londomee

[londomee]

strawberries & pebbles

Once upon a time, there was a boy and a girl. On a particularly sunny summer day, they went out to a grassy meadow in the middle of the woods.

Upon arriving, they decided to split up - the boy would find shiny, smooth pebbles on the bed of the stream nearby, while the girl searched for strawberries ripe for the harvest near the banks.

As the sun began to set and the sky took on its warm, orange hue, the two met up again, opting to trade the shiniest, prettiest pebbles for the largest, ripest strawberries. Only the girl had other ideas in mind - she'd save the best strawberries for herself.

That evening, the boy slept soundly. Though somewhat sad to have parted with his favourite pebbles, the strawberries were well worth the trade in his eyes.

The same could not have been said of the girl. Thoughts pestered her as she wondered, again and again, if the boy had done the same and kept the best pebbles from her.

The end.

(heavy(?) stuff below. Nothing that's content-warning level, but not the read if you're looking for the average tumblr shitpost)

It's been a long time since I've put my pen down for fiction, and this is a recreation of something I read a long time ago. I suppose it was somewhat deceptive of me to have started with "once upon a time" when the plot fits much more of a parable or fable than a fairy tale.

Point is, I see myself in the girl sometimes. I don't think I have much reservation about telling lies ("white" lies, if you would) if done with the benefit of others in mind. Something might get on my nerves slightly, or sit with me in a certain way, but I'd be telling other people that I had no issues with it.

Most of the time, that'd be fine. I might be conflict-averse to a fault, but I'd get away with it a lot. However, by doing so, I've inadvertently devalued the words of both myself and other people in my eyes.

What if they weren't okay with me showing up late, or the delay in my work, or the quality it's been done to? What if they're actually mad, or worse, disappointed? What if they're not actually impressed by what I do? What if they're only saying that to save my feelings? I would totally say that, if I were them.

My next-to-best strawberries are the lies that I think I make for the sake of other people.

[londomee]

had the weirdest fever dream while falling asleep to pokemon nuzlocke playthroughs, in which i became a drama teacher in a public school in London in a world where pokemon are real.

I had kids looking through documentaries in form time and writing down observations and analysis to apply in their devised pieces

John Godber must be proud :P

[londomee]

Departure + Mid-Year Patch Notes (June-2022)

Sup everyone! School's officially let out (for everyone including non-graduating classes that is), and we're all enjoying the summer alongside the relaxation it offers.

I've currently come back to Taiwan to meet up with my mother's side of the family. The first 3 days of home quarantine have elapsed, so now I'm just enjoying home to the fullest :)

With IB results coming out in a little less than 3 weeks, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't apprehensive at all. Although we took the non-exam contingency, it still feels like a really big moment in our lives (as it does literally decide a great part of our future).

The biggest thing I have for this post would probably be the farewells I've had to say. Our goodbyes amongst friends + classmates were relatively un-tearful (with exception to one of my friends who's also come back to Taiwan hahah. We'll be meeting back up in London), and I just thought that would be the general trend for my departure from China this time round.

But uhh yeah that didn't happen lol.

On our way to the airport, transferring between rides on a rest stop to avoid weird quarantining logistics, my mom got a voice message from my childhood babysitter. She's well into her 60s now, and with a mild fever she wasn't able to visit us before we left.

Listening to her message, I think many of the emotions that I've put on hold have unbottled themselves. I stayed largely in a state of numbness for the countless "farewell" (mostly an excuse to just hang out again hahah) parties and meetups, and watching our year group of 33 dwindle down to a measly 15-ish as many departed for their home countries and uni destinations was a weird experience.

It was until that moment, did some of the true weight of my departure really land. Hearing her voice and realizing that it would be so long till I saw her and many of my relatives and friends here in China again. That by the time I came back - if I came back to the same city, that is - so much of what I consider to be my hometown would look nothing like it did before.

Over the past few months, I've been biking whenever I could, around the city, trying to capture its essence, and that beautiful fusion of modernity and antiquity it held. Noticing the things that I have, in the past 17 or so years, just simply not slowed down to observe. I suppose it's thanks to this newfound emptiness in my schedule and wanderlust in my mind, that I've been able to really admire the city as she is before my departure.

