woke me up…

As I’ve mentioned in the previous posts, I hate people waking me up when I want to sleep. But then I couldn’t do anything, I stepped into the shower room, only to realize my foot was inside a tiny pond. And it wet my jeans. I was so speechless that he wet the whole floor inside the bathroom because he left the curtain outside the bathtub. He argued that no one told him to place the curtain inside the tub to avoid flooding the whole room. I didn’t know what to say. What was more shocking was that there was no hole for drainage inside the bathroom outside the tub… What a shower room! Oh I kind of understand, they want us to use the water wisely as in our course we need to learn environmental engineering science, which also teaches us how to do some water treatment to save the environment and supply clean water to the whole world… A leakage means a loss of natural resources in this case. Probably we could reuse the water on the floor to flush the toilet, water the flower or even something else…

 

In fact, before going to this surveying week, I watched most of the videos given by the lecturer online for the instruction of surveying. My subgroup mates didn’t seem to know much about it as they didn’t watch them. But then I realized that what the GTA (graduate teaching assistants) told us was entirely different from what I learnt from the videos. And some other students agreed with me. So then we had 2 methods of measuring the angles. Obviously it wouldn’t severely affect the result, but as usual, I always want to find out the truth. So I went to ask the lecturer, then he told us the same thing as the GTA. I was hopeless. I don’t know why they give us those misleading ancient videos which might be shot before I was born and now they used slightly different apparatus to measure things in an utterly opposite way. And the thing is they asked us to go through the videos and they are part of our learning materials! OK, I guess it might be me and my friends who got it wrong…

We started obtaining loads of data from the surveying. Then we did some calculation to find out the coordinates of the given surveying points. From the 3rd day onwards, we started doing detailed surveying based on the known points we measured in the preceding days. And our subgroup B2-1 got roughly 50 detail points, and so we got approximately 150 points in total for the whole team about Site B. Then we started plotting those 3-D points onto our A2 paper. I couldn’t remember how long it took me to plot them on, but it was definitely more than 2 days. And we gotta use different symbols for trees, bushes, buildings, fences, gates and other objects. So it took us a long time to finish. As I am a slow worker, there was no doubt that it took me a long time. We needed to use arrows to indicate the earthwork along the whole road (i.e. how much earth we need to dig out or to fill in so that the site is flat enough for the construction of the road).

 

On the last day, the setting out process took place. Setting out means we try to find the points we measured and see whether the data for Site A, B, C and D are consistent with each other. A bad result could be different groups having a dramatic difference for the height of the same point, and these two figures will never match. All of the students followed the lecturers and the group leaders to walk on the sites. It seems that in the end, the result turned out to be well.

We were then on the way back to South Kensington. Before the bus came, the students were so excited that they played football and Frisbees on the lawn. Then when we got on board, everyone started falling asleep. Now that the 5 days surveying week was done and for the past few days, no one seemed to have much time for sleeping. Many of us brought our drawing board back to the hostel and worked overnight. I guess for those days, we only slept for 12 hours (or even fewer) for 3 days. The nightmare has now vanished.

 

Still remember that on one of the night, on the way back to hostel at 8+ p.m., the drawing boards were all around, and some students put them into the carriages overhead. And this made the driver worried as any falling-off of boards could lead to serious accidents. The driver warned us. But then one idiot at the back shouter out, “Oh yeah! Let’s have an accident!” Thee driver then became furious, but he didn’t scold us. Instead, he said, “It was an accident when you were born.” The driver soon became our idol…

Not long after the surveying week, the exams began regardless of our fatigue. The exams took place in the 2 consecutive weeks almost non-stop. And we finished 8 exams within one week. Not until then had we some time for breathing. The hours for sleeping descend from day to day for the exam period. Some of us slept for 3 hours everyday, but I wouldn’t dare to be follow suit. This makes no difference to competing who dies first or who devastates himself most.

Then the Dragon Boat Festival came. My friends from inside and outside civil engineering departments gathered to make rice dumplings called “Zong Zi”. It is a traditional festival in China. Virtually, the boys were helping at all. They only went to play basketball after which they came to eat. But Mary and I came to help the dollies cook in the kitchen. But then we ate most of the food. LOL!

 

After dinner, we sat together in the common room to play Killer. Denny is the only guy who was a member in the professional killer club. It was quite amusing to see how people use logics to analyse and find out who the killer or murderer is. At the beginning, all of us were not fond of debating or arguing to demonstrate our innocence (although the killer could also do this). Then we started voting for the suspects who look most like the killer.

We then found out that many of them were good at acting and persuading, which distorted the truth. I didn’t like doing that, or I may say I didn't need to do that because they said I always look ignorant or completely lost no matter I was the killer or innocent. This clearly proves that I am a slow thinker… OK, I wouldn’t comment much on myself… Anyway, I wouldn't suggest someone to play overnight at weekends considering we still had exams the week after unless…

Paintball, not Pain Ball...

April Fools’ Day came and we didn’t try to make jokes of other people, instead, the medicine department organized a day trip to Upminster, in Zone 6 of London for paint ball. Some students from LSE were also invited to join us. Although most of the people are from Singapore, I, as a frequent guest of Sing Soc, was also invited as well.

Nobody except the organiser knew who was going to the game. Minho, who comes from South Korea, lives on the same floor as me in the student residence. We unexpectedly met each other on the tube and then realised we were all going to play paintball together.

It was a long long journey on the District Line from zone 1 to zone 6. I can’t remember how long it took, but then we arrived on time. There were 13 of us in total.

 

Before that, I had never played any paint ball before, so I didn’t even know how the balls look like. After walking out of the tube station, we took a long walk to the game field Delta Force. It looked quite similar to the computer game CS. We were offered black coats with black narrow helmets which pressed hard on our heads. One of the main difference is all of us needed to wear helmets unlike the CS and I even put my glasses inside the helmet, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to see my targets and hence couldn’t tell enemies from comrade-in-arms although we have a masking tape around our arm, or I might use my gun to sweep the whole field killing the “innocent”.

Before the game, the “marshal” told us the rules and something about the safety issues. For instance, the minimum distance for safe shooting range is 2m, or we might get injured. In some games, one shot one game, and the players can’t response.

