Are teenagers using F*** more often??

I have been thinking about what our deputy principal, Brother Mike had said. Have we really gotten more vulgar?? He has set rules on using vulgar words like "f***", assuring us that he will suspend any student who uses it, and also punish any teacher who don't take action on the offending student. However, I doubt it will have any long-lasting effect.

I agree that what used to be simple expressions like "it is very difficult", " it is a very hot day" has becomed "it is f***ing difficult", "it is a f***ing hot day". People, especially teenagers, have gone around, replacing the word "very" with "f***ing". Use of vulgar languages like these have increasingly become distorted and are fast becoming the "in" thing.

There is no need to catch a person in the act of saying it. With the explosion of blogs, you just have to look around and you will sure to pass a blog that has these expressions. More often, you will find that a blog containing such languages are popular.

Adults, may find that they are "mature" already, and can use this words loosely, or what chinese might say: "把这些脏话挂在嘴里". They, thinking that they have the right to use these words, but don't realise what effect these might have on their children. Though they may have warned their "young ones" against the use of such languages, but that will only make them want to use it more. Moreover, doesn't forbidden fruit taste sweeter?? I believe that was what got them, the "adults" to use it in the first place!!

Is this the the undesired side effects of a society that is starting to "open up"?? People exercising their "freedom of speech"??

The society at large is claiming to be more educated nowadays. But does education means the promotion of such words?

However, I feel that the usage of such words only goes to show their ineptitude at the language.

Hitler cool?? You've got to be kidding me!!!....

I can never believe I will hear that expression... Hitler cool?? They really have to get their facts right. If not, I suggest they go for a mental check-up.

Alright... Alright...you may think now, why I bring up the topic of Hitler and Nazism. Actually, I am referring to today's Straits Times (26/7/05) which was talking about this group of pupils from a secondary school, named "Hitler" as their group name and idol. They also commented that he is cool. Worst of all, they are History students!! Really, I wonder what's next... Maybe Stalin's great???

All the atrocities Hitler and other dictators like him have done, I don't think the title of "cool" fits them. OK.. ok... I agree that he has a little charisma, good oratorical skills and maybe a little eccentric, but I will never define him as cool. Probably these boys are jealous of his power and crave to have something like that. Somehow, I really think they have got their principles wrong.

Maybe we should let them think, how would they feel if they were living in that era under Hitler and his Gleichschaltung Policy (of Total Control)?

The Ministry's move to minimise memorising and regurgitaion of facts should have came a long time ago. At least it is better late than never.

This incident has yet again, like the previous debate on the chinese syllabus, shown us that, after years of development and advancement, forcing students to learn by memorising in this generation will not work. More often than not, the opposite effect (for e.g. causing him/her to dislike the subject) will be acheived instead.

"mood-less"

haiz.. no mood to really write a good post.

Homework, Homework, and more Homework.... I really have to de-stress.
Decided to tryout GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program).... I'm too used to the school's Adobe Photoshop program. GIMP interface though similiar to photoshop's, I still stumbled abit, trying to get a hang of the program.
I created the banner below just for fun.....



I obtained the artist impression of the antimatter reaction from the website of the
European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN)

Sorry readers, but I will write a better entry the next time. Till then...

Yes!! the long wait over!!

Made an unexpected trip to the new National Library. omg, you should see that place, the section on fiction already has about 16 bookshelves!! Imagine the whole library! There are 6 levels of reference section, seperated into the 4 languages and genre!! The whole place has 13 stories excluding the upper levels which were out-of-bounds at that time. They have the central lending library at the basement. The library even have newspapers from all over the world!! US, UK, China, Taiwan, India, you name it, they have it. Whats more?? Many are same day issues!!

Thought me and Jeremy would be the only few students there. oh boy.... how wrong we were. Students from other schools were already there studying when we arrived. Tables were all filled up.

However, our visit was spoilt by a security guard at the 10th level (i think). The freakin' guard asked us to deposit our bags in the locker. We didn't, thus we went up to the next level instead. When we came back down, we saw people walking in and out with their bags happily on the shoulders!!!! Such discrepancy on the 1st day?? It isn't a good start.