Alongside that, trips have also been made easier by the metro. I still remember the opening of the metro line right next to my compound in Grade 5/ Year 6, and have since then been using it constantly to meet with friends, reach places, and for a while during my last year of high school, commute to and from school (combined with the public buses). I live pretty far away from my school and consequently, many of my classmates, but on the last day before leaving, a few of them were able to come to my place. I went with them around the city one final time. To have my closest friends see an otherwise relatively untouched aspect of my life was, to say the least, an interesting feeling to leave on.

Hearing the voice message by my babysitter, seeing the city blend into the highway leading to the airport, I think it finally registered to me that I would not be seeing any of this for a long, long, long, long time. And the same would be true for my group of friends. Despite the late-night hugs outside of the metro station as we waited for my cab, despite our group chats on various forms of social media. I knew that by the next time we met in person, we would all have grown, and changed, and that group dynamic would have shifted in some way.

And that, in short, it just wouldn't be the same.

I thanked my past self for choosing the shotgun seat on the van as I looked out the window and the passing view blurred with tears. Wearing glasses and a mask made it easier to pretend I wasn't crying, but in 2020 hindsight I probably shouldn't have went with calling it a runny nose.

My mood did get better as the tears fell (to be honest, the driver and my parents' complaints about the local COVID prevention administrations probably helped). I knew that there was little to remedy against about me leaving what was basically all my life behind, and that what I could do is wish for the best, and keep in frequent touch with all my friends and family.

After around 14 hours in travel time, we arrived at our home in Taiwan. Doing minimal unpacking and having a brief dinner, we went to bed. Though sadness from leaving China still remained, much of it was accompanied by a joy in reuniting with family that I have been separated from for two and a half years.

I suppose that's most of the process (?). Your guess would be as good as mine as to whether I'd wake up some day crying, feeling more homesick and nostalgic than ever to the high school days and life that I've barely left behind, missing the friends and family that I would not be seeing in person for such a long time.

But, for the first time in a while, I'll soon be facing a new chapter of my life, saying more hellos than goodbyes, in a vast new environment that I'll be able to call my second home for these next four years.

Plus, this farewell is pretty short-lived for many of my friends. Whether it be a planned circum-Taiwan biking trip, or literally going to the same university, reunions are already in place for many of those in our year group. And I believe that with the strong bonds we've forged over the two, the four, heck, the thirteen years, that our class of 2022 will never be too far away from one another.

as per usual, thanks for sitting through the word vomit that is this post. i'll keep my fingers crossed that tumblr's new post editor doesn't eat this up, and hopefully, be able to update y'all with more news now that i'm in Taiwan. see you soon! <3

[londomee]

Intermission (May-2022)

this is part of the lunch break I've decided to reward myself :)

Heya y'all, I'm officially on study leave now, during which Grade 12 / Year 13 students can stay at home to study for the exams. The exams, which, of course, as aforementioned, have been cancelled in my local region. So we're just kinda vibing at home or outside in meetups with friends.

Cue the "downward spiral into chaos and unholy sleep schedule" soundtrack!

Truth be told, I've done little to no productive work over the past while. My day usually consists of waking up at any time between 9 to 12, grabbing brunch, being on my computer either planning our trip to the UK in September, watching videos on YouTube, casual gaming via browser games, or some League of Legends with friends.

Once in a blue moon I bike around the city and/or hang out with friends in the evenings, usually with drinks involved. I stay relatively sober, because I give myself enough shenanigans even without any alcohol in the equation.

But yeah. Other than that, my days have been relatively uneventful. The home's becoming increasingly bare, a constant reminder to the imminent moving we're about to do to another country.

Update regarding graduation: the date's set! We'll be holding a graduation in-campus on the 27th of May, with most of the senior school back to applaud us. Gotta say, it feels great having done the clapping for 8 years now to finally get to be the ones walking down the center at our big moment.

