Post exam shopping and stuff(:

Block test one finally ended, and towards the end, it was more like "wish it would end" rather than "I wanna do well!"

The day when blocks ended I went home ate and slept for the whole day. It was pure nirvana I swear.

Okie so I went out with mom the next day for food and then we shopped around.

First off at Popular...

 

AND IS THIS NOT LIKE THE CUTEST WALLET EVER AHAHA!
Please DO NOT buy me this, I am serious. I won't be able to use it. :D

HAHA a larger version! so cute!

Okay so here is the shallow part of my blog, with selfies and what not.
I see the first one as a potential DP! Bahahahaha.

I bought the white outfit with skirt in the end because I really liked it! :).

And I tried the blue blouse, it was pretty good, but I didn't want to buy so many. I tend to feel guilty if I buy too much things.

P.S. I think contacts are wayyyyy better than specs. I mean I look so much younger!

But aiyah not worth the trouble, like cornea abrasions and what nots haha..

While we were waiting for food, there was a burst of sun, so of course I had to take selfie right! (Partly because it was a new phone heh xD)

 

For those of you who keep asking about the eyes, yes it is contact lenses (black, diameter 16.5mm, I think it is barbie if I am not wrong, and I bought them from here)

Lust to Lush is fantastic for me, because I can buy just one pair at a time, for mine it is only S$9.00, with mailing it is 10 bucks. Still pretty good. I like the ones I am wearing because they can be put in super easily, unlike Clearlab, whose lenses I always have trouble putting them in. Both are comfortable, it is just that the curvature is different, me thinks?

Anyway, Lust to Lush is fabulous, just saying :D

(Wow okay, the eyes are really a bit too shiny, blearrrgh)

Yep, and I got a pair of heels at a good price, will post photo sometime later.

ASEAN youth forum today, damn tiring and hot and tedious, but I made friends! I liked everyone in my group muhhahas :) They were so nice:)

Yes, that's me again, a very sad photo because I was so tired and warm, but hey the lighting it good. What do we do when there is good lighting?

WE ZIPAI AND ZILIAN shamelessly.

Like what I do.

Yeah come Monday I will stop because school starts and school always kills my spirit.

Oh yes yes, for my coming birthday, just in case you like Den or Sluggy who like people to tell them what to buy, you can get me any of the following! 

• Old Town White Coffee, hazelnut is preferred.
• Pilot Maica pens (black/blueblack/blue/purple/brown)
• Contact lens (black/brown) from Lust to lush (degrees: 4.5 and 5.0)
• CUTE stuffed toys

I know it is like "aiyo so shameless" but isn't it better than people spending a lot of money buying you stuff that you don't dare to use? Because it is too nice and too expensive? Like I get wayyy too expensive diaries and stuff, from HQ and Sluggy. Ooah, okay maybe I should feel paiseh....

Please don't buy anything too expensive, like please please because I will feel really bad, and I don't have enough money to buy you stuff that's equally nice. Like that time Sluggy and JQ got me headphones that is close to $70, and till now I haven't gotten JQ anything good enough (but this year I have surprise for her, shhhh! :)))) *squeals in delight*). Sofffyyyy is okie I guess?

And if your birthday is coming, PLEASE TELL ME WHAT TO BUY! I really don't want to get you things that you are not going to use/ shelve away, so please tell me what you like? Like don't need to be shy de, because I will really appreciate it if you just tell me what to get! :)) Like Den, JQ, Leon (harrrrumph) and etc.

BUT NVM HAH, who cares. ^^||

Okie, that's all for now, will update about Asean Youth Forum soon! :))

Giraffe Says Goodbye

I read from here about the giraffe who nuzzled the dying zookeeper, who has been cleaning his enclosure for most of his adult life.

It is quite heartbreaking, yet so comforting to see such strong bonds between the giraffe and the zookeeper. It is like, there are no words exchanged, yet one knows that the other is sick, and the other knows that it knows that he is sick.

Source: The Independent

The look on the giraffe's face seems to be so concerned, and almost sad. It is like he could tell that he was going to lose a friend.