Visited Rockson Tan's blog ( i linked him ) on Kenneth Tan's recommendation. haha... had a hearty laugh. The entries were sometimes controversial yet funny. haha... so much expletives!!Reminds me of XiaXue (linked her too) ...however, her site got hacked.. its just so unlucky.

hmm... I don't think the world expected another bomb blast in London. But we've got to hand to to the British people. They didn't even flinch after the bomb blast. There wasn't even a rush to get out of the country. It just shows how determined Londoners are.
I think Singaporeans' reaction to the NKF incident was even more serious/severe than the Londoners after the bomb blast.

From my point of view, I seriously question the morality of another bomb attack. Its just senseless killings for no cause. I don't think that by doing this, they would accelerate the already escalating tension in the world.

I wish they would just fly themselves into some secluded area like the artic and denotate themselves there. This way, no innocent civilians will get killed, and they would get their wish of blowing themselves into smithereens.

Arrrgh!! Can't take it anymore

Its irritating! Especially when you waited so long for the book only to get the suspense "destroyed" by your friends. I really hate that.

Yea... thats right! I am talking about Harry Potter book 6. I think I am the only handful of avid readers which have not bought the book.
What's worse than not buying is having friends who, knowing that you have not read the book, rattle off the storyline and ending (yes, majority has already finished reading the book on the day of the release..). jeez, even the papers weren't that good either. The Straits Times gave enough clues for anyone to guess what would happen. haiz. Guess that couldn't be helped.

School today was such a bore. By the end of the day, there was only about 20 people left in class. Some had to go for competition, others had to go to cheer on our Track & Field team at their Nationals.
I really wonder if more tests are going to help us. We've been having tests this whole week.

We started the week off with "disasterous" monday. We had 4 periods of maths consecutively, with two periods devoted to a test, and it was followed by Chemistry, Biology and than Physics!! That almost left us "brain drained" by the end of the day. We were just too tired.
Today, we had a Chemistry test. Well, it was ok. Cannot really complain much. However, we will have a Maths test tomorrow, followed by 2158 (History) the following day. And what's more?! Tomorrow's Racial Harmony Day, and we, because we are Sec 4s, don't get to celebrate! While the Sec 1 to 3s are happy having their extended recess, we'll be shepherd into our classes for lessons!! *Sobz*

Well... sighz. Sec 4s... *WaH*... No life at all...

Compatability Improvement for my Blog

Just a quick post / update....

I have just changed the blog layout to improve compatability to other browsers as I noticed an increasing number of visitors using third-party browsers like Opera and the open-source Mozilla Firefox.

Majority of the Internet Explorer dependent source codes have been removed, Although I have allowed some, like the technorati searchlet to remain intact.

However, anymore editing may have to wait until I clear this week's flurry of school tests, unless I can find some time to edit.

However, blogging will go on as usual (i.e. I blog once every two to three days)

For the time being, there will also be no music on this site. The embed elements has been taken off until I am sure it will display and play properly in the third-party browsers.

(p.s. If you have any comments, please tag me at my tagboard, or email me.)

~JZ

1st Bloggers.sg Blogging Convention 2005

Didn't know had a blogging convention in Singapore as I didn't visit http://tomorrow.sg site for some time already.
Well, couldn't join the party anyway as I am still 16, below the cut-off point of 18 yrs old.

However, according to the reporter, the results of the convention was "neither riverting nor provocative", ppl "seemed guarded, as if uncomfortable without the protection of their online personas".

The blogging convention thus proved one thing, that technology is fast eroding our social skills.
Ok.... I know that many are familiar with the 'stereotypical argument' regarding this subject, but until now, i was as sceptical as anybody else.

Hiding behind and online persona and talking is one of the easiest things to do. Sometimes it is easier to ask for something online rather than face-to-face to prevent some awkward moments. I have experience that before and I am sure so does most of you out there.

Does that mean that we have to give up this online persona's as well as the 'security' people feel when hiding behind it? I definately do not think so.