But ehh... what prompted me to finally revive this zombie of a blog is a bit of writing I did for a friend's project, looking at COVID and its impacts on us over the 2.5 years course. This is an extract from it:

The pandemic has brought many memorable moments that I'll be fond of reminiscing on in many years to come: There are many that are simple, such as participating in a Spanish class on a car ride, on the way to the embassy for a visa renewal. For some indescribable reason, the experience was rather surreal as I saw the contrast between the world on my phone screen and the world around me. I was able to stay tethered to my class and classmates back in Suzhou, and share the learning experience they had, while thousands of kilometers away. There are also episodes of stress, such as during the initial periods of asynchronous online learning. Both students and teachers were working hard to adjust to a new working environment at short notice, and at times it felt as if we were overloaded by tasks we had to work on all by ourselves. However, these were counterbalanced by the feeling of fulfillment that often followed. I remember working in my bedroom up till 3A.M. one night on a practice Individual Exploration in Mathematics in Year 11, finishing by myself what was a group project for most of my classmates who have returned onto campus. Though exhausting, there were many moments throughout the pandemic of great satisfaction as I saw achievements and improvement in my independent endeavors. And of course, our online senior prank via Teams. A few days before our study leave period, where we would have taken time off school to study for the exams, schools in Suzhou had to reenter online learning modes, and our region switched to the non-exam contingency for the IB. On the last day of online learning, our year made a coordinated effort to wear matching white shirts as well as goofy hats and sunglasses, hopefully having entertained some of the teachers in the video call. I would say that the main message throughout these memories is that, despite a global crisis, we may still find the highlights of our days, and that despite everything, life will go on.

And I suppose that is the message I should hold going into this new chapter of life. That despite everything, life will go on.

Back to work I go :)

[londomee]

What now? (Apr-2022)

So eh

This feels weird

But

Basically the IBO's given out an update and

All IB schools in East China will be taking the non-exam contingency route

News broke yesterday, but the IB notice came out the day before or so

The teachers held a Q&A session for students and parents, but everything is set in pretty hard stone now

Teachers to post assessed grades by Friday, heads of department to review grades by Sat, and those are then communicated to us on Monday. An appeals process is in place.

Study leave was supposed to start on the 20th, and exams were supposed to start on the 28th.

I'm doing okay. My grades have basically meant that unless I fail cas now, I should be okay to attend the unis which admitted me.

But it feels kinda like something's off.

We don't know if we'll get to meet our classmates face to face again before the end of the year. We don't know if in 6 weeks time, we'll be able to have a graduation ceremony in person.

But uh. Yeah. We made it?

We still have 2 more days of school, and now that news' out, most classes have just been idle conversation. Not that I don't enjoy just talking to friends and teachers, but having something that you've spent essentially the last 2 years prepping up to just vanish is like having your balance knocked off in a way.

I suppose this is it?

COVID's inconvenienced a lot of things, but this was probably one that felt the most tangible, in some ways beyond the months of quarantine as I was stuck online. Fate's strings got somewhat tangled, but I was able to come out on the other side of the rails having seen a different view.

This feels like a high school cinematographer jump cut past at least 2 different plot points highly relevant to the core story.

The teachers' tones are gentle and kind. They express their sympathy. My chem teacher didn't even bring up the fact that I uploaded my work from yesterday 5 minutes before today's lesson started.

No pun intended, is this loss?

There's a mishmash of feelings, which go well with the mishmash of a weather outside - clear skies and 33 degrees Celsius one day, rainy and 15 degrees Celsius the next. The pathetic fallacy feels both pathetic and fallacious.

Ah well. Condolences to the IB students in east China. Condolences to the A-Level/APers who still have much to do. I'll go and try figure out which one of the two unis I really really want to go to while some gaming youtube video plays in the background.

uni updates: rejection from: uc santa barbara, uc berkeley, cornell, rice, mit, imperial college london, cambridge waitlist from: ucla (withdrawn) acceptance from: uwashington - ayy huskies :) (probably not considering but they do have a sick taiko community) uc san diego - tritons :) (weather is so damn nice but nah) university college london (low student satisfaction, but the research :o) university of st andrews (not a lot for research, but the teaching)

Condolences :/

[londomee]

so the first time i typed out something

and changed tumblr on my phone to dark mode

my wifi connection decided to screw me over

and chew up my draft ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

here’s try 2

MARCH UPDATE:

heya. welcome (back? idk how tumblr’s search algorithm or tags system works)