I sincerely hope that Mario, the zookeeper, would enjoy the last of his days in a relaxed, calm and happy manner with his family, the giraffe, and pray that a miracle would happen to him. :'(

What a rabbit taught me about Love

When I was in Secondary 2, I bought a baby rabbit in Shanghai because I believed that I loved it so much. My mentality then was that, because I loved it, I have to buy it, so that I can love it more.

My pet rabbit, Tutu.

I was wrong.

It took me three years to realize that my "love" for the bunny then was immature. I bought it because it was adorable, and I loved petting it, complacently thinking that loving an animal was so easy - it was all about petting and stroking it.

I was wrong.

It took me three years to realize that my supposed "love" for my rabbit was not real love at all. In fact I now wonder if the love was for Tutu, or for myself. It was a selfish form of love: I buy a rabbit and I put it inside the confines of a larger cage with occasional free times, just so that I could feel happy watching it nibble on carrot strips and do cute things like washing its face. All the while, I had declared to anyone who would listen to me, "I loved my rabbit Tutu." when in fact, I am really, selfishly loving myself.

Why? Because loving something isn't about making yourself happy and arrogantly believing that just because you are happy, the object of your affection is, therefore, also happy. It is about being more selfless (I say "more", because I suppose that absolutely selfless love is a rare commodity), and putting the welfare, the needs and the sentiments of the item of your adoration before your own.

On a whole uglier picture, consider this:
A man claims that he loves you. Because he loves you so immensely, he must have you for himself. He keeps you locked in a house, brings you food and takes you on occasional outings to have fun. He also makes love to you, why? Because he declares that "he loves you".

Is that loving you? Or himself?

We can see so much more clearly here that the man is most likely to be loving himself, and it is doubtless that that is a very very twisted, psychopathic form of love.

Was my supposed "love" for my rabbit any better? It wasn't.

What have I done for my rabbit that had made its life better? Nothing lasting. Petting, I learnt, is a very very shallow form of love, also the easiest type of love that often stems from self-satisfying needs.

My form of love is insufficient because I couldn't, and I didn't do anything for it. If it had been bought by another owner who had given it a much better hutch filled with soft hay, a decent water bottle, a shelter from the cold, and plenty of variations in food, that would have been love for the rabbit. Instead of me, who kept it in a bare cage, left to my grandfather's care and very often exposed to the cold, no lining, no nothing.

I did it so so much wrong.

If loving is about grand words and speeches, then my feelings would have been considered love. I spoke often about getting my rabbit a new hutch, hay, organic carrots and grains, but none of these materialized. My whole family must have been taken in by this grand appearance of love, because they said that I was crazy concern over the rabbit, a title that is far too noble for my selfish self.

I learnt from then that genuine love is about a consistent show of concern, not a pontification of ideals, much less empty words and no action. My grandfather must have loved it more than I did, because when I returned home, he was the one who took care of the bunny tirelessly, cleaning its cage and clearing out its poop, remembering to provide for it daily. What are my empty words of passing concern ("Is Tutu doing well?") compared to this loyal display of concern and care? Delving deeper, my grandfather took such care of it because he knew it was precious to me, and he loved it like he loved me.

Never once did I hear my grandfather speak of the rabbit fondly, much less claim that he loves it. He complained about having to clean up after it so frequently, and always having to wake up early to buy it fresh vegetables, grumbling that it is such a hassle to a busy doctor like himself. While I indulged myself in whimsical, dramatic visions of a tear-inducing reunion with the rabbit, daydreaming about how it would bound up to me, its whiskers twitching in delight, my grandfather loved the rabbit silently and tirelessly.

I was so so foolish.

I didn't even notice when Tutu started to be less active and more sedentary, or when his bright red eyes lost their shine and started to look dull. I, with my superficial and selfish love, just continued to smile at the rabbit foolishly and sighing over how adorable it was to by lying on its side, when really, it must have been so weak that it couldn't move. I didn't notice it when it died.

My grandfather did.

He never shed a tear, merely wrapping it up in a black bag and tossing it to the bin. In a stark, almost ridiculously-comedic contrast, I played the part of a bereaved owner, crying and blubbering and once again, wailing that we needed a funeral for the rabbit. I wonder now, whether I was crying for the rabbit or for myself, and I now realize that my tears were as useless as my love - they were for myself.

