Preeeee!

Just felt I needed to do a post for those who are concerned about what I am up to, if there are any that is. Hahaha. Yeah, ai bin la this Bern.

Anyways, I've completed my long battle with all the exams last Friday! The freaking 9 papers battle. Siao. I was wondering whether this was much tougher as compared to O Levels where we have 8 subjects and each sub had 2 papers each, plus practs for pure Science subjects.

Conclusion? I am not too sure too. Hahaha. See, for O Levels you needn't study as much for BM and English subjects as opposed to pure hardcore studying for 9 papers, where 1 of em is actually a 2 semester course. Besides in O Levels, you have tons of past year paper resources to aid your revision. This year, for my course, there were changes in curriculum leading to 3 new courses which DID NOT have any past year papers at all. Thus, pretty much did not know what to expect for those. Oh well, past year papers don't matter much if you really know ur stuff.

Ahh, besides those points, I find the duration for papers here to be just perfect meaning, no time to check at all, even for some, no time to think! The longest ones are only 2 hours. I was browsing the other day at the papers back home, then remembered oops, we have 3 hours' ones. And, the papers here do not allow you to make choices. It is all "Answer Everything" format.

So how'd I find it? Emm, to be honest, all seems okay except maybe a few. I find the last 4 days particularly harsh, as there were 4 papers during that period. Thinking back, we used to have these schedules back home anyways, so I should be okay with such arrangements. Err, however, I wish they had given more time between papers! So much to learn ah uncle! I wonder if I have gotten lazier?

How do I think Im gonna fare? Erm, *fingers crossed*. I don't even wanna answer. I just hope not too bad. In terms of knowledge gained, daym, I think I learned WAY LOT during my time here. I can now fill up my CVs with a couple of new languages I have learned here. Yay! Looking back, I think the harsh workload is actually for our own good. I liked the fact that there was always proper hands-on work to cement what we learnt in lectures. Knowledge-wise, all I can say is, it is very fulfilling.

Woosh~ And 9 months have already past. Not long from now, I will be already leaving this place. Sighs~ Mixed emotions. Happy to be going home soon. A bit sad about hmm.. maybe the cool weather? Hahaha. The Bruneians here had a barbeque outing on the day I finished my exams. I arrived late but who cares. When I saw about a few footballs lying around and wide areas of space to kick about. ITS OVER. I when mad kicking balls for about a couple of hours. The last time I could kick balls as freely were maybe 4 to 5 yrs back kua. Lol. It was just like playing in the aircon. Maybe colder. The sweat that were produced during the 3 hr session quantity-wise would be like the sweat produced after running ard for 5 mins at 4 pm in Brunei on a sunny day. Hahaha. But the dangerous thing of playing in the cold is that, you do not know when your body needs fluids. Its coz when I went home, I felt like shit. Freaking thirsty and all the dehydration effects. So moral of the story, drink water even if you don't feel thirsty when out in the cold! Anyways felt like shit as well for the next 2 days (including 2day too) coz my whole body was aching. LOL. Dumbass who didn't warmup and didn't know his limits lol.

Anyways it just feels so good now. The bothering inner-voice that always screams "Assignment!" or "Revise!" is gone. I can just peacefully do whatever I want without a care of what I am gonna do next or not do next! I like this !

=)

exams exams!

In contrary to what you might think(yeah correct, which is what you think I might think) I am gonna blog about, it is not. Well except the first paragraph.

3 papers down already so far! After 3 papers, I can come to a conclusion that today's one was not good. I am not going to say too much on it just so that I would not happen to jinx myself. Well, you never know. Haha

Well, recently there were times when during revision, my mind would wander and think about rubbish, i.e. stuff not relevant to what is in front of me. This ranges from what I am going to do once I first touch down on Brunei, to how many points LeBron James's gonna score in tonight's game to whatever. One of em was the long debated effectiveness of exams.

