I have finally bought my DSLR which I have been wanting it since forever.

My passion for photography goes as far as  I was a primary school student. I remembered vividly during the CCA orientation session. Every CCA had their own booth and we had to basically go to their respective booth and get our forms filled up.

I was standing the middle of the hall and glancing through all the CCA booth. Students were chattering and moving from booth to booth trying to learn about each CCAs. The photography club seems to entice me the most. I scoffed and walked towards the badminton booth instead.

As much as I love photography, I didn’t join it because as far as I know, that photography club was lame. Students will be given cameras and taking photos of school events. For example, if we were having a children’s day concert in the hall. You would  tend to see students around the hall taking pictures and what not.

2 words. Fuck that.
I’m not doing it.

Did I like wrote my entire life story regarding photography?

DSLR has always been expensive. They take amazing pictures. However, DSLR prices are going down and becoming more affordable. I decided to take this opportunity to get myself a DSLR.

I head down to the Sony Style store in Wisma Atria. My mum sponsored me $300 and I got myself the A500. In my opinion, the A500 is far better valued compared to the A55o. I bought the camera and the lens kit. It cost $1,299.

Vertical Grip

I got the vertical grip and 8GB memory card as free gifts.

Since I was at Wisma Atria and ION is just beside it. I decided to head down to Sephora and pick up a new foundation from MAC Cosmetics.

The images above were taken with my Sony DSLR A500.

I wanted the MAC Face and Body but it’s a mac pro item in Singapore. I got the Mineralize SatinFinish instead. It is expensive. It cost $61 for a bottle of liquid that is like 30ML.

Anyways, it was a great day. I absolutely love my DSLR and I love my new foundation though I still wish I got the MAC Face and Body. The following are just some random shows I did with my new awesome DSLR.

I've always wanted to do this kind of shots.

My eyes ain't close. I'm just looking down.

I’m thinking of starting a new blog where it’s strictly limited to posting of photos daily or opening a deviantart account or a flickr account!

School has been nothing but intense. I’m sure it’s all well worth it. I’m excited about getting my results. For this semester, I really did work my ass out. Hopefully, I can hit above the 10th percentile for the GPA polytechnic admissions to local universities.

Well, holidays are in. It’s a great thing. I have a few things up my sleeves that I’ve been dying to do but it was put on halt as school was my first priority and will always be.

I was feeling a tad gloomy that today marks the last day of school. The reason being is that we are parting ways. From next semester onwards, we will be taking electives and our class will change again and we’ll be having our internships and so on.

I think we all can agree that being in this new class is definitely better than our previous class, C190. Don’t get me wrong. C190 was filled with nice people, well not ALL but they are certain individuals who are rather pleasant in terms of personality.  However, in terms of working with them for assignments.. Nah uh I don’t wish to do that. I’d do the assignments on my own. I have enough bad experience.

Unlike my current class or soon to be ex class as well, most of us are rather talented, brilliant and very hardworking. It’s a much better class to study in. Group assignments are never a chore. Considering that this semester has been nothing but coursework in groups. I’m relieved that working in groups was easy and great. So far, it’s been great and enjoyable.

Well, I’m sure I did make my point clear. I like this class much more better than my actual real C190 class. My biggest concern or worry is regarding next semester, I hope I’m not in the class with the C190 people. I much prefer being this class. In any case, we’ll know when school begins again.

Meanwhile, I have several things to do during the holidays. I’m planning to revise on my french and hopefully improve on it as well. Picking up a DSLR and also some new photography skills and perhaps learn to code applications on the Mac OS X platform. Not forgetting that our NAPFA is next semester, I’d definitely have an intimate session with the gym equipments.

On a random side note, I can’t believe that we are approaching the third year. It all feels like yesterday when I was first admitted into Temasek Polytechnic. I feel that everything is going too fast and I’m becoming an adult way too fast and I’m not prepared at all. I still feel like a child and not ready for the workforce. Does anyone else feels the same?

I’m typing in this entry with heavy eyes. The reason being that I have not slept since yesterday! I’ve been working hard on my school assignment.

The past week has been a very tough week. We basically had two PBL subjects. If you don’t know what is PBL, let me give you a brief walkthrough.