As technology imoproves, so will communication thru the net. All this side effects will also be inevitably introduced. Just like medicines, they are beneficial if used properly. If abused, can caused undesirable effects. Even though people feel the ease to communicate thru the internet, we also must not neglect to develop our social skills.

hmm... Maybe it will be good to have a social skills workshop after having received this type of response...

We're 3rd. 3rd!!! Yeah!!

'C' Div finals have ended!! We're overall schools 3rd!!!
Hooray! We are back in the seeded squad.
Nice work you'all.
It is such a waste Jonas, currently placed at 14, couldn't qualify for the masters.
Anyway, must congratulate Melvin Swee, Daniel's brother, for obtaining 1st place for Singles, Quartet and All Events, with an average of 209.8

Here are the overall schools results:

Boys overall:
1st: Singapore Sports School
2nd: Anglo-Chinese (Independent)
3rd: St Joseph's Institution
4th: Anglo-Chinese (Barker)

Girls Overall:
1st: Methodist Girls School
2nd: Singapore Sports School
3rd: Tanjong Katong Girls School (I think)
4th: Raffles Girls School

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omg! While blogging, I found this.

from channelnewsasia.com

SINGAPORE : The National Kidney Foundation Board and its CEO, Mr TT Durai, have resigned.
Over the next few days, the Government will appoint an interim Board to ensure continuous operation of NKF's various dialysis centres.
It will also work on medium term tasks, including forming a new Board, appointing a new CEO, reviewing accounting practices, funding needs, and pricing and subsidy policies.
Pending completion of these reviews, the NKF will suspend all active fund-raising activities.
This follows the request of the NKF Board for the Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan's assistance to help restore public confidence.
And they offered to resign in order to give Mr Khaw a free hand on this.
They also asked that he help reconstitute a new Board and appoint a new CEO.
A Health Ministry statement said, in the interest of the dialysis patients and the NKF, Mr Khaw had agreed to help in this effort.
He stressed two immediate priorities: care for NKF dialysis patients should not be disrupted in any way and shattered public confidence must be restored.
At a news conference later, Mr Khaw stressed that he was not in favour of destroying an organisation in order to rebuild it unless it was a rotten one.
He said the NKF was not rotten to the core and a lot of good work had been done.
As such, his immediate priority is to build on the organisation's strong points.
And he will be working hard to find a new Chairman, hopefully, even by Friday.
Following the announcement, Mrs Goh Chok Tong also decided to relinquish her position as Patron.
This is to give the NKF a fresh start and enable a new Board to be appointed.
In a statement, Mrs Goh said this had been a sad and unfortunate episode.
But she hopes that Singaporeans will continue to support the NKF's efforts to help kidney failure patients and their families. - CNA/de

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As of 14 July, 2108 hours, the petition website has a total of37794 Signatures. Since it has already achieved its result, the petition will be closed on 14 July @ 2359hrs.

Gutterballs!! 'C'Div doubles

Went to support our 'C' Division Bowling team today.
Very tired now. Just got home.
Ears still have a " ringing" sound due to the bad mix of music and girls screaming.
Glenn was "heartbroken" when Iris cried..... but didn't go over to console her because her mother was there....

For the girls doubles, a team average of 131 will get you a second placing, which is quite a surprise for many.

This year, Singapore Sports School will make a clean sweep of the events. Two bowlers from the school had played an average of 207 and 206 today. It will be quite tough to un-seat them.

gosh! Don't know how many gutterballs I have seen today. I think it is the most I have seen for a national tournament like this.

I really feel that the atmosphere just isn't there.
haiz.....

Hiaz...More Copy Protection for CDs

I just wonder how many more restrictions the recording industry is going to introduce. I believe many, especially music lovers have heard the news. The recording industry is going to introduce a new software onto the CDs that prevent copying of the CDs more than 3 times whether it is the whole CD or even a song.

It just makes us wonder, whether all these are targeted at music pirates or music-loving consumers who support the artist (and also the recording industry) by buying original CDs. Although now there is those 2 for the price of 1, or even 6 for the price of 1, it just doesn't cut any ice. CDs are prone to destruction and scratches, so it is normal for people to have a backup. What if you have to reformat of the computer?? You will lose all the songs as well as the right to copy again because in event of a virus, you may not be allowed to backup before reformatting. Also, backing up items on a virus infected PC may just bring over the virus to your newly reformatted (and clean) computer!

