Event: A Year Lived, Another To Come

2010 is the first year which I spent as a civilian in a long time. Army has finally ended. I can no longer have any excuses like "oh my year sucked badly cause I was in the army". No, for the first time, I could decide what I want to do with my life, especially with the long holidays before I entered university. For now, perhaps I should just look back at the resolutions I made last year.

My resolutions for 2010:

1) Get a good paying job and really start saving up for university

2) Have a good start to university life, cast off my loner self and make lots of friends in university

3) Remember everyone’s birthday, for once, cause this coming year, most of my friends are turning 21

4) Work out consistently and get IPPT silver by end of March

5) Complete Sundown Marathon 2010 and StanChart Singapore Marathon 2010 with a timing of less than 5 hours

6) Restart my skills allocation program, to learn either cooking, instruments, wushu, Japanese, roller blading, computing, photoshop etc.

7) Start a Chinese blog, food blog and maintain them

8 ) Drink way less Starbucks

Looking at my resolutions in general, I haven't fulfilled half of them. For number 1, well I did get a decent paying home aka tuitioning but I didn't manage to save much. So oh well. For number 2, I think I did a pretty good job in making lots of friends in university. Superficial as a lot of them are, I do think that it wasn't as bad as I thought it'll be. The university experience was quite enriching due to the shit activities I got myself into. I don't know if its a good thing that people whom I don't know are adding me on FaceBook, or that people actually talks bad about me behind my back, but from a top down view, everything seems pretty fine for now.

For number 3, I think I bothered to wish most people happy birthday this year. Though I did I got fairly jaded towards the end of the year. I think I'll be happy to go back to my old self where I don't give too much of a care to birthdays including my own. That said, I'm still quite scared that time is passing so fast and before I know it, I'm turning 22 already. For number 4, I didn't even go for IPPT once. I'm going to be so dead. The deadline is in 3 month's time. Better act on it soon.

For number 5, I didn't get a good timing at all. I was injured for Sundown and I had exams before Stanchart Marathon. In general, the lack of training and the overwhelming activities during the period made me run really slowly. I am not joining Sundown anymore, after seeing the extremely lousy quality there. Can't imagine why Adidas sponsored them for 3 years but I hope they stop this coming year. For number 6, I did gear into gaining more skills. But I guess my attempts were futile and half baked at best. I joined cross country and Wushu but I ended up quiting within a couple of weeks. I really need to warm up to university life and start getting more disciplined.

For number 7, I didn't start a Chinese blog in the end. However I do have my own website/blog now, after joining up with a friend to get a domain. The food blog is kind of integrated into my blog now. I haven't been blogging for some time because I was really overwhelmed with work. Hopefully I can crank up my engine again and get more viewership this coming year. For number 8, I am proud to say that I drink a lot less Starbucks now. It's great to know that not all my money is going into expensive stuff like Starbucks coffee or Body Shop stuff which I haven't bought for half a year now.

Many many things happened in 2010.

I went to Taiwan with my closest friends and it was the best! I miss the trip so very badly. We had tons of fun despite me falling quite sick on the last 2 days and it was really warm heartening when Edwin and Ching Yee came back with porridge for me~ I will never forget the chilly winds, wearing shorts with Yinning, the amazing Hua Lien with all the cheap food, cong you bing, cool stone house, all the crappy jokes, the great nature, shopping in a maze, looking for money in the rain in Jiu Fen, seeing how Leonard irks at Chou Toufu etc.

I worked at a couple of banks before giving tuition full time. I missed going out in the mornings and early afternoons to slack with Danny and Jason because we are all full time tutors. I miss just lazing it out on the weekdays, though I have it quite rough on the weekends.

I made the decision to switch over to NUS from NTU. Frankly till now I have no idea whether it was the right choice or not. Since I did fairly badly in NUS as the bell curve sort of worked against me. I wonder if it will be better in NTU. Distance aside, that is.

I celebrated my birthday for the first time in my life. It was fairly okay, could have been better. But then again, this is probably the first and only celebration for the rest of my life already.

I went for my first social camp in years and reignited my "having fun and getting high" attitude. Though I daresay it is kind of failing me again.

This was a pretty sad year cause many of my good friends went overseas for a full year. Another one is leaving soon. Then I'd only be left with 2 blokes who are both attached. So I'm going to be so alone.

I took up quite a few CCAs and I have quite an enriching university life. Many of my close friends call me a "siao on freshie". Truthfully I don't feel so much like a freshie anymore. I am glad that I no longer have the "let's just forget it" attitude, though I don't know how long it'll last. I am surprised to see how much the university has to offer and I am exploring as much as possible.

I got an Android phone at long last. My G2 rocks!

I did pretty badly for my exams. I guess I really need to pull up my socks. I thought I could get back the discipline which I had in JC. But I was wrong. When the time came, I couldn't. Something is really distracting me too much and I really regretted getting too involved in my CCA. I overestimated myself and I guess next time I will have to weigh my options much more sensibly.

For 2011, things are going to get rough again with all my commitments. I'd have pretty much a life that's way concentrated on my university. I just hope that I'd last until at least the exams before I need a long break again.

My resolution for 2011:

1) Study harder. I need to regain back the discipline which I have in JC.

2) Regain back my leadership capabilities and style. I haven't gotten back fully into momentum. After seeing how the other leaders lead their people with their own characteristics, I need to go back into my swing as well. More charisma which I am lacking will be a nice touch as well.

3) Less procrastination. There were things which I was supposed to do in 2010 which I still have not done. Sorry just won't cut it and I need to learn to shake off the lazy feeling.

4) Think of what I'd regret. I managed to make 2010 a better one than I'd expected. But there were a few decisions which were still not promptly and sensibly made. My term of office will end sooner than I think and I will really have to consider carefully what I have, what I lack, what I want and what I need before deciding where to head to next. I also think that I am lacking quite a bit of life now. This is a good time to think about what I really want in life. Do I just want a nicer resume? Do I really need to take up all these commitments? Where will they get me and it is that necessary?

5) Stay fit. After talking to many seniors, they seem to be able to handle studying and keeping fit at the same time. Somehow I just feel exhausted all the time. I guess this has to do with learning to adapt to my new university life and to stop procrastinating.

6) Spend less money on useless things. I think my personality as a spendthrift has declined a lot, but it's still not enough. I can do better and really need to keep track of my spending I suppose.

7) Treasure my time with my loved ones. Spend more time with them.

8 ) Learn to be more punctual. I think I am generally quite punctual for meetings but this month I was late for almost every single one of them. Time to manage my timing properly.

9) Rest more. Sleep when I'm supposed to sleep.

That's all for now I guess. I hope 2011 is a year which I learn more, think more and do more.

Happy new year!