流星。

photo source: touch4health

喜欢一个人看电影，因为可以省很多时间和麻烦。

因为很喜欢日本，所以喜欢一个人去日本，因为觉得这样才是二人世界。

很希望每年的秋天，可以 在火红枫叶下的京都，古老的寺廟前，一个人静静的坐着，听着风和叶的声音，看看眼前的情侣，陌生人祈福。

深吸一口气，想想未来的路，细细体会寂寞，失落，优愁的感觉。

也不知道为什么，就是很喜欢这种感觉。也许这样才是体会人生。

离开前，再回味过去人生的酸，甜，苦，辣，也希望可以掌握短暂的未来。

优伤的秋天，失落的红叶，千年的古寺，刹那的人 生。

Diving

Before the holiday of AY09/10 Sem 2, I signed up a diving course: PADI Open Water which allow me to dive (with a buddy) with the maximum depth of 18m without any supervision. It took me to go through 1 theory session with test, 2 pool session and 4 final evaluation dives at Pulau Aur. It all went well for the theory session, the pool sessions as well as the first 3 evaluation dives but, unfortunately (sighhhhhhh...) due to the buoyancy issue when I fin as well as my breathing problem (mainly due to my nervousness of the weakness, I guess) which lead me to left only 5 bar of the air pressure in the cylinder (the average was 60 bar and above), my instructor has to fail me for Open Water and I only certified for PADI SCUBA Diver which only allow me to dive with maximum depth of 12m with the supervision of a Dive Master. As the matter of fact, I think there were 12 student signing up for the course and I am the only one who failed for Open Water (sighhhhhhh...).

Frankly, not so long ago, I had failed my Class 2 motorbike test TWICE and I decided to give up by "lying" to myself: I failed it twice because my "destiny" wanted to prevent me from having deadly accident with a Class 2 bike. Can I lie to myself again with a similar excuse again: I failed it because it will prevent me from drown or attack by jelly fish or even shark?

Sometimes I wonder: why do I have so many failure throughout my life? I failed my Malay in my UPSR (PSLE in Singapore) and it leads me to take 6 years for my secondary education. I failed my Malay again for my O-level and it leads me to take up the diploma study in Nanyang Polytechnics (I wanted to study Malaysia A-level (STPM) at the first place as this is the cheapest way of approaching higher education). I failed more than 15 times, so far, for wooing a girl. I failed all the quizzes (except one and details are written at my another entry named "Naruto") and mid term test for my physics modules as well (eventually I still able to pass all these physics modules. If God or Buddha really exists, thank God or Buddha!)

The only reason that keep me from being sorrow (but still quite sad) from all this failures are: at least I did not failed any of my physics modules. This is my "bottom line" and the only "strength" that I left in order to push me through all this "minor" failure. Again, if God or Buddha really exists, I beg and beg and beg you all please don't let me loose my only "strength" or knock me down lower than my "bottom line". Maybe people like me really need a "strength" to live on and to "beat" another "minor" failure. Am I being too weak? If I were strong enough, I shouldn't need this "strength" and I would always say: "Just bring it on! No big deal." I really don't know. What I knew is that I don't want to have any failure anymore because the feeling is really hard and quite "unbearable" and I really don't know how much more failure I can "accept" but, in reality, can I really "achieve" no more failure from now onwards?

Please, please, please, if God or Buddha really exists, please bless this little and weak fellow--Liew Sing.

Finally.. AY09/10 Sem 2 is over.. part 2

If you remember "Finally..AY09/10 Sem 1 is over", I did mentioned "how much effort I have put in". Looking back, by judging myself, I think I have only put 50% of my effort into study for AY09/10 Sem 1. Likewise, I think I have "improved" by putting 75% of my effort into study for AY09/10 Sem 2. You may ask how come I can "improved dramatically"? Interested into QM2 as well as MPF asides, the real reason that forces me to increase my concentration on study is simply study with my Mac shutting down. Since all the lecture notes are in ppt or pdf format, I used to study with my Mac on because I neglected to print out all the lecture notes in order to save money as well as trees. In fact, by having posted "Finally..AY09/10 Sem 1 is over", I have started to think about the "root-cause" that reduced my "productivity" about study and I realized that indeed it is my Mac that draw most of my concentration from study.

As we all knew, WWW is full of useful as well as junk information and website. The temptation of surfing the junk website is just a-click away. With my Mac on, psychologically I will be tempted to surf something that will waste my time like Facebook. In fact, I have told myself that I'm only allow to surf Wikipedia in order to clear my doubt regarding physics but I always break the rule. Therefore, I have decided to print out all the lectures note (pardon me, trees) and keep my Mac at bay as much as possible started from AY09/10 Sem 2.