Not only music, software manufacturers have been including piracy protection into almost everything they own. Though I respect the need for all these, it makes no sense for me to contact the software manufacturer to activate it everytime I reinstall the software, be it after reformatting or trying out other software that will conflict with it.
The bottom line?? Consumers are the ones suffering.

Recently, I have been switching some of my standard software into open-source solutions. For example, I have recently switched my email client to the open-source Mozilla Thunderbird. It is lightweight and powerful, thus starting up faster than my previous email client.

Below is screenshot of Mozilla Thunderbird
(p.s. email addresses are all greyed out for privacy purposes) :


As more restrictions are set on consumers, people will start switching to other solutions to keep the cost down. Every upgrade on proprietry software requires a certain sum of money. A Home User may not be able to afford an upgrade everytime. Discounts are also targeted and given to SMBs and MNCs.
With open-source software, upgrades are free. Though we must bare in mind that such solutions are not for everyone. It depends on the level of expertise as well as how secure and comfortable one is, at using open-source software. OPen-source solutions only has community-based support or even none at all. It does not have a dedicated customer support proprtietry software offers.

However at the rate open-source software has improved in terms of usablility, I think many will start looking into open-source solutions. And as more people embrace these softwares, help in this vast community will be easier to find.

Comments across continents

After the London blasts, media gurus all over the world has been flocking down to report on the incident. Many comments have also emerged since..

One thing is common among all. And that is the voicing of outrage over those atrocious incidents. Many governments have already stepped forward to repudiate these terrorist actions.

What was supposed to be a short war has already dragged on for a few years already. Security everywhere has been improved, especially countries which have been in the front light as a US ally.

But, the London blast has told us a few things
-1st, the preparations are not enough. We have overlooked or even neglected to remember that the Osama Bin Laden Terrorist network is a vast,far-reaching and well-organized network.
-2nd, it proves that the transport networks, as stated in the Straits Times, is "every conurbation's Achilles heel".

These small scale blasts may not have crippled the entire transport network, but the precision of these blast have no doubt took out najor parts of the network and shaken our sense of security.

Horrendous, uncivilized behaviour!

Just after celebrating the recieving of hosting rights for the 2012 Olympics, which was a surprise win over hot favourite Paris, the world was shocked again by the bomb blasts in London.

What are the terrorists targeting at?? The G8 summit is a highly probable cause. But the manner at which they do it is atrocious. Totally inhuman! Any country in this civilised world will condemn it. WHY?... Why target civilians?! INNOCENT civilians going about their daily lives!

Just WHAT do they think they are doing?!
Are just trying to catch our attention, showing that they are not to be messed with?? Trying to put across to us that the terrorists are the Aryan people?? If that is it, then they are nothing but the modern day equivilent of Hitler and Stalin.

In this world, everyone is EQUAL. REGARDLESS of race, creed or religion

These terrorists only aim to tarnish the image, trust and respect people have for each other. Trying to uproot the very foundation laid down over thousand of years of evolution. Throwing us back to a perpetual Cold War.

Diplomatic talks, meetings and relations is the pathway to get something done. Violence in this world will NEVER be condoned.

I just don't understand, what's so.... so glamourous in claiming responsibility for such atrocious acts? They must have lost their marbles. A nice white padded cell is where they should be in! It must be worth good money to find out what must them tick and also what goes on in their morass of neurons!!

Moving towards 2012 Olympics

Finally, the long-awaited results are out. London has won the bid to host the 2012 Olympics, defeating Paris, New York, Madrid and Moscow.
The final count was 54-50 with the British capital beating hot favourite Paris by just four votes.

London's victory was assured when Madrid were knocked out in the third round of voting. The majority of the Spanish backers switched to London, pushing them over the line.
Moscow was eliminated in the first round and New York in the second round.

The city plans to construct a new 500-acre Olympic complex in east London.
It last hosted the Games in 1908 and 1948.