Everyone had 100 plastic ammos that contain paint inside, but obviously it wasn’t enough as we had several sections of war. Once we had been checked for the helmet, we could enter the field and marshal would test the guns each time before handing it out to us.

The game took place in 6 fields including the abandoned bus garage, the airport, the house of pain, the pyramid and so on. The first game was between 2 abandoned double deck London buses, the whole buses were covered with a thick layer of paint. We were divided into 2 teams blue and red, indicated by the colour of masking tapes wounded on our arms. There were 2 rounds for the bus site.

 

For the first round, we red army played as terrorist who were gonna kill the president of the blue team. The president was a volunteer who then put on an orange coat. The president would be hiding inside the bus for the first few minutes and then came out to flee to the bus opposite. If the president gets killed, then the terrorists win. And if the president successfully got on the bus of the enemies, the terrorists lose. In a circumstance like this, sometimes you just can’t help pressing the trigger when you see your enemies who are active or potential threats to your life. So in the first round I used up all my bullets despite the fact that I did kill some enemies. We had no time to pick up the non-exploded ammos on the ground in the war. Further more, picking up paint balls to refill your gun was prohibited according to the marshal as those deflected ammos may got stuck inside the gun. Oh man!

Here came the second round. I couldn’t remember how I was elected to be the president. The only thing I knew was I might feed myself with loads of bullets. You can’t probably tell why people selected you to be their president. There is always an opportunity cost. As a president, you certainly have more power than others, but also because of this, you are always under the “monitoring” of media and citizens including the spies or killers. Any assassination is inevitable since no one likes anyone.

 

I was covered by 2 soldiers who sent me to the bus. I carried my empty guy running up and downstairs on the bus. Then I nearly got shot by the terrorist upstairs on another bus. I was scared and then came downstairs again. As I knew I was no longer a normal citizen, my being alive would save my whole team. After 3 min, I was covered by Minho for a breakout among lots of barrels behind which hid some enemies. He asked me to follow him under his command “3 2 1”. In such a war, a president is nothing but a target, and even the soldiers can give you an order. Follow me, or you will die!

We cooperated pretty well at first although the rain of bullets flew around hitting the barrels and made some noise. But the 2nd move, Mr President didn’t get what the soldier’s order, after the soldier said “3, 2, 1, go!” Minho and I diverted and hid behind two different barrels. Holy cr#$! Never mind, if we misunderstand the signal, the enemies may not get it either. I said to myself. It is extremely important the president keeps calm in such a hazardous situation.

The enemies started moving around in order to encircle me. I started getting worried. Never mind, Jesus is with me! Blessed be the good president of Delta Force. A star shone and flashed, oh year, it’s Samuel, my saviour. He’s the man! If I were a princess, I would definitely marry this hero, my prince! Well, it is said that Sam has a large surface area, so can cover people better. Moreover, as a normal Singaporean man, he used to work in the army. This time he didn’t say “hold my hand”, instead, he said “follow me”. I never had any formal military training, so every time we stopped, I crouched rather than sliding down, and the inertia of me made me run too fast or even beyond the cover of the barrels and exposes myself to the enemies.

Every time Samuel would pull me back rapidly with his muscular hand which spared my life from bullets. We moved closer and closer to the bus of terrorist, and more and more enemies stared at us. At the final moment, Samuel covered me and we ran so fast that the enemies didn’t have time to react or to aim at us. We successfully occupied the pirate bus. Without the protection of soldiers, I wouldn’t survive till now. Nonetheless, I didn’t give any awards to them because I tripped over inside the bus and ripped my black coat.

We went back to have a short break each time we finished the section in one field before moving to the next. So we had to clean our helmet and every time taking off and putting on the helmet would make life harder if you wear glasses. And the paint is not easy to rub out sometimes.

Strategies were applied during each game, and we found places where we could have a clearest view and shot of the whole site, at the same time we needed to protect ourselves from getting shot. It happened to me more than once that when an enemy and I approached each other, he couldn’t stop shooting me as he was too nervous. I had put my hands up to show I lost and surrender, but the enemy was so anxious that he didn’t stop until the marshal told him to. Therefore I had extra paint ball massage…

I don’t know why almost every time I got shot, the paint ball would hit the part of my helmet near to my mouth. So I tasted the paint more than once which was so disgusting. It tastes bitter and I was not sure whether the paint was toxic or not. I wonder why they didn’t inject honey or sugar inside the bullet rather than using paint, it would unambiguously taste better…

Don’t look down upon girls or female soldiers. They can kill you silently spiritually or physically. At the last game before we left, we went to the pyramids. Anyone who ran out of ammos or get shot would leave the game. I used up my ammos, so I ran out pointing my air gun towards the sky and ran side by side to the exit. Obviously there were no bullets left in my gun. I played with the carbon dioxide in the gun and made some sound just to show off for fun. But the “cruel” ladies stood up (2 of them) and began to slaughter or massacre me! I put my hands up and they still didn’t stop firing. Phobia can kill! It kills not only the one who is scared, but also the one who makes them scared. This comes to a conclusion, girls can kill! And also if you don’t have the “capability” or “potential” to show off, don’t show off, or you will lose.

During the war, I often found a safe place for hiding, but sometimes, when your enemies can’t shoot you, you can’t get a good view at them, either. I didn’t use many bullets although we then spent more money on more ammo. I shared my paint balls with my teammates who ran out of it, especially Ivan. In the end, our red army team won regardless of the fact that there were only 2 teams… We won the gold medal.

 

Well, it was Easter, Jun came to visit me. On 8th, we went to Greenwich with Jeffery and Peter. We didn’t know Londoners pronounce Greenwich as 'grenidʒ' rather than 'grinidʒ' untilasking passers-by for the direction of it. It doesn’t look very special although its geological location seems to be a bit unique.

 

One thing we need to pay attention to is we need to take the DLR to get to Greenwich, but there are some check-in machines on the platform. For people who use an oyster card for travelling, if you touched before you get on board, make sure you remember to touch it when you alight. The machine may be set far away from the platform, or even hidden downstairs on the sides so that it is invisible. Visitors can still leave the station without touching their oysters.