The past few days have been hectic, but let me just put down a list of uni updates I’ve received so far: (cuz why not expose myself far more than I need to)

Dec 18: MIT deferral (still need to print that out and stick onto my locker door) (videotaped my reaction which was basically 10 minutes of shivering so drastic that you could hear the table shake)

Jan 18: got an email from UCL saying that I was offered a place for PhD in the Institute for Risk and Disaster Prevention, thought it was a marketing email, and rofled when they sent an apology email for the mixup (apparently a LOT of applicants got that email)

Jan 22: Rice interview with a SUPER NICE alumnus whose whole family were rice alumni and the conversation with her went like a dream (did I mention spending the first quarter of that interview shaking)

Jan 26: Cambridge rejection (not unexpected, interview and no external subject qualifications whatsoever were my fatal flaws) (did nicely on the admissions test tho) (I had a premonition since I wasn’t shaking hahah)

Feb 9: took the Imperial College physics admissions test (twice) (results were voided) but uh, was nice in boosting my confidence? My grade 7 year in Thailand actually helped me on one of the math questions :o

Feb 17: received (actual) offer from UCL (mom i’ve got a uni to go to now!)

Feb 18: offer from Uni of St Andrews as well 😛(if only offers usually rolled in at this pace)

And that brings us up till now! The rest of my US apps are scheduled to come in a month’s time by the latest, and I guess UK does UK things. There have been offers provided for my subject at both remaining UK unis though, so hopefully in the next few days heheh.

Ah and uh, besides from that, I’m probably gonna try and document my feelings here more from now on. I don’t think keeping it all cooped up inside me is healthy or beneficial, so this’ll be a platform where I get to stir-fry some of my emotions and examine them so they’re not as raw and slightly more digestible.

It’s been 30 minutes, and I don’t think my mom is checking so I’ll start working on stuff now.

Tip #1: for some people, rubbing Vick’s or similar menthol oil on eyelids does a nice job of keeping you awake :)

Anyways, thanks for reading, talk to y’all later :D

[londomee]

Adulting (Jan-2022)

What should I be doing? A) cleaning my room, B) finishing my last (!) uni essay, C) getting my holiday schedule (of which I’m nearly a week in now) fully sorted, D) all of the above?

Anyways, welcome to today’s blog post 😎

A few days ago, after coming back from the bank, my dad told me that since I was over 16, I’d be able to file the papers for a debit card. I was eager to do so, as it’d mean that I can avoid the awkward conversation about using cash when literally everyone else in China has transitioned to digital pay. Up till then in the holidays, I had stayed in the house save for a night at my friend’s, so I decided that there was no time better than the same day to make the trip.

Walking into the bank was unexpectedly nostalgic. My latest recollection of the place was when I was around eight, having set up the bank account. I remember to this day grade-school me emptying the jar of change I brought into the grate at the counter tallying up to ~￥400, and it’ll likely be one of those days I’ll never forget.

The paperwork was minimal, and the teller knew what she was doing, so 30 minutes later, I was on my way home, now with a debit card in an envelope.

But the moments in between really struck me. Walking out of the bank, I looked at the debit card, now with ~￥900 in from the cash I brought and whatever interest accrued over the nine years.

The debit card.

My debit card.

Like many out there (I think), I’ve always associated payment through card with adulthood. There was an idea of exclusivity, of authority, of importance if you had a credit or debit card. It belongs in a well-made wallet resting in a deep, reliable pocket. Most of all, it meant responsibility.

And I’ve thought about adulthood before. Usually, it was just joking about taxes, voting and driver’s licenses as my friends’ 18th birthdays approached, or thinking about career plans in the “distant future” after graduating from college. It was a semi-angsty look into the future as the global average temperature threatens to rise above 2 degrees compared to pre-industrial figures. It was late-night voice calls about what seemed as far away and nebulous as the stars in the city sky.

But, in that moment, the future and adulthood seemed to take the form of a PVC card resting between my fingers. It put a lot of things into perspective – that it’s been more than nine years since that day I walked into the bank hand in hand with my parents, that I’ve lived through what might be nearly 20% of my life, that in less than a year, I’ll be leaving the city that I’ve spent most my childhood in for a world thousands of kilometers away.