PBL stands for problem-based learning. A PBL subject basically is about solving problems, real life problems humans like you and me encounter. PBL subjects are not like our typical subjects we’ve been taught in secondary school. In a PBL class, we are given a problem and then we would have to research on the internet or library to find a solution. There’s no usual spoon feeding from teachers.

Imagine having 2 PBL assignments due within the same week and they are only a day apart. The thing about PBL is that it requires a lot of time and individual researching and self study.

I’ll just get straight to the point. We pretty much did quite well for our first PBL assignment on Monday which was a subject called Business Integrated Technologies.  A second PBL assignment for Distributed Systems and Connectivity is due on Wednesday.

Mind you it is a programming subject. It’s not easy. We were too focused on Business Integrated Technologies to the point that we didn’t have enough time for Distributed Systems and Connectivity.

My groups and I finished our presentation and in my opinion, it went horrible. Basically we are suppose to design an application based on distributed systems.

I didn’t have time to complete my application and most of the functions are not working. Thus, I was standing infront of the class and talking like a fool without sleep and groggy.

My teacher asked whether if she gave us another day, will I be able to complete it?

That question seems to signify that I did not manage to complete to even hit the passing criteria and she’s considering giving me a second chance.

I shall not continue my blabber about how it’s tough for polytechnic students to enter into local university.

All I’m saying is that I’m upset.

I’ve been procrastinating on my school work.

Way to go Nazri!

I have always ponder if there is a flaw with Singapore’s education system. Do you think we study too much and did not have ample chance to apply what we have learn to real life settings? That is how I feel.

I had an opportunity lately to apply knowledge I picked up in school into real life settings. Recently, a good friend of mine that goes by the name of Kamelia, hey kamelia! a shout for you, you can check her online portfolio here and her blog here and her twitter here and her tumblr here. I’ll stop, I guess there’s no need to post her facebook profile or myspace profile or her address hah!

As I was saying, we decided to open a little business venture. Hey, don’t look down on us, everyone start small somewhere. I’ll release more information about this when we have finalized things. I’m glad I’m doing something useful in my life at this age.

Since I’m in Information Technology, I learn about computers including managing of databases. I managed to apply what I learned in school into this little business venture by drawing the database schema, normalized it into it’s third form and initialized it. Basically, I created a database which will store our customer and their order’s information.

The database is hosted off a server. I’m accessing it via HeidiSQL. In my opinion, this is better than keeping our records in a Microsoft Excel document and emailing each other to keep ourselves updated.

Hence, I feel happy that I did learn something useful after all in school.

On a side note, I am elated that I finally managed to upgrade my Macbook and my iMac to the lastest installment of the Mac OS X. Mac OS X Snow Leopard, 10.6.X and being a makeup enthusiast myself, I finally managed to grab my first makeup item from the famous MAC Cosmetics.

School has been amazing. I prefer my new class so much more. Lastly, I finally managed to give my blog a much needed new look!

What made you happy today?

• My Left 4 Dead 2 got delivered.
• I had fun at our Mac Pros Lab at Level 6 of the IT School.

Thanks to Ivor who suggested me on what to do!

What made you happy today?

As if anyone wanna kidnap me. I bet they’ll have a hard time. ahha. Does anyone get the joke?

In any case, some people can’t leave without their phones because it’s linked to their work stuff.
Below is all the reasons why I need my iPhone with me and why it’s the greatest phone ever! Well, other than the basic functions of calling, text, phonebook, I use my iPhone for…

PDA! I depend heavily on iPhone for school. I literally add everything that needed to be done onto my iPhone. I’m a scattered brain person. I forget things. I can check my timetable too!

My savior. Checking of bus timing. Heavenly.

TWITTER. I love twitter. I spam twitter. What is life without TWITTER?

Youtube. If you really need to know, I watch youtube more than television. My mum offered to buy a TV in my room and I said, “Can I get the money for the TV instead?” I’m not kidding.

Alarm! 1 2 3 Not only you and me! Got 180 degrees! Okay, That was the lyrics to Britney Spears’s new single, 3! No, I’m not saying that’s my alarm clock tone!

Remote Control! I can control iTunes on my iMac with this!

Email! It’s really nice integrating school email onto your phone!

Dictionary! LOL I’m kidding about the word I was searching.