I also only learnt, too late, that funerals are meant for the living and not the dead. There is little point in eulogizing the dead that we didn't appreciate it while it was living. I must have wanted to console myself for being a terrible owner that much.

A Korean drama taught me that,

The opposite of love is not hate, but that "I am sorry, I can't do anything for you."

I didn't love my rabbit because I did nothing for it and everything for myself. It was myself whom I loved from the start, and I was too much of an ignoramus to understand it.

It has to take me so long to realize that loving a person, or a thing, isn't really about telling the person, "I love you." but allowing the person to feel that you do. I understand now why my mother has never told me she loved me, but I am so absolutely sure about her maternal love. She, unlike me, has proven everything through everything she does. For one thing, she always keeps me on her mind, effortlessly, because I am that important to her.

She told me that love doesn't need words. She is right.

She also told me that loving a person means to put the person at topmost priority, to be always worried or anxious about the person, and about doing everything just to make a person happy. It is never really so much about making yourself happy, because that would be loving yourself.

She is right.

She said that love isn't about expecting what you can receive from the person, but about what you can give to the person.

She is right. Again.

My rabbit taught me to not mistake the love for myself to be a form of grand love for others, and that words really don't count that much. It taught me that loving someone is to be there when the person most needs you, and to give without anticipating returns.

It taught me how very very wrong I was to believe that "loving something" was enough.

It wasn't.

It was more about commitment, patience, endurance, care and concern that never wavered. My rabbit, and my family, taught me how to love truly, through their actions, not words.

Three years later, I am still learning to love genuinely and selflessly and at times, I still fail to do so. At the very least, I have learnt not to call feelings of affection "love" or to love something selfishly.

I am learning to devote and to commit to my family more than what I have done before, because love is also at the very basic, a form of responsibility. I think I will learn to do that eventually, because the last lesson I learnt about love, is that it can never be learnt fully.

Regards,
Kira

Hada Labo 3-in-1 Whitening Gel Moisturizer

Sponsored Review

Hey yo everyone, I am baaaack! :)

Today I have yet another cool stuff to share with you guys and more importantly, girls!

Hada Labo 3-in-1 Whitening Gel!

As usual, I have been using this for close to a month prior to this review, so you can read this feeling rest assured that I didn't just get a product, smell it and spout some nonsense! :)

I am totally loving the box it comes in, I mean, look at that shimmer!

shimmery box, yep!

Product Information straight from press release!
Hada Labo 3-in-1 Arbutin Whitening Perfect Gel contains 3 trinity efficacious ingredients that penetrate within and work on 
the skin synergistically:

• Natural Arbutin: High concentration levels at 3% of Japanese pharmaceutical-level Arbutin to offer effective whitening results. Enhances skin fairness and targets dark spots.
• Efficacious Vitamin C Concentrate: Proven anti-oxidant enhances collagen production, inhibits the appearance of dark spots and reawakens the appearance of dull skin.
• Hyaluronic Acids (HA) and nano-Hyaluronic Acids: HA is a natural component found on skin. The duo-HA molecules instantly hydrate and lock-in moisture, keeping skin soft, smooth & bouncy.

Did you managed to understand that? Maybe it is a little too long winded, so let me summarize it for you! Basically, the three best points about this whitening gel is:

1. Whitening effect + spots reduction
2. Keeps skin youthful looking
3. Moisturizes, makes skin soft smooth and bouncy.

And it is definitely not kidding about making your skin bouncy: immediately after application, skin becomes hydrated, smooth and more elastic.

Remember the advertisement from Hada Labo that depicts the soft, supple and almost sticky looking skin? Yes! That's almost the effect, but not that dramatic! Personally, I don't wish for my skin to be that sticky, especially not in the local weather because of the level of humidity!

 

So here is my verdict after almost a month long use:

• Very hydrating, very moisturizing! I love how it can immediately add moisture to my dry skin, especially after bathing or washing my face, the skin tends to dry out quickly.
• Makes one's skin smoother, and more supple! Check! That happened too! I realized that my complexion generally became less bumpy and dried out after usage.
• Whitening effect + radiant effect are not the most obvious, but still evident nonetheless. In fact, I am more relieved that it has not made me a ghastly shade of white after use because that would mean that it contains some sort of bleaching agent right? Since it did not, I can assume it safe and more natural!

