March 2012
3 posts
February 2012
4 posts
January 2012
12 posts
3 tags
Christmas
On the 24th we decided to do something special - it was Christmas after all. So we booked a tour to go visit an elephant camp somewhere in the mountains of the Chiang Mai province. Feeding bananas to the elephants when we were getting to know them, an old childhood memory suddenly popped up in my head: Feeding elephants spaghettis in the zoo in Hamburg. So I went and asked one of the workers of...
Chiang Mai - Day I
Before I start talking about just how much I loved Chiang Mai, both the city and the province itself, I think I should share about my trip there. I had flown in BKK because it was significantly cheaper from the Philippines and I had heard that the bus to Chiang Mai is fairly cheap. I took one of the government buses and I was the only person on the bus who was not Thai and at the same time the...
Plans and typhoons.
Cebu Pacific Airlines is blacklisted by the EU. Cebu Pacific has multiple hate-groups on facebook. It is known for scheduling more flights than it has planes. Still, if you want to get from Manila to Cebu, Cebu Pacific is the only ‘convenient’ way of doing so. Our flight was only 3 hours delayed so in a way we were really lucky. As we arrived very late on Cebu Island, we planned on...
“Traveling is learning. In Manila I learnt to sleep to the sound of karoke (a...”
1 tag
Manila.
After I had spent an absolutely lovely week with my Mama in Singapore, filled with sightseeing, good food and shopping, I got myself to Changi Budget Terminal and on a plane to Manila. Already in the cab from the airport to our hostel, Manila’s poverty hit me in the face. Shoe-less, skinny kids were running from car to car, cab to cab stuck in one of the many traffic jams, begging for money....
November 2011
5 posts
2 tags
An acquired taste
The notion of an ‘acquired taste’ is pretty prevalent in Singapore. Everyone who likes Durians will defend them to those who despise them by saying ‘It is an acquired taste, need to try more often lah!’. I admittedly still haven’t tried durians (sorry but the smell of a food usually is a good indicator of what it’ll taste like) and durians smell so badly that...
5 tags
Study. 24/7.
NUS does a great job in giving you the impression that you should be studying 24hrs a day during this period of the year. First, they open the library 24/7, with a big sign at the entrance: Night owl? Study overnight! (not that there aren’t enough other study facilities on campus that are opened 24/7 throughout the semester). Then I discover at dinner yesterday that the canteen in my...
5 tags
Continuous assessment.
Last year, I had a number of modules that were examined by a single exam each, covering the material of an entire academic year, worth 100%. This year, all of my modules are only a semester long and assessed by a combination of homework assignments, class participation, presentations, essays, a midterm exam and a final exam. Which assessment structure is ‘better’?
Let me start by...
October 2011
1 post
4 tags
You know you live in Singapore...
… if you brought a sweater, socks and long pants and are still freezing inside the study room/lecture hall/library.
September 2011
6 posts
Hong Kong
Last week we had a week off (it’s called ‘recess week’ but then seeing how it’s right before midterm exams, you probably shouldn’t take it as that. Well, I did.) and I went to Hong Kong! It was absolutely amazing and I fell in love with the city. I never thought I could be intrigued by chaos, but the chaos seemed oddly real and comfortable and made me realize once...
Kiasuism
The ingredients that got me to read academic papers on kiasuism= having stumbled upon that word multiple times in the past few weeks + actually having to do reading for Macro right now.
My curiosity about the notion behind kiasuism, which is said to define both Singaporean’s behaviour as well as Singapore’s behaviour as a state, first led me to urban dictionary, where one can read...
to mug - to cram for an exam/study really hard
Singlish would have its own word for that.
August 2011
7 posts
"See you later calculator"
Singaporeans LOVE their t-shirts with slogans. My friend Sepi and I started texting each other the best ones we come across and now, after around a week, I already have a ridiculous quantity of stupid/funny/non-sensical slogans in my inbox.
“You’ve got your As, I’ve got my Abs”
“Life is short, paddle hard”
“Add me as a friend”
“Vodka and...
Die Qual der Wahl
All my classes so far seem not only really interesting, but also well taught. I am currently enrolled in 8 modules which means I will have to drop 3 and I can already tell it’ll be a tough decision. But I thought I should share the things that struck me on my first two days of uni here:
1. Both of my somewhat culture-related classes ( Chinese Philosophical Traditions and International...
Stretchy pants.
Before I came to Singapore, Vicnan kept telling me: ‘Bring stretchy pants, Singaporean food is just way too good’. True. ‘Singaporeans favourite free time activities are eating and shopping’. Also true.
Yesterday I had a really good Indian dish - masala and potatoes inside a thin, crisp bread with a variety of sauces that were far too spicy for me. I really enjoyed Little...
July 2011
9 posts
Seeing a familiar face after 4 days of having the exact same conversation with a hundred different people (‘Judith’ ‘Germany’ ‘Politics, Philosophy and Economics’ ‘PGP Residence’) was incredibly comforting and relaxing. Michelle (who was my flatmate in England when she was on exchange in York) and I went for lunch, which was delicious and cheap (a...
“So if it says ‘reverse osmosis’ or ‘drinking water produced by...”
Rules
Accommodation rules:
- no visitors between 11pm and 7am
- no male visitors with the door closed
- no alcohol
- if you leave on the lights when you’re not in the room (and you’re caught) - 10$ fine.
…and many others.
However, yesterday our lovely tourguides first told us that J-walking is strictly forbidden in Singapore, only to teach us half an hour later how to J-walk...
First three people I talked to
1. A German guy, who, as we find out pretty quickly, happens to have been taught by my friend’s dad at the University of Hamburg. (Die Welt ist ein Dorf).
2. A guy from Sri Lanka who did his undergrad at Princeton, we bonded over Small World Coffee.
3. A well dressed Asian guy starts talking to me on the bus and I am like ‘yay I am making non-exchange student friends’. Turns...
“May all the mountains you climb in life…
…be made of chocolate.”
– my favourite cheesy card, by my favourite cheesy girl Lolla
3 tags
Wanderlust
Words are cool things. It has always fascinated me how a person says just as much about themselves with the chosen register and diction as with the content of the words itself. With such importance of our social life attached to words, it makes more than sense that new words are constantly emerging. In whatever language, most new words that appear nowadays are English. Whereas I love English and I...