And honestly, I doubt that I’ll be ready for all of it.

On one hand, I’ve been pretty emotionally independent since my youth: my mom recounts anecdotes of my tearless first day of school, I’d be fine spending summer vacations over at friends’ places, and spending Grade 7 in Thailand starting off knowing very little of the language meant that my adaptability’s been forged over and over since a young age.

On the other hand, my life skills need more than just work.

If you spot my room completely… uh… acceptable, it’s probably because you’ve told me you’d be visiting a good 148 hours in advance for me to temporarily hide the clutter that usually sprawls across the floor, desk, and bed.

I’m not great with belongings: I leave stuff behind all the time, broken important things quite a few times. I drop stuff so frequently I’ve trained myself with a reflexive habit to use my foot to damp the fall.

If my computer was alive, it’d be constantly screaming at me to close a few tabs - my work these days spans 3 browsers and multiple workspaces. It’s holding on, though I doubt for much longer.

Time is also not a commodity I am in plentiful supply of (as per probably every other article has referred to). I’ve spent enough time droning on about wasting time so imma keep this paragraph short.

On days I feel oddly confident and okay, I find cooking always manages to bring me… back down to earth. I’m not awful at it – provided sufficient quantities of pasta and pasta sauce in a well-equipped kitchen I can survive for a good while – but, I guess it always leaves something to be desired.

My sense of direction is as amazing as the rest of me :D shoutout to the countless times I’ve forgotten where I’ve come from in a new environment. The only contexts in which I retain a sense of cardinal direction are when I’m near home and when travelling via the metro.

Awkward social interactions haunt me a lot, which would be okay if they didn’t happen so frequently.

FOMO, or Fear Of Missing Out, has played quite a role in my life lately. People seem so engaged in what they’re doing, academically, extracurricular, or otherwise, and I’m just… existing. It might be a summer program, it might be a night out with friends, it might be an internship, or even just learning something new. It’s like watching everyone rush by me as I stood, stuck in the same place. I guess years of reading chic lit and watching movies have just inflated my expectations for what a seventeen-year old’s life should be like.

I think I’m approaching the end of this blog, so I’ll try to finish on a good note.

Back when I still did Chinese debating, we once had to debate whether the increase in choices brought joy or distress. I remember a metaphor I applied as the proposition:

相信对围棋略知一二的人都了解开局定式的概念，而定式，就只有开局的时候才会用。若是定式延伸到了中局，甚至收官，那么一盘棋开局就能决定结果。围棋之所以有趣，神奇，是因为它的三百六十一个棋格中拥有可谓无穷个可能性，有那么多种变化，那么多个选择。若开局就能见胜负，那围棋还有何乐趣呢？

Those who know of Go understand the concept of standard openings, and such openings are only used in the inception of the match. Should standard moves extend into the midgame, or even the endgame, then the results of a match would be determined from the beginning. The infinite possibilities, variations, and choices the 361 squares hold are precisely why Go is interesting and fascinating. Should exposition reveal resolution, where would all the fun be?

And I suppose life is like such – both fear-striking and beautiful in its volatility and variation. Like the mayfly, like the snowflake, almost gone before you know it. And all we must do as people is just make the most of it while it lasts.

Complaining about life now approaching adulthood doesn’t mean I won’t work on it though. I guess I’ll start by cleaning my bedroom.

Happy New Year everyone ;)

[londomee]

Heya I´m backkk

(I literally only typed "hey" and this GIF came up. Big Data knows me too well)

Heya seguidores (read: the two friends IRL who know about this and whoever's had the misfortune of stumbling upon this in the wilderness of tumblr).

This is just going to be a quick catchup for the last basically two years of a blank I've left.

My grade 9/10 finals were cancelled, so the exam board's just requested for teachers to send predicted grades, evidenced with coursework throughout the year.

Grade 11 came, and junior year was pretty nice (I think I've pretty much peaked). I learnt the stuff, did the tests, went for Student Council, did some Taiko, usuals with Model UN. Stuff flowed, and the year generally was great.