(Source: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/olympics2012/)

Bye Chinese Orals! I won't miss you!!

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Finally!! Chinese Orals are over!! O-v-e-r.... over!!!
I was all jitters, seeing people leaving one by one... It isn't a nice
feeling to be last... From confident, you will become worried than paranoid. I was shivering from the cold by the time my turn came. (The air-condition in the hall was at full blast with only 6 perople inside including the teachers). Can say I screwed up the 'reading aloud' part. Not that I didn't know the words, I accidentally skipped one line. Luckily I realised in time.
The other two sections were good. The 日常话题 and the 报章报道 was on technology advancement - whether boon or bane, and Students taking part-time jobs in order to buy the latest products respectively. Questions were considered easy when compared to the ones on the 1st and 2nd day. Got back from school late and tired. Got quarrantined till 5pm because
of the Oral.

Skipped Bowling Meeting today, again due to the oral. However, managed to get a summary of today's meeting. I thought Sec 4s were given the option whether to go and support/ see the National Schools 'C' Division Bowling Championships, but that doesn't seemed to be the case. Will be skipping schools 3 days. In other years, I would have been jumping for joy, BUT I fail to see any 'joy' in this crucial year. Well, we'll just take it as a short "hoilday".

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War Of The Worlds

Went to watch War Of The Worlds today.
Thought Jeremy said he counld not find anybody, but in the end there was 6 of us... Other than Jeremy (obviously) and Ming Yuen, I did not know any of them.
Haha... Nicole kept refering to Ming Yuen and Me as the "orange T-shirt guy" and the "Billabong guy" respectively. We can't blame her, Chinese names are harder to remember and pronounce..... At least Le Jing and Jesse remembers.

Unexpectedly, I met Lionel and Glenn at GV too. They've become quite good friends, always seeing them together. The last time when I was at the bowling alley, I saw them together also....

War Of The Worlds, like the newspaper had said, featuredTom Cruise spending most of the time running around. The ending was quite abrupt too. Thankfully, the picture of the microscopic organisms triggered my memory (I read the book when I was in Primary 4 or 5), and I finally understood what it was all about.

Putting the morning activities aside, I am starting to get nervous, especially after what I heard about the Chinese 'O' Level Orals. The first day, the topic was on Singapore Idol, and then the second day, it was on terrorism. The topic on terrorism caught us by surprise as our chinese teacher had said that global questions like terrorism that had no close connections with students would not come out!!
I Wonder what will be next.... the ongoing 117th IOC session?? I really hope not!!

CHEAT and avoid going NUTS

Did anyone read today's Straits Times?? Creative Technologies founder, Mr Sim Wong Hoo's secret key to success: CHEAT (Create Huge Excessive Advantage Tactics) and avoid going NUTS (No U-Turn Syndrome). No wonder he named his company creative.

However, if this were to be applied to school, I think CHEAT will stand
for: See How to Excel in All Tests.

Btw, National Day is around the corner... the theme song is out.
It is sung by Taufik and Rui En (or issit En Rui??)
For those interested can download from the Singapore NDP website.
However, if you want a good quality of the video, it is a 86Meg file.

Very bored now... today has been nothing but work, work and work.... I still have some A.Maths Question that are not done. Trying to keep myself out of any situation where I can get myself hurt. Didn't even dare to eat peanuts for fear of losing my voice...

Friendster seems to have updated itself. The layout of the profiles seems to have changed. Overall, I would say that it has improved its service tremendously.

I am now hoping that Monday's plan to watch War Of The Worlds will not go down the drain.....

Open! pleaz!

22ndtJuly. The National Library will open.. Must go there when it opens. hmm.... hope it will be a conducive place to study for my 'O's.

Glad that my throat is better now, and about time too... Wonder how did my friends fare at the 'O' Level Oral today. I heard from those in 401 that the question was unexpected. Something about American Idol. I hope that when my day comes, they will not ask this type of awkward question.

Youth day! In a days time. Thankfully it will be a holiday the next day, a Monday. A chance to rest but not relax.

oh no.... Inuyasha has started... gtg....