Check out the pure looking, almost translucent gel texture! You will love it!

Don't forget to check out Hada Labo's Facebook page and join their Snow Princess game! You might stand a chance to win something - you never know if you never try~~! :)

Also, don't forget to redeem a free e Hada Labo Arbutin Whitening Lotion sample on SampleStore.com! Just head over to the link, create a free account, click on "Sponsored Samples" and choose the sample! As easy as 1, 2,3! :))

For those who are interested in purchasing the retail size, you can head over to any of the outlets listed below to purchase 80g (the size you see in my picture) for S$38.90!

• BHG
• Guardian
• NTUC
• OG
• Robinsons
• Sasa
• Unity
• Watsons

Trust me, it is worth it because you don't have to apply to much each time, just dab on the forehead and cheeks and massage them in. I have used it for a month and I keep feeling like the amount didn't decrease at all!

Till next time, see you all!

Stay beautiful! :)

What do you want to be in the future?

I know. In the face of the coming national exams that seems to more or less decide how the rest of our lives would be, I have been asked that over and over again.

I haven't been able to answer that question for a while.

Remember the scholarship fair last year? I went around there and took a look, the personnel at each booth asked me the same question. Initially I tried to be honest.

"I want to become a farmer."

A farmer?! They echoed in utmost surprise. Where can you go to become a...farmer?

Some lost interest after that, others told me that it was an unusual dream, a rare one. Certainly it was.

But the more I think about the rustic landscape, the openness of the pastures and the appeal of the nature, a simple cottage with all my own farm animals surrounding it, the more the idea appealed to me.

I searched around for images of farmhouses, and I am surprised to see them so grand. I am thinking more of a simple, small cottage, like the tiny tool shed in the left of the picture, but also situated within the green lands like this one.

Looking at it makes me feel so much happier.

I don't enjoy the rat race of city life, or the noise, much less the pollution. I am also not much of a social butterfly, preferring to be left alone to my own devices with less human interaction. I love animals however, and I keep thinking about how heavenly it would be to rear my own free range chickens, and to eat my eggs without having to worry about all the artificial hormones and antibiotics and whatnot.

Perhaps then I would turn vegetarian because I live with the animals that I am supposed to eat, and when we treat each other like family, like mutuals and connect more emotionally, it would be so much harder to think of them as a mere food product. Perhaps then I would learn to see chickens with their own personality, give them names like Sally, Jim and Pepper and not just see them as "chicken wings" and "yum! chicken breasts!".

Aren't these little fluffs adorable?
Maybe when we witness the growing up process, and experience how it is like to nurture a chicken in a humane way, we would be less tempted to eat it as compared to when we see them as mere food products.

"Hey, cuddle! Someone's taking our photo."

Although, I do admit that I am an absolute meat lover, and I believe that it would take me quite a lot of effort to change this habit. Maybe I won't be able to change it. Maybe I would be able to compromise with myself - I only eat those chickens who are already dead from AGE (not illness!)

Sustenance farming shouldn't be as stressful as commercial farming right?

Ooh, and I like cows! They are such relaxed creatures. Free range cows are probably happy creatures. Me thinks that I will only keep three. Any more than that I won't be able to have the time to pay attention to all of them.

The cows here look so stoned haha

I think it would be nice to try organic farming and all things organic and free range.

My mom and I keep discussing this over and over, like what animals to keep. So far we like:

1. 3 cows
2. 5-6 chickens
3. 2 dogs
4. 2 cats
5. 4-5 sheep/lamb
6. 2 goats
7. 1 horse and 1 pony
8. 5 ducks
9. 6 pigs and piglets
10. terrapins, fishes, koi, anything that live in a pond.
11. Maybe a tortoise. I like chillax things.

Aren't foster parents and foster children so adorable and sweet?

I think I would love to adopt any other animals that come to my farm, and not turn them away. It is so idealistic that even to me it sounds like a whole bunch of phony idealism. I mean, do I have the capital to do this? Would my crops grow? What if my animals fall sick?

I am still thinking about whether I should have internet connection and phone...I like the idea of being a hermit, but then connection is rather important.