Sometimes I wonder whether exams are more of a memorization test to see who had better memory or really a test to see how much one could understand the material. In the first 2 papers I had for example, there were loads of stuff that I had to gobble up memory-wise. Stuff like definitions and a few examples for each particular emm.. waddaya call that, topic? You memorize so much, and all that comes up is only about 15 % of what you memorized. LOL.

Sometimes I feel its getting silly. We spend a year waking up early sacrificing valuable sleep time to attend lectures, rushing from lectures to home n to lectures n spend nights re-reading notes ( haha.. rarely done thou) bla bla. Not only that, for some(like me), we sacrifice our time we get to spend with our families, and all the yummy foods, to come all the way to a foreign land. Yeah seriously we do learn stuff in the lectures or practicals throughout the course of time here. BUT. What happens in certain subjects' exams is that they ask for definitions, examples bla bla, they'd it'd seem foolish to note memorize to prepare for em.

Somehow, I feel for those whose mothertongue ain't English(and also possibly some whose mothertongue's English), there is this higher chance that our command of English is not that strong which limits how we express what we interpret of something. Thus, our without-the-book defining of a term would be insufficient to cover what the term really means. Thus, what happens? MEMORIZE.

From: link

So, I was wondering recently, walao, if this course was all about memorizing, I could have just got all the notes, and just memorize every single damn term n whatever-there-is-to-b-memorized from Day 1 itself. Err wait. What course am I in again? Definitely not a 'memorization-techniques' course eh?

Besides, I feel that the scheduling of such exams that requires massive memorization is really important. Imagine you had an exam on the day before this paper. Chances are most likely you'll not do as well as when you have a couple of days before this one. Why, you might ask? Simple. Coz you don't remember stuff you memorized like 3 days back or maybe 2 weeks back during one of ur revision sessions. LOL. Why again? Cause err, we have like another 9 subjects to revise plus any other random stuff that utilises the brain of yours.

From:link

Im talking bout term definitions once more. Most likely you'll remember the outline of how something works, lets say emm, the steps involved in drawing a PERT chart for example. But most likely not those definitions! Well, one might have a case to say, that revising makes it easier to memorize. Well, in a way, I agree too as it works in my case. Besides, one might also say, revising makes you understand the material. Understanding material = easier to memorize. True too. But the 3 lines-definition of what is 'data re-engineering'? Ahh, I think a probable good point. BUT, you'd still have to most likely dig through these the DAY before the exams, which explains why I think the schedule of such exams are very important. Hahaha.

Come to think about it, sometimes all the 9 months of hardwork comes all the way down to the placement of the last day before ur exams. If ur brain decides to rebel, n bring ur mind all over the place instead of storing those definitions, mati. If ur brain decides to be good to u, and go to super-mode, any definitions also masuk, Sui. So what's the most safest way when applying to a course? Ask the one whose in charge of the exam schedule, when is this exam gonna be? Is there a few days preceding it for me to study or not? LOL

From: link

So, yeah thus sometimes I feel its a wee bit silly to use exams to judge one's understanding of the course. Ahh, how bout coursework then?? No memorizing, just applying what you've learnt and ur work will be individually assessed. Wonderful eh. Well, not exactly. In reality, courseworks are sometimes marred with people with good brain-manipulation-plus-superior-social skills getting the edge over honest & diligent in studies straight-forward people who don't know a thing about the word 'deceit'. Might sound silly, or childish. But it runs all the way in any levels of education. (Or maybe most)

From: link

Lol. Its true! I've seen over n over again, people seemingly not knowing much about a particular course score better than one who is diligent throughout the course. Why? The good-in-talking-n-going-about dude ask a bit here, and a bit there. Sometimes, even the lecturer becomes victim n leaks out a clue or two. The honest, but sadly dumb in this case dude, sits in front of his PC throughout and tries his best, never asks anyone, thinking this is INDIVIDUAL work. LOL. He goes home wondering, walao eh, work so hard also so low for the coursework. Nau hia.

Yeah, so this shows that the questionability over the efffectiveness of coursework in assessing one's understanding too!!! LOL.