This makes life tougher since people who forgot or fail to complete this process will be charged 4.30 pounds as penalties. It is said that this is how the London transport stole your money. This invisible trap instinctively creates a “fraud”. But if we pay a bit more attention to this, we can avoid this kind of “tragedy”.

Brighton Reunion in April

At Imperial, life makes you a little insane, and it is your own responsibility to keep yourself healthy. Going to the choir used to be my measure to mitigate the enormous academic impact. For the last 2 weeks of the spring term, dozens of us ‘lived’ in the central library to finish our coursework. Some boys nearly cried after working for over 24 hours nonstop in the library. Never mind, it’s just the Imperial Tradition, you can get used to it. Some say that Imperial’s objective is to train everyone into a powerful workaholic who is energy efficient or cost effective. Thus we can remain alive under the condition of sleeping for only 4 hours (or ever fewer) everyday.

I have a feeling that if I continued working, I might get bombarded by plenty more spiritual missiles or even end up in a mental hospital. You need to be a yellow dog to have this special service which many international students can rarely have. In order to survive the depressed feeling, I was determined to return to Brighton. More importantly, Uncle Gary is going back to Brighton as well. He is my best friend in England I may say.

England is a funny place where the public transport is usually privatised. In such a serious economic crisis or recession, the inflation of public transport is still happening. On the other hand, in my city, the public transport is highly subsidised. So the price for single journey is 2 yuan on average, and stays the same for ages. A couple of months ago, the cheapest return ticket between Brighton and London only cost 4 pounds, but now it costs 6 pounds (large increase in terms of percentage change).

I got up extremely early to catch the train at about 8:30 a.m. It was chilly outside, although the sun was shining happily. I didn’t go back to get more clothes, luckily, it was warm in the carriage. After getting on board, I opened the book in hand to kill time. Due to the engineering work, it would take me 2 hours to reach Brighton. But I didn't care about the time. I didn't feel that sleepy, but I reckon my brain was not operating properly. I looked at my watch. Just half an hour after the departure, I thought there was half an hour more to go. Gradually I fell asleep and woke up from time to time.

I couldn’t remember how many times I woke up. I couldn't even notice I arrived when I looked out. Probably Brighton Station didn’t change that much. We’ve just been apart for a few months, I couldn’t even recognise it. Sigh… I didn’t realise the train had stopped until I saw the passengers all got off. I nervously bounced up and jumped off the train. In my head, the sleeping monster was still distracting me.

I was wandering, it was a bit cold. And I turned around to confirm that it was Brighton. I didn't move until I was sure. Then I walked fast towards the Churchill Square after which I walked along the Western Road. Everything seemed intact since I left apart from a bit refurbishment going on. There are 2 colleagues in our department who come from Brighton, but shameful enough, when one of them talked about the roads and streets in Brighton, I knew none of those he mentioned. “Are we virtually talking about 2 different Brightons?” I never remember the names of streets. Instead, I just walked, sometimes based on accurate mapping in mind whilst sometimes just according to my own feeling.

 

This time I just walked down the Queens Road. I walked all the way from Brighton Station to Palmeira Square to see Gary who was in the Holland Road Church. Along the whole road, I didn’t see anyone I knew, which was a bit disappointing though. I tried to find everything I remembered on the road and they all looked unchanged. I seemed to understand something: I fixed my eyes too much on the past and focused on those that I saw, but meanwhile, I lost the chance to concentrate on the new things which came to me at the back when I faced the past. Obsessed in the past, I messed up the past and future. While I’ve been seeking something familiar with, now it’s time to move my eyes towards something novel.

There was a place I was desperate to go to. That is GFC, also called Girl Friend Club by Bellerbys students. When we were in old Bellerbys campus on Cromwell Road, we went to GFC a lot for lunch. The boss is a Turkish guy who is always lively or even “aggressive”. He always tried to make fun of us. Probably it was because we were his regular clients. After we moved to the new building near Brighton Station, we seldom went to his store, but once we had time, we would still go, especially on Sunday afternoon after a short gathering with Uncle Gary, Nelson and Ivan. As exams came last May and June, we couldn't afford the time to visit GFC. Just before we finished our A Level life in Brighton and went back home, we went to GFC again. Since then, I didn’t go again until now. So it has been more than one year.

When we popped in on that day, boss’s eyes flashed a spot of light. He seemed to be shocked and couldn't speak a word. He shouted out eventually, “Oh, my friend! Where have you been? London?” He was so excited that he stopped what he was doing and started chatting with us. But meanwhile, he attempted to make jokes of the laughing Gary like usual, “You! Get out of here!” with his finger pointing at him. “So where are you going now?” he asked. “Well, eat in GFC.” We was a bit touched and smiled. Seldom had we seen him smiling like that. He said, “So what do you want to eat?” “No. 6 PLEASE!” I placed a 20 pounds note on the counter. This time he didn’t make fun of the “6”. Instead, he seemed to be a bit shy and he told me that he would like to cook me a special meal. Then he moved the note back to my front and patted it after which he gave me a gesture telling me that he wanted to offer a free meal. Then he helped us get 3 bottles of canned drink. Gary’s friend who came along with us was fully entertained by the boss.

 

I took my money back as we knew he wouldn't take it, so we would give it to him when we left. Customers came in one by one, and boss made fun of some of them whom he was familiar with (usually students). As I hadn’t been there for ages, I decided to take some videos of him and the whole shop. So I video recorded what he did behind the ordering desk, including his packing food, collecting money and making faces. After a while, the special meal was sent to us. The boss gave me a dish of diverse or mixed kebab many of which I couldn't name. Never mind… I don’t usually pay attention to the name of food, and I just eat what I like to eat. Before eating, I took loads of photos of the kebab. The kebab might not seem to be unique in the world, but it actually is. The taste may not be the best in the world, but it is cooked by a good friend and it is the chef that really makes the meal particular. Boss said he wanted to help us take photos, but after we passed the camera to him, he started taking photos of himself and his girlfriend. He is just like a naughty kid as before. I shared the dish with my friends and then we finished every single piece of food in it including those I didn't usually eat. After all, I didn't want to waste any food he made. We noticed that the price of the student meal had gone up by 50p for each. So the Donner Kebab is now 3.5 quids.

