The Next Step.

I am now officially a graduate of Nirwana College's Foundation in Science program. Have been since Thursday, actually, but haven't been compelled to write about it up till now.

Honestly speaking, I thoroughly enjoyed my two semesters there. Made friends with people I never thought I'd never be friends with, did things I never thought I'd do, and generally made huge leaps and bounds in terms of my social and intellectual development. I find myself hardly being able to believe that my eight months at Nirwana are actually somewhat comparable to my two years in Rembau in that aspect.

So what does one usually do after he's graduated from his Pre-U studies? I can't exactly say, but one thing's for sure - I'm not gonna just sit around kicking my heels. I'd had enough of that sort of thing during the post-SPM days.

I guess I'm looking towards my Bachelor's Degree next, and to get that over with as soon as possible, too. Of course, my primary choice to further my studies in Actuarial Science would be at Indonesia's Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB), as that was the whole reason I got into Nirwana in the first place.

However, my initial desires of earning an overseas degree have somewhat mellowed in these past few months. Back then, the allure of studying on foreign soil looked to be a novelty, something highly coveted by recent SPM graduates like myself. I would have agreed to go anywhere, just as long as I could do my Actuarial Science degree somewhere that wasn't in Malaysia.

I was at the education fair earlier today, and naturally, my mother made me listen to some of the Actuarial Science degree programs offered by the various institutions there. I didn't really feel particularly attracted to any of them, except for the last one we went to.

Manipal International University (currently in Kelana Jaya, but they're relocating to Nilai in February next year) was apparently offering a new-ish course called Actuarial Finance. It piqued my interest, mostly because it differed from the original Actuarial Science by being more finance-centered, which was the route I'd planned on eventually taking anyway. 

Another difference is that this course only requires three years to complete, one less than the one I'd had my eye on at ITB. Also, with it being shorter and conducted entirely on Malaysian territory, it's considerably cheaper.

Well, nothing's finalized yet, but Manipal is definitely an option. I'll be off to Bandung on January 4th (which happens to be on the same day that my Foundation results will be released) to help me decide once and for all if ITB is what I really need. If not, then as of January 15th 2013, call me a proud pioneer* of Manipal International University, Nilai.

*Yes, the parallels with Rembau are not lost on me.

Hat-Trick (...well, almost).

In football, when a player scores three goals in a single game, his feat is known as a hat-trick (except in Holland, where all three goals must be scored in a single 45-minute half). Hence, the term 'hat-trick' may also be used to describe a triple achievement in other fields.

I nearly had a hat-trick of the performing arts this semester - singing, dancing and acting. However, in an earlier post I mentioned that I would not be acting in the class drama, so I suppose this particular hat-trick  just about slipped out of my grasp, and realistically, may never be achieved. 

The Singing

For our Chemistry presentation this semester, our lecturer asked each of the six groups the class was divided into to perform a song describing the various chemical reactions of carbon compounds. It was something none of us had ever done before, so naturally my classmates were very excited by the idea.

Initially, I was less than thrilled - I'm not one to sing in public. I'd much prefer it if we did a regular presentation, just like everyone else.

Eventually, however, the idea of a musical presentation started to embed itself into my head. It seemed like a fun and easy way to memorize what was, admittedly, a large and complicated chapter in the syllabus. My group was given Alkenes as our topic, and I took it upon myself to write the lyrics for our song, based on 'Starlight' by the British rock band Muse.

I'd finished writing the lyrics in the same week that the topic was given. However, since we had difficulties in finding time to rehearse, our performance ended up being much less elaborate than the other ones (notable gimmicks from our fellow classmates included an excellent video and an intricate dance routine).

The lecturer didn't mind, though. The most important thing was that the message got across, and ours certainly did. I think I might find myself singing the Alkene Song during my Chemistry final if I somehow manage to forget what Markovnikov's Rule is.

A side effect of the performance, however, is that I somehow managed to remove the lyrics to the original song from my brain. This wouldn't be much of a problem, if it weren't for the fact that Starlight is one of my favorites.

The Dancing

The dancing was never supposed to have happened in the first place.