The internet! It’s heavenly. I can check last minute announcement on our school’s website! Moreover, there’s TAB browsing, you know when you’re in firefox, you can open several pages at one time. Now, how many phones can actually do tab browsing?

The next app is probably one of my favorites. It’s called Shazam.

Let’s say you were listening to this music on the radio and you really like it but you have no idea who is the artiste or what’s the name of the song! Fret not, this is wehre Shazam comes in.

Basically you launch the app and let your iphone ‘listen’ to the song,

It will then analyze the song.

Well what do you know! It was Fuck You by Lily Allen!

Fmylife.com What is life without reading people’s misery on FML?

A voodoo doll application. I can torture everyone now. It’s has always been a dream of mine.

What fun will it be if I can’t burn them?

Other then that, I use my iPhone to check the news, the weather, a remote control for presentation, checking of movie times and to setup a ‘Fake Call’ to get away from those awkward social situations.

What are you waiting for now?

Go get an iPhone!

How many of you are actually happy in the course that you’re in? Did you get to choose what you wanted to study?

I’m in Information Technology. It’s about programming. You write codes and make programs on computer work. After I got my O Level results, I didn’t have much choice what I wanted to study. I wanted to apply to Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts but my parents didn’t allow. I wanted to study Aerospace Technology at Singapore Polytechnic but my score wasn’t good enough. I needed to minus of another 3 more points.

My mum told me, the business, information technology and the engineering sector are the strongest. As in the demand for people is always there. I’m sure everyone wants to be employed once they are graduated from school.

I think my future is screwed. I don’t wanna drag  myself out of bed each morning to work as a computer engineer. Truthfully, I don’t even like studying information technology. But I do not have a choice.  This might sound mean but I’m sure the best interest is captured at her heart. My mum only allowed me to choose courses  from Business, Information Technology and Engineering while I was applying for polytechnic. It’s because, as I’ve mentioned above, the demand is strong.

At that point of time, I was still 16, I was naive, I knew nothing about Business. I was like, “Well, I’m not going for Business, I don’t wanna sell things. I’m not going for Engineering either. Pure Physics in high school was terrible!” I was then left with information technology. So here I am today. A student in Temasek Polytechnic taking Information Technology.

I took Sociology and a Psychology elective in Temasek Polytechnic. I love it a lot. It really inspires me to be a Psychologist or a Sociologist. But I do like Sociology more than Psychology. I’ve checked with National University of Singapore that any students from any diploma can enter into their Psychology or Sociology course.

I don’t like studying in Information Technology. I do not know what to become in the future. I don’t know what I want to work as. Even though I like Sociology, what jobs are waiting for me when I graduate? I want to be a virologist too but at this point of time, it’s too late. I should have taken Biology in high school.

I do know that I don’t want to work a 9am to 5pm job in front of the computer everyday.

My mum told said that I can study whatever I wanna study after I have completed my diploma in Information Technology. The reason being is that, let’s say I’m studying psychology and I can’t find a job well at least I have a diploma in Information Technology and I can find a job in the IT area. Look at the world today people. Open your eyes bigger, even though I really can’t since I’m Asian. You get measly pay with a diploma. I’m not gonna use that as my backup plan in case the current sector I’m in was hit badly with retrenchment! I wanna go for at least a degree.

I’m 18 now, 2nd year in polytechnic. I’ll be completing my diploma when I’m about 20. 2 years of NS, I’ll be 22. 4 years in University, I’ll be 26. That marks the end of my backup plan.  I wanna work as a psychology that means another 4 years in university to get my psychology degree. I’ll be 30 by then. I’m sure everyone wants to go for a PhD. I think it’s about 7 years. I’ll be 37 when I’m done with my education.

Great world I’m living in.

I’m worried about my future

But yet again, how many of us actually manage achieve your ambitions?

Basically now I’m having my lunch break in school and it’s an hour and a half long break.I wish there is 5 minutes of break for every hour of lesson instead. I reckon that the people in this class would eventually die out of hunger.

I think many people would know that I rarely go lunch since the food here taste so bad. Instead, of heading down and sitting on some random bench on the streets, I decided to stay in class alone. In class, the students tend to leave their bag and the school’s laptop. Do you know what that means? There’s a possibility that theft might happen. And the only person to be blamed is me, me and me. I know I won’t commit such acts. For fuck’s sake, the laptops are fucking ugly windows on HP machine. I am a Mac person.