I still remember that I used to be a greedy child. Every time I went to GFC, I would ask boss to give me an “Extra Large Kebab”, and he always gave me a larger portion happily. He was a boss who didn’t seem to love money. But this time, I would give him 5 pounds for the kebab as well as thanking him for being such a friendly boss. We placed the 5-pound-note on the desk and about to leave. He threw the note out beyond the desk. We there laughed and picked it up and put it back to the desk. Then he threw the money out again “furiously” (which he actually wasn't I reckon). Gary’s friend picked it up again and put it onto the desk again and we ran away swiftly. But he still threw the cash away. As we left, we saw the customers nearby laughing. Were there any police nearby, we might have been arrested as we ran away like robbers or thieves. If the police then realised that we were not escaping after burglary, but because we overpaid the boss, we might get ourselves onto the front page the newspaper for the day after: “3 Asian students who caught after paying too much for a meal”.

Sometimes we’ve got to become a child again to ease ourselves from the heavy burden of life or work. Since children are innocent and they don’t think too much, they can often live a happier life than us. It is indeed a good way for relaxation. Mr. Bowen is a good example. My dear friends, youth is not age of life, but about the state of mind. As long as we can keep ourselves young in mind, we can recover ourselves rapidly from the misery that comes to us. We are like kids, and so is the boss. He released his anxiety of work and at the same time entertained us. Honestly speaking, I hadn’t been that happy for a long time.

 

Gary asked where I wanted to go. I told him I wanted to go to the beach. London is near the Thames River, but it isn’t near any sea. At least not as near as Brighton. The sea and the English Channel wouldn't understand my sadness in college, but it could comfort me. It was a bit chilly in the wind although it wasn’t quite gusty that day. We headed to the opals on the beach and I ran around. As we could see, there were many people around enjoying the bath of sunshine and some were reading books. We lay down and the rocks warmed us. I closed my eyes and listened to the kind roaring of the ocean. Then I began to pick up stones on the beach. I found a few stones that are in heart shapes and Gary’s friend found some shells and rounded limestone which we called the “Easter Eggs”. Now you know why the opals on the beach kept vanishing and the sands underneath got revealed. Year, I put a few opals into my schoolbags. This is my way to carry the smell of Brighton back to London. Shh… Don’t tell others. You didn’t see anything.

Gary and I shared and exchanged the feeling about university and he tried to help me out. Well, as civil engineering students, we don't appear to have enough time for socialising. So besides working, it was sleeping. No clubbing or even speed dating. I don't seem to have many friends from other departments. Thanks to the help of the boundless capacity of the sea, the unhappiness was filtered and rushed off. At least at that moment, I found the peaceful wonderland, a silent one for my heart. Thanks Brighton! Thanks Gary! Thanks for accompanying when I feel down! Now I am not that depressed any more and it’s time to pick up tools again and fight back!

March Recap

In Imperial, everyday we come across new things. Otherwise we wouldn’t need to go to college, would we?

In March, we started our brand new subject, Surveying. We learnt how to use theodolite to measure the angles and distances between different given points. It would help us prepare for the Field Trip in Silwood Park near the Heathrow Terminal 5. This includes setting up a tripod, leveling and centering it. Then we place the theodolite onto the tripod and adjust the whole apparatus again. It could be fun, but indeed it was pretty annoying though as you need to repeat the same procedure from time to time to mark down data and check errors.

 

When dealing with piles of figures, it’s really easy to make mistakes. Once we erroneously take down the readings, there was a risk of the need to go back to square one. Besides that, the fluid mechanics experiment was done in the basement laboratory. Due to the inaccurate measurement, we got a great deal of weird numbers. But lucky enough we had more than one set of data. So we chose those that made sense for further discussion. Working in a lab was under a limited time, so cooperation and teamwork really mattered. Before conducting the experiment, we needed to have a rough plan and different people were going to take different measurements about different data. For instance, the depth of water, the width of container and the distance from the sluice gate all need to be measured, but by different people to make sure we could finish the everything in time. However, in A Level, we seldom had this kind of practical.

Since this month, coursework started flooding in our life. We got almost 10 coursework to finish in half a month. Unlike LSE where students bring their sleeping bags to college library, in our college, people don’t need to bring anything along besides books or notes.

It is just the end of the spring term, there are no exams going on, but here is one of the typical scenes inside the library:

2 o’clock in the morning, a couple of first year civil engineers are still wandering around inside the library. The second year students shouted at us, “You guys are crazily hard working! It’s just your first year.” They didn’t seem to understand that wasn’t what we intended to do, but it was because we had to do that. Last year, students doing civil engineering only needed to do 6 subjects while this year, after the syllabus was changed, we were required to study 11+ subjects. The humanity courses were gone as there was no spare time left for us to study that, only those who would like to study 1 year abroad could take the humanity course.

 

In the end of term Matlab test (a programming test), many of us screwed it up. And in the end, we couldn’t help using the codes we learnt to write a script to demonstrate the frustration on this:

% This is an m-file powered by Dr. Mad Lad

% from the Civil Engineering Department.

% In this section, you will learn how to write your own diary in Matlab

% By the end of the section, you should be able to use 'if' comfortably

 

% First of all LAUNCH the BRAINWASH process

clear all ; clc;

 

% Now prompt the user to input the DAY NUMBER

disp( 'To start with, please input the Day Number to obtain your corresponding time table for your civil day' )

a=input( '>>>The Day No. should be 1-7 indicating Monday to Sunday, then Press ENTER:  ' );

 

% If statement

if a>=1 && a<=7

   

    if a==1;

        disp( '>>>Oops! It is a busy day, would you like to wash your head or have a shower?' )

        disp( 'since you cannnot afford the time to have both, but just either of them' )

        a1=input( 'Input 0 if you wanna wash your head only, otherwise input 1:  ' );