Maybe internet but no Facebook?

Haha.

Dreams, they are so beautiful.
They make reality all the more harsh.

I know I haven't been blogging faithfully, because I am having a really busy time with the impending exams (school-based) and the looming prospect of A-levels!

I swear that once this year is over, I will redouble my efforts into blogging kay? :)

Cheers! :D

A Friend

I have a good friend since Primary 4.

Sometimes I wonder if the person can remain unchanging and guilelessly kind against the crashing of the tides and the fall of the pendulum, but then I would remember.

I remember the person being kind to me since my first day in a totally new environment in an alien school where I did not know anyone.

I remember the person giving me his own Chinese textbook when I didn't bring mine, forcing him to share with another person.

I remember the person almost always being the first to apologize whenever we argued, and at that time, I had always thought that it was because I was right - I wasn't. He was much more mature despite his innocence and he apologized first despite the fact that I was really just being a terrible, self-centered person like I had always been. Perhaps he understood that sometimes it wasn't about being right or wrong.

I remember the person laughing and saving up his money just to buy me fries in primary school - one dollar, mind you, was a large amount at that time.

I also remember that the person would always be there for me when I was bullied, and I remembered myself always trying to interfere when he was bullied. That sort of made primary school days more bearable.

I remembered too, that the person has the funniest ways of cheering people up, by giving them fishes and water snails and shrimps (live!!) and also a guppy and a goldfish. However, I also remember that the person loved his food so much that he won't offer me a second donut cookie despite my very not subtle hints like, "HEY THE DONUT IS GREAT! Where did you get them?"

In my memories, the person was sincerely the most tolerant, kind and compassionate individual I had met in primary school, despite the fact that he once tried to catch an earthworm with an oil filled plastic bag, on the basis that EARTHWORMS EAT OIL. (Earthworms eat sand! Not oil!)

Oh yes, the person has weird habits. Like being an absolute perfectionist (thank god he lost that), and being a stubborn OCD who checks under the table about ten times before going home, and forcing me to check it for him just to make sure that his eyes are not wrong. When I did, he would gleefully rush out of the classroom just to have me stamp my feet realizing that it was all a prank.

I always believed that no friendships can be maintained if you never even communicate in person for four years, but hey, it is strange yet awesome that we can talk like there was never a four year gap. Or that we have ever changed from our childhood selves.

There was no fear of criticism or judgments for being who I am when I speak to him, despite me becoming harsh, cynical and realistic. You realized he never judged anyone apart from jokingly, because he is such a darn good person that I doubt evil has ever entered his world.

So at times when I look at him and wonder how is it possible that he hasn't changed from that kind person he once was while I have changed so so much; my paranoid self also wondered if it could ever be possible if he, like so many others, would be befriending me for utilitarian purposes. An excess of exposure to harshness has made me fearful, paranoid and skeptical.

Then I remember, he wouldn't. Nor would it have mattered. You know that someone is a truly good friend when the person has been good to you not just in your best and most glamorous moments, but also stoically there with you in your worst and most pitiful moments and never looked at you with a discriminating eye.

You know, maybe, for this kind of friend, it is worth taking down your guards as well as a risk.

So, if you are reading this, and you know you are the person who made life bearable in primary school, thank you, sincerely and I will try to treat you better hehe. (Yeah I feel so guilty about being so bad.)

Some updates(:

I realized I haven't blogged in a while.

I suppose it won't be entirely true to say that I am so busy that I cannot spend half to one hour blogging, it is more of the fact that I usually pre-blog the post out in my head to see if I like how it sounds, and it usually results in two things:

1. I really really like the way it sounds in my head, but then I can't write it down instantly since I am usually on the bus, and by the time I have access to computer, the excitement over my imaginary post has died down. Has anyone ever mentioned that passion is very important?
2. I don't like the way it sounds in my head.

Sometimes I do sit down to write a post, only to stop enjoying what I am writing halfway (Man, that could be like a thousand words or so sometimes), and then I decide to scrape it all because I don't want to share things that I have lost interest in.

Okay anyways, I decided to rant a little bit. Again about things that some how tickle my nerves. Which I just saw somewhere to remind me how much I dislike it.