As mentioned earlier, I can only increased 25% of the effort (it should be at least 30% I think) and I still prefer to have my Mac around when I am studying. Am I addicted to WWW? If I really do addicted to WWW, how to get rid of it? Or it is normal to addicted to WWW since everyone is doing the same?

I think I really can't blame my Mac or WWW for distraction. If I were to have strong determination, I guess nothing can move me. It is myself to be blamed and I shall keep this in mind at all times.

Well, I think I have to apologize to the earth in advance as I am going to use a lot of paper for lecture notes the following semester, too but I promise that I will definitely recycle all the paper.

Long live our Gaia.

Finally.. AY09/10 Sem 2 is over..

Prof. Oh and Mr. Nerney

"May I have your attention, please", Prof. Ng Ser Choon from PC 2230 Statistical Mechanics continues: " stop writing..."

The long await moment has finally come and the curtain of my AY09/10 Sem 2 has officially falls. Frankly, it was by far the most interesting semester for me because of Quantum Mechanics 2 (QM2) as well as Expository writing: Model of Press Freedom (MPF).

I found QM2 interesting because, frankly again, of Prof. Oh Choo Hiap. Prof. Oh was such a great lecturer. To him, the content of QM2 is just like at his fingertips. He managed to teach the module "fluently", in the sense that, I believe, most of the student understood the reasons behind all the mathematical structures that described the physical phenomenons about the hydrogen atom, boson, fermion, etc. Thus the students also understood the importance of the mathematical structures and started to appreciate the work that our good-old physicists like Prof. Dirac and Prof. Pauli, put in. Also, Prof. Oh's explanations is by far much better that reading the text book. I think I can safely say that the lectures is much more rigorous than the text book, too. Basically, by purely understanding the lectures will help to understand the text book but not vice versa. As I was doing my final revision for the exam, I found that the outline of the lectures are so "smooth and elegant" that I can answer myself that "because of this (previous theorem, "classical law" or the 7 postulates for QM), we have to do this (new mathematical structures like "hermition" the new "operator" ) and thus it enable us to solve the hydrogen atom problem and allow us to understand it. I think this way of learning by questioning and answering is very rigorous and fascinating and I really enjoyed the module. It is really "intelligently delicious"! Also, Prof. Oh is very passionate about teaching, too. If I were to ask the class what is Prof. Oh's "favorite quote", I believe most of the students would answer: "Do you have any question?" Prof. Oh is such a lovely lecturer that he would like to walk around the theater before the lesson starts or during the break and asked student this question:" Do you have any question?" I was moved by his passion of teaching-even when I just pop up and knock his office's door for consultation, he always smile and welcome me when he sees me. If I were to teach one day, Prof. Oh would definitely be my role model and he will be remembered when I think of hydrogen atom, boson, fermion, etc.

If I were to tell you that Mr. Paul Nerney was my first Caucasian-no offensive meaning- teacher/lecturer, you would see my point as why MPF was such an interesting module for me. Yes, I have a very difficult time during the first few seminar with Mr. Nerney and my head was "spinning around" after the seminar ended. As you may aware that my English is really bad, I have a lot of difficulties of catching what Mr. Nerney said during the seminar and I hardly come out with a good question or answer in order to keep the seminar engaging. As the seminar consisted of only 8 students, interacting with Mr. Nerney seems to be cannot be avoided but unfortunately I have to keep quite and "act interested" most of the time. However, I did learnt a lot from Mr. Nerney, especially the way he looks at the issues regarding press freedom and the way of writing persuasive articles. It helps me broaden my horizon as well as the way that I used to think about certain issues. In fact, before the seminar, I thought that I am able to think critically and fundamentally but, after few seminars, actually I am not- not even close to that! I remember my first lesson was defining "model of press freedom" and I spent more than 2 hours to look for the answer after class, despite the fact that the definition of "model", "press" and "freedom" were provided from a dictionary. These questions pull me down to the ground and forces me to think about the fundamental meaning of "model of press freedom", which I took for granted. By knowing the truth that I am actually lacking the skill of thinking critically and my mistake of "take thing for granted", this module makes me more interested into it and I would like to thank Mr. Nerney for his patient as well as his helpful suggestions/explanations.

Well, the 3-months-summer holidays has started and I really hope that I would have an even better and fruitful semester for AY10/11 Sem 1 (I can't wait!) and I would also like to wish Prof. Oh and Mr. Nerney all the best and good health.

Happy holidays!