       

        if a1==0

            disp( '>>>Damn! You are so filthy, no gals will like you!' )

        else a1=1;

            disp( '>>>Look at your messy hair, it sucks!' )       

        end

       

    elseif a==2 || a==4

        disp( '>>>I am sorry, but you are having loads of work today' )

        disp( 'Would you like to sleep in the library or in your own bedroom?' )

        disp( 'as you will be staying in the library until midnight' )

        a2=input( 'Input 0 if you plan to sleep in lib, otherwise input 1:  ' );

        if a2==0

            disp( '>>>Poor you! But for Civil Engineers, Library is no different from your room' )

        else a2=1;

             disp( '>>>The gate facing Queens Gate will be locked, you gotta go around the campus' )

            disp( 'to get out, but is it safe to walk alone on the street at midnight?' )

        end

       

    elseif a==3

        disp( '>>>You seem to have a bit free time today, would you like to relax' )

        disp( 'or do you want to finish the piles of work left from yesterday?' )

        a3=input( '0 to relax and 1 to continue working:  ' );

        if a3==1;

            disp( '>>>Good boy! Working is what the life is especially for engineers!' )

            disp( 'Do your work NOW!' )

            while a3==0

            a3=input( 'What? How dare you are! Say again!:  ' );

            end

            disp( '>>>Good boy! Working is what the life is especially for engineers!' )

        end

       

    else disp( '>>>Hooray, it is Friday & weekend again! Wanna have fun with your girlfriend tonight?' )

            disp( '>>>Oh come on! What else can you do at such a lovely night?' )

            disp( 'Oh year, just realise you do not have a girlfriend although you are almost 50!' )

        end

    end

   

else

    disp( '>>>Idiot! There are only 7 days per week!' )

end

This clearly shows a typical day for us civil engineers.

It is said that, without collaboration and teamwork, it is not likely that engineering students can finish their work on time. Honestly speaking, in Imperial, we had tasted the busiest life in our life.

On the last day of the spring term, it was the deadline for 3 pieces of coursework. The first one is a 5,000 word essay, the geotechnics coursework and the surveying coursework (the deadline for the last coursework was a bit flexible). I had been spending a few weeks on that essay, and the week before I sat in front of a computer in the library from 2pm to 2am to amend it. But as I am a perfectionist, I always want to make things look better if there is no such a thing called “the best”.

In the beginning, I wrote down 7,000 words for the essay which means I had to cut it by 2,000 words. I want to bung in as much information as I can into the essay so that I can explain or clarify things better. After getting used to blogging, it is sometimes hard to say a simple key point with only one sentence, but with loads of paragraphs I suppose. However, I managed to shorten it and I made it. Then I found a few interesting points in another book, so I started to add more into the essay, which ended up with 6,000 words again. I sighed and struggled to delete piles of words.

Not until the next morning did we sleep. The sun rose and it was 6 o’clock, the group of civil engineers in the library almost finished half of their work. We threw ourselves onto the desk and took a nap before we continued to finish the second coursework. Unfortunately, the safety guard woke us up when he went on a patrol at about 7 a.m. I became extremely furious as we had been working overnight and he woke us up when we just fell asleep.

We did sleep in the library for a few days. We were thinking about moving into library as there are a few shower rooms in our department. In that case, we could live in the library and went to the department for a shower. Thus we could save ourselves from renting a house next year.

Basically this was how we survived the spring term and how we spent the days in March. The holiday was meant to begin on 27th, but we still had the last coursework to hand in. It seems that most of the students who stayed in the library after that day were from our department. Our “holiday” then started in April. It is called the “Revision Festival”

Of course, there was also something funny going on. As I’ve mentioned earlier, I was partially “Singlified”, and the most impressive musical I have ever watched so far was the Sing Soc Production “Ah, Yum!” The story was mainly about a family which was famous for making Hainan Chicken Rice. It includes the conflicts between siblings and how people who were slaves of money.

The dances and music were all original and with the support of the great light effect in the great hall, there is no doubt that the musical is a great triumph. Some souvenirs were also placed on each seat representing the Singaporean society in Imperial College. The fees received from selling the tickets will go to charities. And after the performance, every audience could get a box of Chicken rice in the main dining hall with a free bottle of Tiger Bear from Singapore.

In my opinion, this event was well organized which maximized the use of wisdom of Singaporean elites to give a fabulous output. Compared with this, the CSSA which didn’t organise any beneficial or spiritual activities still has a long way to go to catch up since people have been complaining about this all the time. It shouldn’t be only about speed dating although the students go around the whole London to all universities to “hunt for” a partner!

February Feel

February is either the sea of sorrow or the season for sweet.

On the 1st day of February, it snowed heavily.  Almost the whole Britain was covered with snow.  Although I had seen some snow before when I was studying in Brighton, this time the snow was much heavier and hence much colder.  I was trying to do some revision at night as there would be some tests.  Suddenly the noise came into my ears although it was midnight already.  For normal nights, this noise was unacceptable by neighbours, however, this midnight, it was still loud outdoor.  I raised the curtains and shocked by the snow outside.

   

As I lived in the basement, I couldn't see how everything looked like on the road.  But the snow was already very thick.  I felt so excited and I put on my coat and walked out with my slippers on.  I just finished my shower.  I took my camera to take photos about people who were having snow fighting in the streets.  I didn't even feel cold.  I walked into the snow until my toes were buried by snow.  Suddenly the whole garden was whitened.  And in the light of lamp, the reflected light shone the whole street.  The bus was still in service.

I went back to my room to change shoes so that I could run properly in the snow.  The students all moved southwards to avoid disturbing the neighbours.  So the fight began on the next street.  I went back again to wear my safety gear.  In such a snow fight, especially when it was my first snow fight, shielding and basic protection was crucial.  So I wore the high visibility coat which was waterproof as well.  Then I put on my safety helmet.  Standing in the snow, I asked Peter to help me take some photos.  Someone ran towards me at the back and threw my helmet away.  Then I was hit by plenty of snowballs, nearly lost one of my ears in the attack.  In order to take revenge which I didn’t have that ability to, I put on my helmet to fight back…

The next morning, the internet didn’t work and the snow outdoor had accumulated to be over 1dm thick.  After I left our hall and walked for a long distance, I met my departmental friends who were on the way and they told me that all the lectures on Monday were cancelled.  But I wanted to take more photos, so I went to the college.  By the time I got there, it was already pretty late.  And after taking some photos, I went back to my hall just to know that there was actually a lecture in the lecture room when I was unintelligently taking photos in the campus not far away from our lecture room.  I nearly fainted when I heard this news.