Then Grade 12 hit ;-;

Understandably, the workload isn't large per se, it just that I'm not organized enough to stay on top of everything. So starting since August, it's just been wave after wave of deadlines, from every subject. (Except Spanish. And for that I love it.)

In fact, what reminded me of this blog at all, was the MIT admissions blog. I´d applied to them basically grasping the end of the early action deadline (nov 1 :D) and have been checking the blogs religiously for a decision date since (from previous experience, should be either this Saturday or the next). So uhhh yeah. Back :)

ANyways, life hasn't been the smoothest of petal patches. Grade 12 has really been kicking everything up a few notches, and as someone whose literal first full blog post has been on procrastination, I haven't been exactly living the dream.

But uh, yeah. Living through, doing one thing at a time, and ticking it off my checklist. Winter break is coming up, and I hope I'll get some time to recollect and kick back into the right notch as decisions begin to roll in.

Thass gon be all for today. Sorry for the messy structure and stream-of-consciousness level of cohesion, just wanted to get something out since this has been sitting in my draft box for a good 4-5 days now, and it's been forever since I posted. Thanks, see you next time :D

[londomee]

summer.

Welp. I’ve left this to its own for quite a bit. Guess it’s time I came back.

It’s always been a weird feeling for me, on the last day of school. The half day seems to go by in a second, and the goodbyes feel rushed. There just never is enough time to talk to people, to wrap up all the things, tie up all the loose knots. It felt like that even more so this year, being stuck with online learning an all. It’s like someone turning off the TV after keeping it on for the evening, or waking up in the middle of the night and realizing that the birds are no longer chirping.

The end of year meetups are always filled with apprehension for me as well. I find myself looking at my phone, counting the hours left. It’s always a countdown until the party ends. It makes enjoying things so much more difficult, when you know you have to savor it because it won’t be like this for a whole two months.

I suppose there’s only so much one can do while away from friends.

I’m currently short on brain juice, so here’s a piece of writing in chinese for those of you out there. It’s just general rambling from the last day of school last year.

Enjoy.

2019-6-21 16:45

今天…是十年级的最后一天。在学校的上午也是一晃眼的过去了，感觉没几秒就消逝了，来不及和同学好好说声再见就没了。我和同学沿着一排校车走，看着车窗另一边的人。校车前尽是要转学的朋友，仍含不舍地相拥着。走着走着，我和同学也约好了下午见面的时间，地点，各自出发。

下午和大家的聚会，也感到那么一点空虚。眼睛总是不由自主地飘向商场的时钟，总是默默数着最后的几个小时，几个分钟。最后在和同学道别后，我上了地铁，独自一人回家。 天下，的确没有不散的宴席，但是，我从小，每年说了多少次再见，经历了多少次离别，总没太习惯，没太能安然接受朋友的离开。

大概是每次都定的承诺吧：承诺要去看他们，他们承诺回来看我们，看是来看了，但是重逢，总是少了点什么，好似两人间隔了一层无形的薄纱，带来了一丝尴尬和陌生。的确，岁月无情，但其无情的对象不是人的面貌，而是人的内心。一年后，同学还仍是那个他，但他的个性，喜好，观念，都有那么一点的不一样了。离别时怕的，应该是重逢时的陌生吧。

下了地铁转站，走下了楼梯，听着一个人在人群中孤零零的脚步声，听着地铁的隆隆声，听着一群群人之间交流的嘈杂声。我挤上了地铁，看着周围的每一个人。大家都低着头，任由窗外的景象匆匆而去。一位提着行李箱的游客用着陌生的口音向我问了高铁站的信息，之后便好奇地望着两边的风景。除那之外，车厢中响起的，只有地铁进隧道时的鸣响和时不时传来的广播。

有些朋友，在再见时，仍能一如既往的无所不谈，在我看来也算少之又少了。即使是微信聊天，次数和频率也是随着时间的推移而渐渐减少。我总感觉我是一个较为冷酷的人，在时间的冲刷下慢慢地开始淡忘，从离别的悲伤再次恢复正常，过着与之前一样的生活。朋友的离开，到最后只是一个蕴含感恩之情的回忆，一份能再见的期待。或许是人类自我的保护机制吧，能让我们活在当下，而不是沉浸在去日的不舍之中。

