The first written test over here in Wuhan was held today. With the theme park trip the previous day, it had me all hyped up to do things including studying so the roomies and I revised together the previous night to make sure we had our basics right. Overall, I think the paper was manageable but I had poor time management skills. I did not have time to really complete my paper, let alone check it.
After the test, I headed for lunch with Sheila at the Muslim restaurant. I don't like to see myself as a creature of habit but seeing how we have to take into consideration the strict diet we have to follow due to our religion, it does not provide us much choice but to frequent the Muslim La Mien Restaurant. It's pretty good actually but I would like to try the various foods that Wuhan has to offer.
Reflection: I am not satisfied with myself for the work that I have submitted for the test. I don't believe it was a display of my utmost capability and understanding of Project Management because I was rushing through the paper. I am upset with myself but I will take this in stride and see it as an opportunity for me to do better in future [for the PM Exam].
On a different note, I would like to try more of the different foods in Wuhan. I want to make this trip worthwhile and not leave with any regrets.
After much contemplation, I decided to tag along for the trip to the theme park. I initially was against the idea seeing the amount of work I had waiting for me. On top of that, it was their Golden Week in China and thinking of the amount of people around really put me off. But I decided to go anyway because all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.
Upon reaching, I was slightly confused to see that the access to the theme park wasn’t pay per entry like how theme parks usually are. Over here, it's pay per ride. I’d find the prices steep if I were a native/local Chinese. Just sayin'.
I only tried 3 of the rides because the others didn't seem thrilling enough. Even so, it wasn't as gripping as I expected it to be.
This ride would have me screaming if it had been longer than how it was. In other words, it was too short and a very huge anti-climax.
The ride in the picture above was the most fun I believe there was at the park. On top of it swinging like a pendulum, we were being rotated constantly with our height from the ground getting higher and higher. This ride still wasn't enough for me but it left some feeling sick.
Reflection: All in all, the day was a fun one. I'm glad I didn't coop myself up in the room to do my assignments and study because that isn't the sole reason why I came to China. Sometimes, I have to learn to loosen up and learn to enjoy things because if not, I'd miss out on a lot of things. Also, this trip bonded us more as we could spend time together without the added weight of shopping bags and tired feet from walking around too much.
Another day of shopping where I initially intended to get nothing but returned to the dorm with 2 pairs of shoes, a scarf, pants and a top. Anyway, what happened on the way to the shopping district made me proud to be Singaporean.
Reflection: Despite having National Education classes in primary/secondary school, I've never exactly felt the urge to be any more patriotic than I've ever needed to be but after listening to an old man speaking highly of us to another stranger on a bus made me proud of where I come from. It feels good to hear other people's perspective on us because it sheds light from another angle on how we Singaporeans are. As a native, I have grown immune to all the good that happens around me so much so that I can only see the negative things. Like how [even in school] people just brush past you to get into the elevator when you're not even out yet. Or how people lack courtesy and don't appreciate your holding the door open for them by not even bothering to smile or say thank you. It's because I've been staying in the country for so long that I fail to see that there is some good too. Like having neighbours of different races to exchange different foods [yes, my family actually does that]. Or how you don't have to be wary of the people in your surroundings and feel safe walking alone at night.
Being away from home, I see how I've been taking things for granted. Things are safe, stable and I don't have to worry about clashes or getting robbed. Also, I've never realised how privileged we actually are to have education compulsory and I don't know, education is so much more easily available to us than it is to other parts of the world. I know the previous paragraph isn't all that related to this but I feel that this is what makes Singapore a wonderful place to live in. In Singapore, even the poor are given equal opportunities for work and education to break out of the poverty cycle. Like our 6th NE message:
We have confidence in our future.United, determined and well-prepared, we have what it takes to build a bright future for ourselves, and to progress together as one nation.
Together as a nation, we have it in our hands to mould a better future for the generations to come. With the absence of apartheid it makes things easier on people to improve their current state of living and not feel discouraged or be robbed off the opportunity to do something worthwhile just because of financial restraints or anything of the like. ----------------------------------------------------------------------
For the day, we went about shopping and at the end of it all, we had Pizza Hut for dinner. The bill amounted to 300ish yuen and we were converting it back to our money and saying how cheap it was. But it certainly is steep a price for the locals. Anyway, here are some of the photos.