 

So as there was no more lectures on that day, people started fighting wherever they could.  If religions cause wars, snow can as well.  Some people went to Hyde Park for snow fight while some just fought on the Queen’s Lawn of Imperial.  As for me, I came back to hall and made snowman with my hall mates. Huge snow balls could be seen around. Almost everyone wished the snow to continue for a few days.  It wasn’t because we wanted to play with snow or snowman, but just because we didn't want to go to college. On the way back, we saw a tiny snowman made in front of a house, holding a flag.  It says “No School” on the flag.  This showed us the great wishes for not having schools…

February is either the sea of sorrow or the season for sweet.  It is the month for love. Instead of going out with my girlfriend, I went to the Valentines’ Day party in ULU.  The topic of the party was My First Love.  Basically, it was an event organised mainly for Singaporean and Malaysian students.  I seemed to be one of the few Chinese students.  But it doesn’t matter since the main topic was to watch performances.  This wasn’t the main topic for February.

 

The site visit to Cannon Street tube station benefited a lot.  After all we saw something real, which was never seen by most of us in the lectures.  But the most important event that took place in February was the Design Week on 16th-20th.  We worked from 9am to 6pm everyday. 

 

At the beginning of the week, we were given the task to build a design our own bridge across the Thames River and link Battersea to Chelsea.  As we haven’t got much knowledge about the structures yet, what we needed to do was to create our own sketches and then used the card boards to produce a model, strictly speaking a to scale one.  Students worked in their timetable team and each team was also given a word for lateral thinking.  Our word was “unicorn”.  I couldn’t remember how our brainstorming carried out.  But we easily spread the mind map to a whole white board.  At the end of this, we came up with something for structures and environment.  As we wanted every single member to be active in taking part in the design process, first of all, each student just used their imagination to create his or her own bridge and then we selected the best two to build models.

 

On the first day, I did what the lecturer said and created my daring design, the Spring Bridge regardless of any engineering problems.  I thought “Impossible is nothing” as technology grows.  My design was then rapidly and highly spoken of by my colleagues, especially for the creativity.  I knew it was more or less impossible to build, but I still tried to improve the entertainment process in the middle of the bridge because we had to come up with some ideas to attract our clients to spend money on that.  Only if they know that the project is gonna make money will they try to invest.  I fused the idea of light and mechanics to build a huge lighting clock and pedestrian in the middle of the bridge and also a tower for sightseeing.  This created more challenges to the project.

At noon, two of our teammates went to the site for a reconnaissance.  They grabbed some passers-by to do some tiny surveys. T hey asked the local residents about the opinions for building a bridge in the area.  The residents told them that it was not convenient for local people to go shopping or travelling around.  It is not close to any supermarkets or stations.  The residents thought the two students were sent by government to investigate the local transport and was about to build a bridge over, so they were eager to that.  This showed us the expectation of the citizens.  Moreover, as there are already two truss bridges nearby, to improve the looking of the city, we shouldn't build another truss bridge or it would be too many.

Many teams tried to build cable-stayed bridges.  My idea was soon abandoned after lecturer came to give me some comments.  He thought I watched too much cartoon or fairy tales.  That meant I had gone too far.  I was a bit let down.  It was supposed to be a bridge of imagination without any concerns for the structures, wasn’t it?  Well never mind, perhaps I just lacked common sense.  At the end of each day apart from Wed, we gave a presentation.  On the first day, some GTA came and they didn't regard our individual design as a good way for self-development, nevertheless, he thought we came up with too many ideas and we didn't cooperate.  It was a dumb situation as we were actually told to have several designs at the beginning before converging them into one.

Designing kept going and someone in our team came up with a design for the bridge.  Some of us called it Double-S while some called Double $ or “Hamonial”.  We spent the rest of the week on building models.  We “stole” some white card boards which were supposed to be used as a deliverable.  We wanted to use them for the model, what happened was we were scolded by the teacher to waste that “expensive” card board.  But we didn't care.  Sacrificing is for the sake of something really good!  (Although ours was too far from being called an innovative design…)  Come on, Sir!  Forget the love for money, and get the best thing in your life!

The design week was tiring but relaxing, as there were no lectures going on.  So what we needed to do was to divide people into different specialised groups and kept working.  Some were in charge of drawing while some were for materials organising.  For Qiu and me, we focused on model producing and we set up some nice models in a relatively efficient way.  When we almost got fed up with the bridge, we were given an entirely new topic to entertain us.

On the last day, we were given limited resources: straws, spaghetti and card boards for designing a crane and a dome.  As there was a scarcity for resources, this time we planned more carefully to distribute the materials. Qiu, Kelly, Merwin and I determined to create the crane.  The straws were reinforced by spaghetti from inside using glue.  And the whole structures were then wounded by layers of Scotch tapes.  As it didn't count for credits, many of us didn't have initiative for it.  At the end of the day, all the products were tested under heavy loads.  Obviously our crane failed directly only by adding a small piece of weight.  The result was calculated by a particular ratio by the weight of the crane and the maximum load it could carry.  Similarly, for the dome, a weight was also exerted on top of it to find out the failing load.  At the end of the week, our team didn’t win any prizes, but c’est la vie!  If everyone can get prize, it isn’t a funny game then.

 

In this month, there were a few international food night.  And we had a funny demonstration of how the bridges work in terms of structures.  Due to the lack of time and the length of the post, I would probably not talk about them here.

January "Report"

Hi everyone, it has been a long time since I posted the last entry.  I wish I had that time to put down what is going on in my daily life.  Honestly speaking, when I was buried by the mountain of work, I still had one hand outside the mountain to grab something non-academic.  This can be called life.

On 20th Jan, a baking competition in our hall was held.  Remember that our hall is one of those which organized plenty of events?  Or perhaps I didn’t mention this… never mind, there’s just too much going on in my head.  Every time the hall organizes an event, they will try to spend some money which was extracted from the vast amount of sterling we paid.  The budget for this event was unknown though.  In this match, the participators needed to bake some cakes for the visiting judges who were the warden team and the residents.  For people who were waiting for the cake in the common room (i.e. lazy us), there was another match going on, the biscuit match.  Candidates were given unlimited number (actually limited) of plain biscuits, jelly beans and some jam to build or make something to impress the rest.