走出地铁站，望着天空，天气已从中午闷闷不乐的小雨转为下午温暖的阳光，仿佛驱使大家开始享受暑假。我走进了家，把西服挂到了衣架上，一学年中最后一次换下了校服，开始收拾起了明天起程的行李。

[londomee]

Ideas and Stories

Note: I went to look at a sticky note on my desktop and momentarily minimized the browser. Three seconds later, boom, what was practically an essay vanished. This is Take-Two, and 3 AM me hopes it’s the final take. Fortunately, Tumblr doesn’t have a character limit. (though I could always post in two parts)

A while ago in debate club, my teacher mentioned an interesting concept: instead of perceiving a speech or essay as being that you “have to say something”, find a way in where you just “have something to say”. The idea kinda just sat with me, like most concepts in school did: a 50% “cool”, 50% “interesting” kind of feeling. I didn’t give it much thought then.

The concept recurred when I was reading through the requirements of an essay later that year: “maximum 2,000 words.” Although its primary cause is probably to preserve the sanity of the teacher and ensure the quality of writing, my mind drifted back to the idea. It made sense, especially as the subject was to prepare us for uni and the bigger world, one where a person had to be self-motivated, fueled by their own ideals and beliefs. In the professional world, nobody wanted someone who had to change “can’t”s to “can not”s in order to drag themselves over the minimum effort line, and the lack of a lower word limit reflected that.

The idea resurfaced yet again earlier this year, when our school sent out a notice of the upcoming TEDx Youth event themed “Vision 2020” hosted at our auditorium, encouraging performers, musicians and most importantly, speakers, to take to the stage. Seeing as I didn’t have an ounce of talent, musical or otherwise, I was more inclined to becoming a speaker. I thought about speech ideas for quite a while then, looking at TED talks, at current events, even at Carmine Gallo’s book, “Talk Like TED” I got a year or so ago. Its table of contents looked a little like this:

Unleash the Master Within

Master the Art of Storytelling

Have a Conversation

Teach Me Something New

Deliver Jaw-Dropping Moments

Lighten Up

Stick to the 18-Minute Rule

Paint a Mental Picture with Multisensory Experiences

Stay in Your Lane

Of this table of contents, the boldened words stuck out to me. Through semesters of Spanish speaking and that Grade 6 autobiography unit in English, it was no mystery how bland my life seemed to be, or how little I managed to capture even of that. Each question in those units had me flipping my mental cabinets inside out, searching for the smallest nugget, the most minute anecdote that was worthy of mention at all. It was clear that I had no story to tell, or by the very least, didn’t know how to look for one.

As for specialities, the utter normalcy of my life seems to magnify by a thousandfold outside of school. The talents my friends possess range from:

Instrument playing/ singing/ outright just opera,

Web design and programming in general,

Badminton/ volleyball/ track and field/ swimming,

Sailing,

Arts, design and calligraphy,

Theatre/ performance,

Rainbow Six Seige (though he’s taking a 6-year hiatus to focus on studies, started the 2nd of April),

And many more extracurriculars I just probably don’t know about because the legends don’t even need to flex about their talents,

and then there’s me. I like Math and Science, but... that’s basically it. I have no lane to stick to, much less anything new to teach.

Although the truth hit me like a baseball bat to the left pinky, I still tried to think of ideas, at one point deciding whether to resort to making a talk narrating the process of finding a topic to talk about. The event is scheduled for the 1st of June, and I haven’t signed up yet, so I suppose the most I’ll be involved in the event would probably be as an audience (if the event is still going on, with all the COVID-19 stuff).

However, the whole experience wasn’t just the baseball bat to the left pinky. Looking at the life I lead, barely finding anything of note to bring up when icebreaking with strangers or planning for speeches, I decided to take a proactive approach. This could all be me cooped up from the quarantine talking, but I’ve got a few project ideas in mind, plans to spice up and add a twist to my state of normalcy. Goals, in no particular order:

Learning:

The NATO phonetic alphabet (alpha bravo charlie)

International phonetic alphabet (the Greek and Latin letters that show up indicating pronunciation in dictionaries)

Morse code (yes there is a cryptography/ linguistics theme here)

The 88 IAU official constellation shapes, names and literal translations (astronomy not astrology)

Talents:   

How to crack open eggs with one hand (because that’s cool)

How to spin a book  (because that’s cool)

How to lockpick  (because that’s cool please don’t flag me thx)

How to play polyrhythms

How to juggle

How to type using an alternative keyboard scheme (DVORAK anyone?)