Here we are on the 18th day of the trip. Things can start to get a little mundane if you don't know how to find things to do [besides school work and blogging]. So when a suggestion of going to the KTV lounge popped up, I agreed without much hesitation. After all, I've never been to one. So off to my virgin KTV trip we went!
We had dinner at McDonald's first only to find that the wonderful weather we had earlier on was playing hide and seek with us. It started to rain but it didn't dampen our spirits. Eliza and Yu Haw booked the place earlier so after dinner, we all headed there.
Costing 480rmb, we had a whole room to ourselves and albeit the somewhat off-key singing, it was a great deal of fun. I never have figured that going to a KTV lounge would ever be any more interesting than sitting at a coffeeshop but I guess I was proved wrong today. I thought that a place like that would be for old people to sing their lives away but I should have never been so quick to judge.
Reflection: Previously, I have never been inclined to try singing at KTV lounges. Every time an offer comes up, I'd be quick to turn it down. Perhaps it's because of how the television portrays these kind of places and also my parents' strong dislike towards adults who bother wasting time at said place. Sometimes, you can't help but to generalise the certain type of people who go to a certain type of place because of the negative experience that you've faced. However, the flaw in that is people are not alike. The reason why I didn't turn down this offer was because I'm on a foreign land and I find that I'd be at a loss if I intend to stay within my comfort zone.
Truth be told, I don't see myself as an adult and going to lounges to sing just because. It's a temporary thing with friends to let loose and laugh inwardly at each others' horrid singing. After all, we're only young once. Like Jason Mraz's latest album; We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things~ [No, we didn't steal things. We sang. We danced. That's it.]
When you look back on your life, you'll regret the things you didn't do more than the ones you did." H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
The day was fully utilized for the preparation of our interim project presentation. It had everyone rushing to complete their AON diagrams and Gantt Charts. People were shuffling from one room to another to have their project meetings and it certainly left us all famished.
Having been introduced to vegetarian food by Han Hui, we usually call for delivery along with him. So when we learned that the boss was offering us [HH, YH and HS] a free hotpot dinner at the vegetarian restaurant, we all tagged along because the food there isn't all that bad. The group of us went - even people that have never eaten there before. I felt that somehow, we were taking advantage of the situation and it wasn't very nice. But I guess the boss of the place didn't exactly mind. He was being really hospitable and arranged more seats to accommodate us all.
Reflection: It's rare to be received with such good hospitality back at home. Besides Zac's Place near Arab Street, I've never been to a place where I've been treated so well [well, at Zac's we don't get free food. just heavily discounted]. Having taken Customer Relationship Management last semester, it's a real example of how relationship marketing can bring you better business. If a business goes the extra mile to establish a relationship with its customer, it's highly likely that the customer would frequent the place. Also,
My physics teacher in secondary school was a very interesting person and to engage us, he would drop a little philosophy along the way. It sparked my interest in the field but what we shared in the classroom was the beginning and the end of my brief stint with the former.
So, when the Chinese lecturer said that we would be covering Chinese Philosophy, she immediately caught my attention. We covered Confucianism, Taoism, Moism, the Legalists, Logicians and also Buddhism.
Confucianism represents the collected teachings of the Chinese sage Confucius, who lived from 551 to 479 BC. His philosophy concerns the fields of ethics and politics, emphasizing personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice, traditionalism, and sincerity. The teachings of Confucius weren’t only spread throughout China but also neighboring countries like Korea, Japan and even Vietnam.
Having humanity as its core, the teachings of Kong Zi can be classified into the following categories for Confucianism: Humanity, Rite, Rectification of Names, Doctrine of the Mean, on the Heaven and the Spirits and Government by Virtue.
Okay, I shall not be longwinded and type out things that anyone can Google. I love the teachings that were brought up during the lecture. It showed me that we’re all better off as realists and being wicked towards each other wouldn’t do anyone any good. People nowadays are shallow and go to great extents to achieve or strive for unimportant achievements that don’t even guarantee them a good job with a high paying salary. Sure, you’re book smart but you need street smarts to get around too.