The common room soon became hilarious, and here came the creativity of youngsters.  Most of the candidates began to build houses, some of them used massive amount of jam or butter to glue the houses, at the end of the day, a butter house was done (didn’t see many biscuits as they were all glued inside). 

Some teams virtually tried to create a huge house within details of the structures such as the double layered walls for insulation.  The house was divided into several stories and rooms. As you may see, some created the triangular or truss (sorry, can’t help starting using civil engineering jargons). In fact, there were 2 other civil engineers next to me who represented our department.  Unfortunately, they didn’t build any stable bridges.  What a shame! (Not really).  The bridges they built could easily collapse when you shook the table.  Yup, probably you are right and they should study in the mechanical engineering. Compared with the baking competition, the “building society” seemed to have more fun.  So basically, we concentrated on building houses while the cakes or muffins came in occasionally to give us energy back up for the stomach.

The best team won the prize (meaningless words as even donkeys know that).  What they made was a garden with coconut trees in the yard.  Inside the fence of the garden, a house was also built next to the so-called swimming pool which looked like cells of bacteria.  P.S. I am not laughing at them as even the producers didn’t know what it was.  What?  Me?  Oh yeah, I did have my masterpiece as well although I didn’t feel like creating things.  I just picked up some pieces of biscuits that fell off from other people’s project.  I used what I could get to build a twisted stair inspired by the engineering department of Cambridge University.  It was simple, but didn’t look too bad.

Then we had our first formal coursework and it was for geology course.  It was about measuring the water content in the clay sample.  I don’t want to talk about too much technical stuff here.  But briefly speaking, we just used our hands to roll the clay of different humidity into spheres and strips and then the GTA (Graduate Teaching Assistants) would help us put the samples into the oven to get rid of the water in it.  By measuring the change in mass, we could obtain the water content for the sample.  It was quite funny though.  It was the first time we found the GTA to be helpful.  As we all agree, in many tutorials, some GTA didn’t know how to solve problems even when they held the answer in hands.  Then how can we expect them to help us?  Absolutely hopeless…

In the experiment, we were having fun, especially for the girls I guess.  Imagine how their faces look like when they heard that clay were good for skins.  In Imperial, to “seduce” girls, talk about beauty and toilettes; to “entice” boys, discuss gyms and stuff about muscles with them.  Well, of course people aren’t that shallow like how I described (But probably not far from that).  It was a pity that I haven’t got any photos from our lecturer who took some photos of that.  I would say, it was indeed an unforgettable experience.  It wasn’t as awkward as we thought, but a relaxing and interesting lab section.

Not long after that, the Chinese New Year (Spring Festival) came.  The happiest thing to do was to have some really good meals.  Studying in Imperial, a non-catered college, it is completely disastrous.  I tell you what.  We international students were not the only ones who were “lazy” for cooking.  As what we’ve observed during the past few months, the home students altered their dining habits from time to time.

When we just entered Imperial, we bought a whole set of cookware.  Then everyone started cooking or learning cooking although the fact was that at least half of us were poor chefs.  Nothing stopped the ambition for trying new cooking until the workload started growing.  Engineers were those who benefited and suffered most.  We benefit because we learn a great deal of subjects, pretty much every single subject Imperial has (after the reform of syllabus), that means we are gonna learn more and probably bear more and die harder.  So what we saw was that the British students started by cooking for hours at the beginning.  Then they started cooking once for 3 meals and stored them in the fridges.  Then they started cooking food like spaghetti which requires less time.  Gradually, cereal and bread became their main thing for dinner.  Everyday, we stayed in college until 6 or 7 p.m.

For the second term, the timetable was stuffed to be full and lectures finished late at night when the sun had set and darkness came.  Who on earth had the mood to cook for himself when he came back from college so late?  Moreover, people could rarely cook together as people who are from the same department may not live together while for people who live together, they come from different departments which mean that lectures finished at different time.  It was extremely difficult to have a common time for cooking.  For more information about the hell we are in, I will talk about them later in the forthcoming posts.  Oops!  I am going too far from Chinese Spring Festival.  Before the New Year came, I got quite a few invitations from friends.  Basically, I was invited by the some departmental friends, from China, Malaysian and so on.  We had normal Chinese meals and hot pots on separate days.

Eating is the eternal topic in our life when we are alive.  The Asian Food Festival launched by the CSSA was doubtlessly a great success.  Lots of Asian food including proper meals and desserts were offered.  Many people enjoyed the “Pearl Milk Tea” a lot, before we finished our lecture, these drinks were all gone.  So what we did was creeping around in the common room among the ocean of people.  Some small games such as Mahjong was also set up at the corner, but what was eye catching were the drinking and eating competition.

In the drinking match, the candidates work either individually or as a group to drink Coke.  Whichever team drank up the fixed amount of Coke most quickly would win the prize.  Similar rules applied to the eating competition.  But what they ate was plates of dumplings, but this time, the candidates ate plates of dumplings in a given time.  At the end of the game, the number of plates was count.  Audiences were highly entertained by and cheered for these games and the CSSA was thinking about organizing a bigger event next year.

Basically this was what happened in January. In the next entry, I will talk about February.

Trip to Scotland

On 20th-23rd, December, four of us went to Scotland.  Honestly speaking, we didn't travel a lot. It was my second trip to Scotland.  We didn't see the highland cow, nor did we go to any national parks.  And we didn't go to any distillery factories.  So what did we do?

We had to stay on the train for three hours from London Euston to Glasgow.  Before that, we got up at  four a.m.  Alex, my roommate, who is a nice guy, before he went to bed, said to me, "Shiny, If I don't see you tomorrow, which I probably won't, then Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!  See you next term."  I am so delighted that there are so many kind people around who care about each other.  I really feel grateful.  I didn't sleep the night before our departure, or I will say I only took a nap in hall for two hours as I didn't pack up my luggage till late.

I tried to sleep on the train for several times.  Why?  As we sat next to the door or carriage, the toilet and also the loudspeaker, people made sound when they opened the door, when the conductor checked our ticket, and when "pooh-chi!" the toilet was being flushed.  Every time, I was woken up by this noise, which was indeed irritating.  And my neck lost support and shook and rotated from side to side with the movement of the train, so every time I woke up, my neck was like got snapped.