Improving:

My knifework

My typing speed

I realize that this is a pretty long list with activities that could last beyond my college years, but I suppose I get to dream big, especially with a goal to make my life more interesting. Passerbys feel free to critique, judge, contribute, or copy.

I’m not gonna pretend I came up with this idea (because that’s probably how I sounded before the list). JaidenAnimations had a project in the past where she reviewed all the different varieties of apples at her local supermarket, and Mike Boyd has a major part of his channel dedicated to learning things. (Heck, he’s even got a “5 skills to learn while under quarantine lockdown” video). This idea probably wouldn’t have occurred as fast to me if not for them though I suppose the thought rather naturally came while I was starting a bucket list.

It’s almost 4 where I am, and I need sleep. Sorry for the lengthy read, and depending on where you are, good afternoon, buenas noches, and おはようございます.

[londomee]

Procrastination

It’s always been a problem for me, especially with school projects. In fact, the farther away projects were, the more appealing they seemed. I would view them as a personal interest and have fun doing it while feeling all the dopamines of being productive. However, as deadlines drew closer, they seemed less of exploration and enquiry, but instead a chore I had to complete in time or else.

So yeah. Procrastination. For me, there are two modes of procrastination. The typical type where I do other things to occupy my mind and keep the impending doom out of sight (like I am now), and there’s the type where I enter this superposition of being relaxed but also panicking yet not being able to find the motivation. The second one is what really gets me and is definitely the more stress-inducing one.

My school is in China, so we’ve been doing the whole online learning thing for quite a bit now. And through the 7 weeks, I’ve had my ups and downs. I’ve had days where I’ve cleared everything like 4 days in advance, and other days of me staying up till 2 or 3 to finish that piece of work due last Tuesday or something. Yeah, pretty sure we can all agree that online learning is definitely inferior to its face-to-face counterpart as of the technology and training available now, but the whole quarantine thing has also taught me a thing or two.

Throughout the days, I’d often forget to unwind. Well, properly unwind. I’d always manage to convince myself that I can multitask, so my work was sluggish, slow, and often turned in at the last minute. But as the weeks passed on, I found that taking breaks would often help me focus better. It could be going around the house, it could be neatening up my room, or even just a few strums of my guitar currently leaning against the wall. It provided a sense of satisfaction that online learning doesn’t really pack, not even with Microsoft Teams’ turn-in animations. I’d feel remotivated to jump back into taking notes or ploughing through that analysis question.

And this would help me in general too. I found myself being slightly more organised, starting with self-set calendar events reminding me of classes, to making lists of tasks for the day (well maybe that ain’t a lot). My guitar also kinda did improve, as I was leaving it untouched before the quarantine. Currently in an extremely sparsely populated area, I’ve also started to take jogs around the house, so there's that. Our pace through the learning curriculum may have been slowed, but I’ve managed to re-pick up a few hobbies and try a few new ones.

The takeaway of the day? There are two types of procrastination: not doing anything, and being somewhat productive while procrastinating. The latter sounds like a load of crap, but I suppose I’ll take it over the alternative.

First thing I wrote other than the hello tumblr post. May sound overly verbose, but that’s the name of the game blog.

[londomee]

hello tumblr

Welcome, all to witness the monumental moment, the birth of this blog. *ta-da*

I’m a random high schooler, in a random high school, from this random place, on this random part of the world. And yes, I will randomly use the word random. If you read this repeatedly the word “random” will stop making sense to you. You’re welcome.

Back to seriousness though, this will be an online journal, most likely filled with my rambles. I’m writing it mostly for myself, but companionship will be nice.

The next few years of my life will be jam-packed of all sorts of things, with junior/senior years, applications, colleges and whatnot, so I’ll try to record it, probably not in the best way, but in what I feel like is an interesting one.