Reflection: Different religions and racial groups exist everywhere. In Singapore, we have the Chinese, the Indians, Malays and Caucasians/Eurasians and there are obvious differences among us all in terms of appearance. However, the way we act have is rather homogenized and besides the skin color, the only difference would be our religions. Because we've been living with each other for so long, it has been cultured that we develop sufficient tolerances and have grown seasoned towards the different practices of the different racial groups.
Like the 2nd NE Message:
We must preserve racial and religious harmony.
We value our diversity and are determined to stay a united people.
Having to gather at the gate at 12.15pm, we all had vegetarian brunch together in Han Hui’s room before we left. We took a 4 hour bus ride to a neighbouring city to board the cruise. As mentioned previously, the condition of their places aren’t exactly the best. Perhaps it’s due to them being a big country thus making it more difficult to manage as compared to our city state. Seeing how we’ve all been told of the video required for our IS component, everyone seized this opportunity to capture a lot of stuff. We barely stayed in our rooms other than when we had to sleep because everyone was running around trying to capture well-enough footages for the project.
Here we go:
The first night on the cruise, we all stayed outside to enjoy [or freeze, rather] the breeze and the night view of parts of Hubei and the mountainous areas. There wasn't much to do and we spent the time walking around the ferry. I can't exactly recall what time it was but all of us were called to the top when the ferry reached the locks.
Having briefly studied this in Introduction to Freight Forwarding, I found it rather interesting to see what I've learnt being enacted. The image at the top shows us entering the first ever lock and the bottom one shows the gate closing behind us.
After waiting for quite some time and seeing the water being pumped, the gates finally opened! Ok, no the bottom one isn't the image of the other side. It's just the first lock of 5 at the next part of the dam. Click here to read on how a dam lock works.
A few of us intended to stay up to witness the ferry moving through the locks but it took too long and we all headed to bed instead.
The view of the mountains in the morning. The morning after, we all left the ferry to get on smaller boats to get a little closer to nature at the Witch Goddess Creek. [ 巫山神女溪]
The view there took my breath away [and so did the cigarettes from selfish smokers]. It's uncommon to be this close to nature in Singapore besides Bukit Timah Hill. Sometimes, I dislike that we're a concrete jungle but home is home regardless.
Next, we went to 白帝城 where we snapped a gazillion more photos [of which I can't upload because I've exceeded the limit]. It was another breath-taking sight and I wished that my family was there with me just because.
Reflection: Having seen a side of Hubei apart from the busy streets and even busier people, I saw a side of the country that seems so peaceful and close to nature. Sometimes, when the going gets tough, all I want to do is get away to someplace quiet and pleasing to the eye - probably somewhere away from people and closer to nature. It's hard to find that in Singapore. There isn't exactly a space to sit and calm your nerves besides cafes. Not until recently, we haven't any sites that actually enables people to closer to nature besides reservoirs. But with spaces like the tree top walk and such, I guess us Singaporeans can get a little close to the flora and fauna that way. Like one of the NE Messages, we have turned a challenge [lack of land hence the need to clear areas for development. thereby leading to loss of forested areas] to an opportunity ['forest walk through reservoirs to make up for the lack of natural sites]. This isn't exactly a reference to the original NE message so I'll include it in another post k?
I shall end this post with photos taken at the 3 Gorges Dam. Having been a Geography student, I've learnt of all these things and I guess I threw all the information back at my teacher after the O Levels. But seeing all these things that I've studied for in the past in real life, it makes me happy to know that I graduated from school with not only a certificate but also some lessons and interesting facts that we sometimes hardly notice around us.
And I can't remember where exactly this was but we had a choice. To either climb up the steps or pay a few yuen to have something like a gondola lift send you up the slope.
The first written test over here in Wuhan was held today. With the theme park trip the previous day, it had me all hyped up to do things including studying so the roomies and I revised together the previous night to make sure we had our basics right. Overall, I think the paper was manageable but I had poor time management skills. I did not have time to really complete my paper, let alone check it.