Every time I opened my eyes, it was dark outside the window.  Peter said, "It's only 8 o'clock in the morning."  I think we are already in the high latitude area on the globe, at least to the north of England on the northern hemisphere.  I can't remember how many times I've been waken up.

The sun eventually rose.  The greensward rowed rapidly in straight lines outside the windows.  The train was shaking like a cradle and the scenery outside window changed a lot between sky and the lawn.  The weather was not ideal.  According to the BBC weather forecast, there would be a drizzle in Glasgow.  It seems to be one of the few correct forecasts.  As we see, the weather in Britain is so changeable. Moreover, almost every time, it rains on the first day I go traveling, or when my friend comes to visit me.

When we reached Glasgow Railway Station, it was almost noon, we could only see a shabby hotel in the station.  And more unpleasantly, Chi-hin told us it was the hotel that we were going to stay in for three nights.  When we entered the main entrance, one side of the first automatic door was broken, so it was partially opened by manual.  Then there was another entrance which looked awful as well.  It seemed to be a hopeless place.

Now that we came, we stored our luggage first and then we looked around.  There were a few elevators.  I mean there were a few dilapidated elevators.  And there was only one that was still in use.  And the door was a bit deformed and defective.  When we entered the lift, we pressed the button four but the background light wasn't on.  It was a bit hard to tell whether we had pressed four or not.

On the fourth floor, there was a long corridor like in the horror movie with the weird decoration.  When we walked along, we saw some rooms unlocked and with light on.  We took a glance inside and it was terrified.  The wall was dark due to a lack of refurbishment.  Some parts are about to fall off, but the rooms look like a small warehouse.  Oh, come on!  It's Christmas and how can they decorate the hotel as if we were having Halloween?

In Geo-technics course, we had our own "British Standard" to classify rocks and sands.  On this island, there seems to be a "Scottish Standard" for hotels.  The so-called "four star" hotel has been devastated to such a large extent that I can't think of any other possible derogation which will make it look worse.

For the first day, we went to the Modern Contemporary Gallery in Glasgow.  There is much artwork inside, but the abstract artwork can't be well understood by us.  From this point of view we are amateur, honestly speaking, if those paintings or crockery were put into a public place in college, it might have been used as a dustbin.

But there were also some designs that really impressed me.  And I am fond of two simple pieces of work near the entrance.  They are simple but a bit philosophical.  Below the paintings there were two lines of words: Are we driven by the desire for pleasure?  Are we aware of the pain caused by us?  Here comes to the point made by Dr Butcher before.  There is a scarce resources for time and "We don't do things only because we can, but most importantly do it when we need to."  Similarly, we don't do things because we want to, do it when we need to and meanwhile consider about the consequences on others.

I kept walking, until I saw a blouse.  I then braked to read the words on it. "Life is easier now, but are we happier?"  The design of the blouse isn't very outstanding or eyeball-catching, but it makes us stop and restart inspecting our life.  What makes us unhappy?  Is it the accelerating pace of life or the growing desire for joy?

            

The most tiresome outdoor event on earth is not going shopping with a girl or girls, but buying clothes with boys.  In fact, the clothes in shops all looked huge.  Oh yeah, it's in the UK… when I walked towards the zone for children's wear, the size seemed to fit me because the models were more or less as tall as me.  Can you imagine that one of us took a T-shirt and went into the fitting room for a quarter hour?  I was utterly shocked.

On the second day, in the morning, we got up late, but then we took a train to Edinburgh.  The only place we went was the Castle after which we went to buy some scarves and Haggis.  Then it was 6pm already and we decided to have dinner after we went back to Glasgow, so we took the train back.  I was totally speechless.

On the third day, there was another three hours on the train to Inverness.  It was a bit humdrum.  Peter and Zhelong had fallen asleep whilst Chi-hin was listening to music.  The coat on me no longer kept me warm; instead, they turned into my burden in the warm carriage.  It seemed to be a hurried trip, but also it wasn't a hurried trip.  We wasted most of the time doing meaningless things.

What on earth can re-fire our passion on this trip and redeem my mood?  There was something missing.  Even the scenery outside the window could not interest me.  Anything and everything (including the snow on top of the mountains) looked normal and too ordinary.  The beauty outside the window seems to be so temporary, and every time I raised my camera to capture it, it fled and slipped away or sometimes got blocked by the trees.  Sigh.  Opportunities sneaked unconsciously as well as time.  When you try to grab it back, some cruel obstacles block you on they way.

After moving to London, I obtained a new mania which is imitating the announcement on every single train or tube.  Usually different lines of tube or trains in different areas have different ways to say out the announcement and also in different stress.  Now I am getting used to pronounce a bit Train Language, London accent and of course Singlish (Singaporean English).  It sounds a bit silly, but I did learn something through an entertaining way.  It's better than staying on the train all the time doing nothing.  In the underground, it says, "Please mind the gap between the train and the platform."  But for the Scot-rail, they say "Please mind the gap when alighting from the train."

Moreover, the pronunciation for names of places are also bizarre.  Some of them don't have a rule.  For instance, Islingword Road, somewhere I used to live in.  It's not quite difficult to tell though, but I can show more examples. "Clapham Junction, Gloucester Road, Leicester Square, Tottenham Court Road, Edinburgh" and so on.  It is tough for English language beginners to pronounce.  I stared at the screen in the carriage.

   

Through the whole journey from Glasgow to Inverness, I didn't stop writing my diary.  I tried to look carefully at every passenger nearby and I tried to describe them in my diary.  People have different living style and diverse behavior, even when they are on a train.  Alright, I should learn some psychology.

            

It was so windy near the Loch Ness, perhaps more windy than in Brighton.  The gust can make one dizzy or even cause a headache.  It could probably blow us away if it got a little bit stronger.  In my city, at this time of the year, the grass might have turned yellow, but here, the lawn was more than green and lively.  Perhaps it's because the climate here is relatively humid.

Ok, I think I won't continue writing this blog although I feel like doing so, but as some people have told me, when your blog becomes too long, people lose patience to read it, especially when I am not writing an impressive novel.