******

Cialat. So how like that? Is there a proper solution to this?

From: link

Some of the possible solutions :

Solution #1:
Exams that test you not on definitions, but ur understanding. Hoho. I think this one's effective. BUT.. Its too scary for the students. If you don't know ur stuff, you'd be dead for sure. Good right? But maybe not too. Here's why. I feel sometimes, lecturers just cover way too much in such a short period of time that we tend to not catchup. Yeah, they say you could ask, but damn its just way too much plus its the fundamentals leh! Paiseh man. Study by myself ok. Ok.. But what happens? Study break too short, insufficient time to learn n prepare at the same time.

Solution #2:
Exams that have the right mixture of elements that require memorizing and also understanding. Perfect! Memorize as much as you can without really understanding and you could pass! Well, nah, not as effective right? Not as scary as compared to the latter, for the students thou' hahaha.

Solution #3:
Every 2 weeks once, assessed in-class-only practical or test sessions. Maybe 10% of overall marks each. No copying. No going about. Just basically testing ur knowledge on the subject material learnt during the past 2 weeks. Not too much needed to memorize either in this case eh since its only 2 weeks worth of material.

Possible schedule:

1st n 2nd week lectures.
3rd week - Test week.

3rd week's programme:
Monday,Tuesday - Study break.
Wed to Fri - Practs/test

4th n 5th week lectures
6th week - Test week.

.
.
.
.

How's that sound? Will you forget, what you've learnt at week 3 during let's say week 12 of the course? Yeah most likely, if the test's material is only built upon 2 weeks worth of work. Why not tests focusing 70% on the 2 weeks' worth of work and 30% worth of previous weeks' work??

Sounds good to me.. Any suggestions people? Im sure there are. Hahaha. Let's revolutionize the education system! LOL. Go ahead. Spam my cbox.

Well.. Not this 'spam'. Hahaha. From:link

work work work!

Hey folks,

Just a follow up on the previous post, yeah, I've managed to ignore those "give up" calls and plough my way through thus 1st assignment was successfully shot down(possibly 20 marks in the pocket)! Just as recent as yesterday the 2nd one was also shot down(10 marks hopefully!) Yay! A free Saturday coming up!

However thou, we were presented with another one yesterday. DAMN.. which means more ploughing to be done!!! Ahh!! 'Perseverance' is the keyword at the moment.. To be honest, life's hectic here in Year 3. Heard from a mate, Year 2's workload wasn't like that. No wonder, the Head of Year 3 group once said that Year 3 is going to be a really demanding year for us all..

I find that life here is not the same as back home.(duh of course.. haha) Besides the weather and the food, the mentality of people here is different too. Well there's the regular group of slackers in class but, majority of them are simply hardworkers or simply brilliant! I have this coursemate who seems to have this super-brain which enables him to answer simply any questions thrown to him by the lecturers. Heck, he even sometimes corrected the lecturers!! Mind you, I have lecturers which are book authors(which means that should be expert in their fields) themselves. Walao.. But strange thing is this dude doesn't seem to look every single bit like a "smart student" with his super long hair and such. However, of course, it ain't right to judge one that way, I just think he's just super brilliant! Btw, I have a lecture with super long hair too! hahaha.. He's a professor btw. LOL! Summarising all in a sentence, competition in this part of the world is high..

Anyways to the UBD-ians reading this, make sure you chop those papers into bits in the upcoming exams aight! All the best n good luck!

SmilE!

Frustration

The title says it all.. Frustration!

I've mentioned in the previous post about the work thrown to me .. The one I'm currently on involves programming..

Those who have done it will certainly have experienced this. Solving a programming problem which you are stuck on for quite a while would give you the best damn feeling in the world. On the other hand, getting stuck in a problem for a long time, is super frustrating and hair whitening(is there such a word?) !