1. I don't really like daylight saints, or extreme saints. Yes, probably because I am the Wicked Witch of the West (wooh! that actually sounds cool, like WWOW) and I dislike anything cheerful and sunshiny and overtly warm and fluffy because I keep having the feeling that there would be a duality. Like you know, what is underneath all those sunshine? More sunshine? Where are the clouds? Ah, I am a freaking cynic and I love it. 

So it is like whenever I watch TV, and there are these saints riding around on their moral high horses and inundating the world with their high principles, I sit on my couch rolling my eyes so hard that if it could do a 360 swivel, it would. And saints preach almost the same thing, "Forgive and forget." Forget them saints, listen to WWOW, forgive but don't forget, who knows when you will get cheated and hurt again?

2. I really don't like Instagram and its wagon of stupid HASHTAGS. I would have hash-tagged that but thanks to the marvellous virus that my computer is suffering from, it is locking down my hashtag and I cannot hashtag. 

On a sidenote, it screwed up every other keyboard punctuation apart from my comma and fullstop and my apostrophe. *yells in frustration*

I think I have a teeny little right to announce my distaste for Instagram because I have used it before, and therefore I cannot be accused of "not giving it a chance". It is like, the App itself is not that bad, apart from the fact that it is like a virtual Vanity Fair with stuff like OOTD (Outfit of the day) and what LOTD (look of the day) and whatnots. It is like this constant grovelling for attention from others to assure oneself of one's existence (as rightly sited by a comprehension that I did). Another thing is that almost every photo looks the same. It is like the same boring filters applied and reapplied and called art, which is a bit like bleargh because I rather look at a normal ugly photo than one that looks like every other "artsy photo".

3. I really dislike the "internet language" or the "internet slang". It is like why would anyone spell things in an awkward and really non-fashionable manner when it can be spelt properly. My pet peeves include:

Come - cum (seriously it is just one alphabet, and it changes the whole meaning)

Sorry - soz (or something I cannot remember)

Cry - Crey (WHY? WHY? Why add a letter and make it alien?)

What - Whut (okay not the most annoying, since the latter does ascribe a tone of annoyance and agitation to the word)

Mixing in all kinds of numbers to replace words

I can't recall anymore at the top of my head, but I really would prefer conversations to be written in understandable English. Not that we have to spell everything exactly like,

"I have to finish up my homeowork, will talk to you later okay? Or see you tomorrow!"

I mean, this is still understandable:

" I've to finish my hw, ttyl kay? Cya tmr!"

Like just some alterations don't even shorten the word, so I don't even know why people do it.

Anyways, I originally intended to type more, but then I realised I still have not done my Chem home-based learning work (HBL) , so I have to scoot off and do it. Gah, me thinks that HBL is very pointless, and sometimes I imagine that it is the school's way of feeling less guilty about giving us a break. But then we are really shortchanged because I am pretty sure we DO NOT have all the subject lessons even on a school day, so why must HBL include all the subjects? Can't nobody take a break aish.

And, angst angst, three (and half, but really half doesn't count) weeks to blocks and I have not started revision. Lord bless inefficiency. I crey cry.

I suppose sometimes it is eye-opening to look around the real world than to live in my own make-belief one. I witness things that are vastly different from my imagination, I get disappointed, I learn, I realized that hey, fiction remains fiction, while facts don't change.

So a spin around the world, suddenly makes me appreciate many things, many people, many qualities better.

It made me relieved that I haven't sunken in too far to pull myself out of it, and that I am still clear-headed enough to tell myself where to draw the lines.

Maybe being a spectator is always better than being a participant.

Not everything has to be learnt through experience; we can learn it through witnessing.

Why practicality can be a terrifying thing

I remember announcing my interest to go for a physic talk on the Standard Atom and Higgs Boson, and possibly even glimpsing the particle accelerator, The Large Hadron Collider with excitement. (Even though I honestly doubt that it is the real Large Hadron Collider, I mean there is no way they can actually import it from CERN right? Probably a miniature...or a non-functional model.)

I also remembered the shock and incredulous face of the one who was listening to me.

"Are you crazy?" she asked, "You don't even take physics. Besides, at such a time, isn't focusing on your work more important?"