For our Malaysian Studies presentation, we were divided into groups. Each group was to play a political party from a certain area (kampung, rubber estate, etc.) and present their propaganda in front of the class, attempting to garner as many votes as possible in order to win the 'election'.

By the time the final two groups (including mine) had to do their presentations, it was already recess. So thus, the lecturer decided to postpone it to the next week. 

It was not to be. He didn't enter class for the next few weeks, so by the time he finally did, he'd already forgotten all about it.

Midway through that class, however, it suddenly hit him - ten of us were still yet to do our presentations. He then said that since the next class was to be our last, a political debate would probably be too dull for the occasion. Instead, he proposed that we perform some traditional dances.

Thinking he was only fooling around (and boy, did he do that a lot), we went along with it. Needless to say, my classmates and I were somewhat surprised to find that he was actually being serious about the whole thing. The two groups would have to join together and perform different traditional dances in pairs.

Once again, my groupmates and I found it difficult to rehearse. Our first rehearsal was actually carried out on the afternoon before the presentation was due. Our only other rehearsal was right before the Malaysian Studies class started.

So yeah, I ended up having to do an Indian dance - Tamil, I believe it was. The dance was fast, energetic and intricate. I now have a newly-found respect for dancers - it's harder than it looks. And even more so for a guy who'd usually never be caught dancing in public (or even in private) such as myself.

Judging by the cheers coming from the mostly-Indian audience, I'd say I did pretty well for someone with zero experience in traditional Indian dance, and who'd only learnt the steps less than 12 hours prior to the performance. But then again, the crowd's reaction may just have been because they assumed that I 'wasn't the type'.

The Drama

I wrote about the drama the other day (also, I've already provided the link to that post early on in this one). In case you can't remember or are too lazy to look it up, here's a brief background.

I was a co-scriptwriter for our play, Animal Farm. Due to my (thankfully) unconvincing acting skills, I was given a behind-the-scenes role as the sound guy (or sound engineer, as our lecturer once put it).

So that's that. Many of us had high hopes for this drama, but the end product wasn't quite how we'd pictured it. In fact, it wasn't at all how I'd pictured it to turn out whilst reading the book and writing the script.

The original Animal Farm was supposed to be a serious allegory on the Russian Revolution, with its characters based on such historical figures as Karl Marx and Joseph Stalin. In the end, the directors cut out so much of the script that I and my co-writer had painstakingly put together that the play only just about stuck to the actual storyline.

I don't blame the directors for doing so, really. It was pretty much forced upon them, due to several reasons.

Firstly, the seriousness of the original content was fairly unsuitable for everyone involved. Most of the actors were either not mature enough to 'get' the whole message, or they just couldn't understand half the words that Orwell used.

Secondly, time constraints that were amplified by a lack of co-operation. We only had about a month or two to prepare for the play, and many of us would turn up late for practice every single time. Hence, we didn't have enough time to stick to the entire script, so that necessitated much of the script-tweaking.

In fact, we even had a few musical numbers thrown in as well. They certainly helped to liven up the atmosphere of the play, and, I have to admit, they made it a bit more interesting to those who were watching. Having someone play live acoustic guitar helped, too. Not sure what George Orwell would have made of all the disfigurations that had been made, but it's just as well that he died over 60 years ago.

Anyway, I suppose the play could be considered a success. Sure, there were a few forgotten lines here and there, which led to a fair bit of confusion. Sure, some of the actors should probably stay off the stage for the next play that comes along. And sure, some of my sound effects were mistimed. But our lecturer seemed happy enough to give us full marks for it, much of it due to the tremendous effort we'd put in.

*****

So that's what I've been doing here in Nirwana for this past semester, aside from the studying and the hardly memorable Prom Night a few months back.

And yeah, I'd be lying if I said that I hadn't enjoyed myself. But if I could choose to do it all again, the answer would be a definite, resounding NO. I don't need to tarnish those memories with more of the same - they'd lose their novelty.

I guess I can safely assume that most of my friends who are currently doing Foundation in Science, A-Levels and other Pre-U courses at other institutions probably won't get the chance to do even one of the above things throughout their respective courses, let alone all three.

Well, all that's left now is the finals. Then it's farewell, Nirwana. And hello, Bandung.