I'm currently facing the latter! "HAHAHA". I've been dedicating hours and hours(a few days in fact) typing code just to get an algorithm to work right. I've failed to solve it till now.. Deadline's looming, whilst more work piling.. sheesh.. I can't remember the last time I got stuck in one for so long. Its just only a question! Oh my.. One which is carrying around 10 marks for my whole course! Gosh.. My patience is seriously wearing thin at this moment. There are even thoughts of giving up and just turning the half-baked code..

God bless me, God bless you. May I get over this hurdle asap!!! (cause I've have to deal with other stuff too!! eek..)

s n t wk!

Yeah you have seen it over and over again.. balik balik.. sama title eh?!

Yep, I was involved in the S&T week which sadly ended today with a fiery feasty Counter-Strike session in which I managed to get over a 100 kills for the first time ever coz I'm usually anti-CS.

Professor Foo demo-ing with the Wii controller


One of the activities.. card sorting

Overall, it was very fun, happy, tiring and even has one of my most embarassing moments ever I think!

Do look at Chee Huat, CK, Ing and Geok Yi's blog for info. and the pics taken throughout the week

The OGDC booth had this cool game, its called Magic Pen. You ppl should try it! Click on the link.

Anyways, for the first time ever, the CS department had this brilliant idea to organize a challenge similar to AXN's Amazing Race, which was called the "CS Amazing Challenge". It involved solving challenges after challenges in the shortest time possible. Of course, the team that clocks the least time will win!

We as volunteers on the other hand were handed tasks to organize a challenge. The challenge that I was in charge of along with Hazwan is the Biology Challenge. What does it involve? Hoho.. running around the bamboo garden (whatever it is called) near FOS, recording all the different species of bamboos(Miss one bamboo type, go back to search it! No cincai hahahaha) and also finding and collecting 5 of a type of dry fruit.

The bamboos!

Whoa.. We required participants to write the Scientific Name.. Not the Malay one hahaha!

The undisputed "most common" species of bamboo - Every team found this


Now.. the evil bamboo that caused most teams to go back
searching the whole field.. MUAHAHA

Surprisingly, a lot of ppl never knew that there were these labels in UBD! Some even thought Hazwan and I were the ones who placed those labels. haha

Overall, the CS Amazing Challenge is a brilliant idea, and I would really wanna be a part of it as a participant instead of a volunteer if I had the chance to! It looks really fun!

Oh, the embarassing moment...

What happened?

There was this trick whereby the performer can so-called "read what number is in your mind"
It is actually based on binary, thus the link with our booth.

Heh.. after much persuasion from some of my mates, I decided to try it on some innocent looking primary kids which happened to stop by. Muahaha.. "Show off time"

Me: Ok, "Pick a number between 1 - 63 ok? Remember it, and don't say it out aloud ok?"

Kid: Nods

*Magician wannabe me does all the steps required by this trick. Ok, should be correct liao eh.. "
* Then does a facial expression which makes it seem that I was thinking hard...

*Ok, enough liao la, now the Moment!

Me: Hmm.. Your number is xx ?!

* The crowd went silent, looking at the kid for the "WA!" and open-mouth look..

0.5 sec... No effect, maybe he thinking lar..
1.0 sec.. Still no effect, maybe he too shocked to even respond.. HAHHAA
1.5 sec.. HE SHOOK HIS HEAD!
2.0 sec.. I realised that that is a NO!
2.2 sec.. The crowd burst into laughter and my faced was flushed with this warm hot rush .. ahahaha

Few sec later..

Me: okok! I did it on purpose. Come let me try it again.. *Eyeing on the kid's friend
Me: OK Ready? Pick a number from 1 - 63 ah..

Thru' the steps again...

Hahaha.. this time sure correct for sure.. I did it far more slower..

Ok, on to the last step..

Take a deep breath, pauses..

Me: "Your number must be xx?!"
Kid's fren: nO!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Same responses after that.. Gosh.. Lucky Mr Chong came in and saved the day, and make sure the trick really do work..

Conclusion: Bern, u lousy trick performer!

Speechless.. LOL

Ok, end of post

Good day people!

scent of freedom

2 more days to freedom!!! May God bless my last paper!!!