Yes, yes I am crazy.
And yes again, I don't even take physics. I wonder why.

While I don't regret taking Biology so much unless it is the day before exams and you realize you have to cram about 5 topics in half a day, I sometimes do wish that I had taken physics instead. It just appeals to me more, and I enjoyed learning it so much more.

One of the best choices in my life was my insistence on NEVER taking economics, because heck all those people who draw glowing appreciation of how useful economics is in allowing one to understand...(well yeah) economics, and how it can be a stepping stone to becoming a business man/woman.

I don't even aspire to become a business(wo)man in that sense, so I wan't about to torture myself over charts and diagram that resembled pig Latin to me for two whole years and really ended up learning nothing. In my opinion, Literature (for me) is way more enlightening, relaxing and mind-opening in so many ways. It is like this one lesson that you look forward to in a day that helps to offset all the other monotones that I have no choice but to face. And thankfully, I love GP too, so that makes it frequently two pleasant things in one day of bore.

Practicality can be a terrifying thing. I was persuaded, encouraged and warned against taking literature because of a multitudinous reasons such as, "it is hard to secure a definite good score", "your school's economics notes are way better and more helpful" and also because "what will lit do for you in the future?"

Yep, literature probably isn't going to be helping my job in the future.

But isn't it the same for those who take BCME or PCME, where they probably don't plan to be a biologist, chemist or engineer while being a business man in a pressed suit?

Why can't we study something (or go for a talk on something) simply because we are interested in it? Is that so "practically" reprehensive?

Indeed, now doesn't seem like the good time to be partaking in something that is outside of curriculum because of the looming prospect of the Great Terror of A-levels, as any man of practical reasoning propagates. We have to think practically, and do what is important first, they say.

This is exactly why practicality is so terrifying.

Practicality encourages one to always choose the more logical, the more sensible, the less reckless thing to do. It tells us to finish tasks with closer deadline, handle things that are "more important" and engage in activities that will ultimately benefit us, in a measurable and recognizable way.

In essence, it attempts to compel us to do whatever that is due and therefore supposedly more important, instead of having the chance to venture into something we might actually enjoy doing.

I am surrounded by voices of reason almost all the time, my own included. These voices of reason guide me to do the "right" things, the "good" things and usually the boring things. Whenever my personal voice of reason go for a holiday, external ones are quick to replace it, and they are fast in evolving into nagging, nerve-pricking voices of over-pragmatism and bore.

Sometimes I portend my future to be dismally boring and dull because of these voices of reason. Sure, I may get a good job with a good salary. Yes, I may have a good family with good (and hopefully not overly-practical) kids that will make me happy most of the time. But I was just thinking, even so I may never be happy. Being practical, I would have abandon a dream job for a dry one because of its higher pay, and I would be practical enough to marry a practical man and then have practical children.

So there will be this whole viscous cycle of practicality.

Worse thing is, if your practicality and hence misfortune is the corollary of always heeding the practical advice of others, you have no one to blame, except yourself.

You listen to the teachers at school who tell you to do certain things. You listen to your mom who has been telling you things and influencing you almost your whole life (or whole life up till you decided to develop an opinion of your own). You are the good, sensible child who knows how to prioritize (and prioritize seems to be increasingly more of "completing what is urgent" rather than "completing what is important") and never worry your parents. A good wife/husband and a good employee.

But it may always feel like you are lacking something. A vibe. A life.

I am not proposing that we should close our ears and stop paying heed to all the grown-up's advice, because undeniably they with their grey hairs have experienced more and (probably) understand more. Listen to them, but listen actively and not passively. What is true for them may not be the same for us, for you. What works for them, what makes them happy may not work for you. Listen to them and access their advice before choosing to heed it or simply take it with a pinch of salt.

If they live their life in a blissful bore, do you plan to do the same?

My plan is that I would balance my overwhelming sense of practicality with occasional recklessness, idealism and iconoclastic behavior. I know at certain points that practicality will still reign, but then at least I am sure, that practicality has stemmed from me, and is not infused into me.

Physics talk for a biology-literature student? Hell yes.

But at another time perhaps, when it does not coincide with the school day where I have both Literature and GP lessons.