I reckon Miss Chiang, my care person, something like our Form Teacher back then in high school trust me and don’t really mind that I’m sitting alone in the classroom. Miss Chiang is also the instructor who is running this course.

Other than students taking part in this course, there are also teachers who are participating in this course. This course cost about $8900. However, under some university alliance scheme, we are heavily subsidized till the point we paid only $400 and other random small fees for learning materials.

Enough of background information!

As everyone was about to leave for their break, one of the teachers was suggesting, is it safe to leave their laptops in the classroom. Miss Joanna knows that I tend to stay in class all the time. And she said that she’ll be leaving her laptop here she knows I’ll be here to take care of things supposedly.

The other 2 female teacher, whatever their name is, truthfully I don’t even know, was quite appalled to know that a student is in the classroom alone with all other student’s bag and thousands and thousands dollars worth of school laptops.

She said, “Nazri, You’ll be staying here alone?”

And I nodded my head.

And the other female teacher was giving a nasty look to the female teacher that talked to me and saying something super soft. I can pretty much tell from her expression that whatever is being mentioned is not nice. Her imagination running wild.

PURE PREJUDICE I TELL YOU.

I know what’s my first impression like. I’ve asked my mum whether I look decent, like the study kind type of person and she said, no. Well, let me describe vaguely. My hair is long, emoish. Dyed hair. From the hair, you can probably tell something about being a deviant.

The fact that I’m not a deviant. I’ve never broken any of the school rules. In my former class, I am one of the most hardworking person. I do most of the work in group projects. I produce quite good but not excellent exam results.

In my entire examination history in Temasek Polytechnic, the lowest score I ever got is a C+. Everything else is B and above. C+ has a gpa of 2.5. My current cGPA stands at 3.62. As far as I know, Mr Mark Philip said that the current cGPA required to enter into a local university is 3.5. I’m doing pretty darn well in school actually.

How dare she even looked me and judged me like I’m some kind of deviant who will commit such foolish acts.

Okay maybe I’m exaggerating a little. For reading part, there was some words I stumbled upon because I was a tad anxious. I scanned through the text, the most complex word were amateur and magnesium sulphide. Easy Peasy.

As for the pictures, i rattled on non stop and I am not kidding. I said practically everything until I became quiet and the examiner asked, “Is that all? We’ll moved on to the conversation.”

SHE DIDN’T ASKED ME ANYTHING REGARDING THE PICTURE PART.

FREAKIN’ AWESOME.

The conversation was about friends which is so easy. She basically asked, Did anyone ever asked you to do a difficult task. And I said difficult as in beyond my ability to help someone? She then further explained..

The next question was, where do you usually make friends? I said school, orientation camps, school again on how we meet each other everyday and etc.

The last question was, have you ever had a conflict with a friend. I told them about my Denise & Adelene saga. LOL. And then the examiner finally asked “So are you still talking to them?” I said dramatically, “Sadly, no.” AND THEY BOTH LAUGHED!

To be honest, my conversation part wasn’t that good. I wasn’t talking in a very coherent manner. It’s like I’m on the spotlight and I’m only given a few seconds to think and compose it. Furthermore, I didn’t give a lot of points. I gave 1 point and then elaborate as much as i can on that.

All in all, I am very pleased with it.

And lastly, I MET LIKE A FEW OF MY PRIMARY SCHOOL FRIENDS WHO ARE RETAKING O LEVELS TOO. That’s great since I’m able to go with them!

Anyways, you know there’s like 3 groups and 6 examiners. F150, F151 and F152. I was in F151. One of the examiners in F150 was my secondary 1/2 history teacher. LIKE OMG. And one of the examiners in F152 is one of my choir teacher that I know for years and she’s freakin’ awesome and great teacher. LIKE DOUBLE OMG.

I was really hoping I got my ex choir teacher so I wouldn’t feel that nervous. Yes I am that unlucky, I got into the group that I know none of the teachers that were examining me.

IT WAS LIKE, HI MISS MELISSA CHIN. She’s awesome and she left my school when we were in secondary four and everyone was devastated..