WARNING: THIS ENTRY IS ABOUT ME COMPLAINING, PLEASE DO NOT READ ON IF YOU DON'T WANT TO HEAR ME COMPLAIN.

I was brought up in a prim and proper environment, where the girls are sweet and heed the Golden Rule, where vulgar language does not exist, where everyone goes by the moral of "See no evil, hear no evil, do no evil".

So, I cannot stand it when you have a friend, who is not really your friend, but was your friend at first, says "Oh FUCK" straight in front of your face, I cannot take it.

Really, I can't.

I've always requested people not to swear in front of me or around me, because I can't stand it. It's pretty damaging to your ears.

There is this story in Jeremiah( or Isaiah, sorry i can't remember who he is), where he was supposed to go and preach in some city and everyone didn't adhere to his preaching, but he still went on day after day preaching, telling people to repent of his sins. Until one guy went up to him and asked him "Hey, why are you still here preaching when everyone else is not going to listen to you?" Jeremiah ( or Isaiah, can't remember who it was) replied: " I'm still preaching here because i want to keep myself pure and not to be influenced by the sinful ways of the people here, to remind myself that I'm here to save them and not fall into their ways too."

Similarly, I have to keep myself pure so that I can be more like God, thus I have to keep myself away from people swearing because it can make you say it along the way too.

As the chinese idiom says "er2 ran2 mu4 ran2".

ok, i think i make sense, but i'm incoherent as in the example does not really go with my point, sorry.

Today, I've finally knew one of the major differences of being an Asian (mainly Chinese) and a non-Asian (mainly Australian).

This morning, I had an Accounting lecture, where the current lecturer was replaced by another lecturer because the previous one has something on. So, this substitute lecturer just read through the lecture notes and showed us a video clip on OneTel.

Everything went on smoothly until the OneTel video. There was some technical glitch in the video, that did not allow the sound to be heard loudly, so basically, I was just trying to watch a video with a soft sound. In a way, it was pretty hard to hear the video, but it was even harder to hear the video when all the non-Asians (mainly Australians) were packing up their bags and leaving the lecture theatre. Just because they cannot hear the sound, and they think it's a waste of their time to stay there, which, by the way, it was only 5 minutes to end of lesson.

One digression is : What can you do with 5 minutes more?

Walking out of the theatre requires you at least 1 minute, plus if you decided to go to the washroom, or go get your food, or think of catching up on some work, it will take you more than 5 minutes to get to your desired place and get your work done.

But, that's besides the point.

My main point here is that the non-Asians (mainly Australians) started packing their stuff and leaving the lecture theatre even when the video's still running, the lecturer's still there and the other students like me, were trying to pay attention to the video.

After 3 minutes, the entire non-Asian (mainly Australian) population (or at least 98%) left the theatre, with only a handful of non_Asians (mainly Australians) and Asians (mainly Chinese) left.

Mind you, only the Asian (mainly Chinese) population stayed the same throughout the whole lecture.

From this, I am proud to be an Asian (mainly Chinese), because we have been taught from young to give respect to our elders.

Yes, we are there at the university to learn, and to study well, but we should not forget to respect our seniors, the lecturers, who had put much effort in preparing for the lectures. And even if you can't really hear the video, try to stay till lesson officially ends, show respect.

P.S.: the above non-Asians (Australians) do not apply to my college mates or anyone that i know for that matter.

I've never knew the significance of letters until yesterday, when I've received a letter from Church (the Singapore one).

Letter here means post mail, air mail, not e-mail.

Yesterday, i thought i was late for formal tea, so i took a cab home, because i know my legs can never take me further than 3 streets.

When I got there, everyone were at their respective places, eating, thank goodness the High Table was not occupied yet, or i would have been dead.

After formal tea, everyone went back to their rooms and did their stuff. On my way to my room, Jason shouted, "Amanda, you've got mail!" and i was like "Huh? What mail?"

He said " Mail, you know, Mail, mail at the pigeon hole, airmail, letter?"

And i said "Oh thanks!"

So, i made my way UP to the mailboxes, and there, lo and behold, under the mailbox with the surname letter "T", there was only ONE letter, which is addressed to ME.

I took it, and started tearing away and had a look at the letter, which turned out to be a card from the church in Singapore, COOL.

And as i was going back to my room, the second time of the night, Masa said " Amanda, do you know you've got mail too?" and i said "yupz, i'm reading it now" with a big smile plastered on my face.

So, please send me mails, not e-mail, but real mail, because if i get one mail here, everyone will make a BIG deal out of it, and it just makes you happier, like someone out there still cares about you and have not forgotten about you, and by the way, they did not send it by courier mail, but by airmail, and it still got here safely, so please send me mails!

THANKS!!!

i had a busy, cold, wet day at uni today.

it was freezing cold from the rain the night before, and according to the accounts of my friends at college and uni, and the nightly news, there was actually hail (which is small pieces of ice) , that rained on this small town of adelaide yesterday at around 5pm. Thank God that I was safe and sound in my room when that happened, or my umbrella would have broke and i will be umbrella-less for the rest of my stay here.

Next, it rained today, both the drizzle rain, and the thunderstorm rain that we often get back up there in Singapore. However, the thunderstorm rain in Singapore is much bearable than the rain here, even though i still used the same flimsy portable small umbrella as my shield, is because the rain here is accompanied by strong freezing gales, which chills you to the bone, even if you have 5 layers of clothes on, with a hood over your head and a scarf around your neck. My pants got super wet, my shoes were wet throughly through and through. and i hope it doesn't rain, or worse, hail tomorrow, because i'll be decked out in my new shoes as my old shoes is gone beyond repair (in terms of wetness).

And i just realised that I'm pretty under-prepared in terms of the no. of umbrellas i have. Knowing that my uncle produces umbrella, i should have brought a dozen of umbrellas over, small, big, golf umbrellas. Oh well, i've only got one. If this one breaks, i shall call my mum and get her to ship a dozen umbrellas over or i'll just go and buy one myself, whichever is cheaper.

So, i've got to get back to work now for my tutorial that is due on thurs, and the workshop due tomorrow, hope i will be able to finish them all.

take care and may God bless everyone!! in Singapore, hongkong, USA, Australia and Canada. :)