Constant Debate

This week has been a little less exciting so far. We had Crazy Costume Day on Monday. That was entertaining. There were some students who dressed up as bees, the opposite sex, and witches, while the English teachers all dressed up as FBI agents and the science teachers were dressed as CSI scientists. I didn't dress up as anything, even though I had been thinking of dressing up as a baby with nappies and everything during the weekend, and Phoebe suggested I dress up as a girl. After having everyone asking me why I was wearing a skirt on Friday though I was a little afraid of being considered a queer for 'cross-dressing' for two straight days.

 

In the past two days we've had free lunchtime debates for entertainment. Yesterday was the senior team up against our advanced team of Patrick, Heather and me. The moot was:

 

"that a cabbage is better than a rose"

 

The senior team were on the affirmative while were were negating. We were originally going to plan it on Friday, but we couldn't find each other, so in the end we only met up yesterday morning to start planning. We did our research, then decided we needed props! So we all went down to Woolworths to buy a cabbage and a rose. We spent the rest of first period planning our debate (I didn't wag it was my free!)

 

Finally at lunch the debate got under way. Patrick was our first speaker, and chucked the cabbage on the ground and stomped on it. Matthew, Chen and Luke were on the other team. I spoke second, on how a rose symbolises love and beauty and that we give roses to people to show our love to them, and not a cabbage because a cabbage is big, round, ugly, wrinkly, green, etcetc. Heather spoke last for our team.

 

Unfortunately...our team lost by 12 points. Luke got speaker of the day with 93 while I got second at 88. Ms Conde (English teacher/adjudicator) said she was 'shocked' at my speech, I'm not too sure why since my points were valid and legitimate! I did mention that giving your partner a rose could help you score, and now according to Aonghas this guy in his maths class told him that he and his friends thinks I'm a dodgey guy now, who probably has some sex problem/addiction! (I'm hoping they're just joking!)

 

Today the teachers debated the moot

 

"that male teachers are better"

 

with the womens team affirming and the men negating. It was cool to see nearly half the hall filled! It was pretty entertaining once again, and for the record the women won.

Big Boy!

Yesterday was the first time I had gone into the city all by myself! It was the University of Auckland Open Day. I got Aonghas to cover my classes for me (I will pay him!) while I caught a public bus into the city all by myself!! :D I couldn't catch the free one because it'd mean I'd have to go all the way to one of the schools it actually stopped at, and I couldn't wake up early enough to be able to make it there on time. So instead, I just caught a public bus.

I got into the city at 9.30am just as the Open Day started. I was supposed to meet up with Jacqueline and Hannah (really old friend from primary school! She also went to Rutherford two years ago before leaving), but they weren't coming till about 10, so I had half an hour to kill. It was really scary walking all by myself! Well not that scary but...lonely...Anyway I tried to look as though I was loved and preoccupied by texting people and walking around reading the info booklets. I got to the health sciences stand, and one of the guys from the Physiology section asked me if I'd like to be hooked up to this machine to see my heart flow or beat or something like that I can't quite remember. I ended up lying on this bed with these wires connected to my arms and legs. Fortunately after analysing the graph the man said I was normal!

When it was finally 10, I was told to meet Jacqueline and Hannah at Britomart, so I had to walk all the way back down Queen St. At the same time though Kat, Melissa and Aneesya were at the other end of Queen St! As I was walking down the road towards Queen St, I spotted the girls waiting at the intersection! I caught up and walked to Wendys with them where they were going to eat. After talking to them for a while I realised Jacqueline and Hannah were still waiting for me, so I power-walked my way back down Queen St to meet them. We then went down to yum-cha at the waterfront, which was really nice!

After that we went back to the university, where we had a look around. We came across Esther and Archi together, Neha and Josefia together, Estee and Pita together, and Nick, David, Shrikkanth, Shen and the St Peters guy (still need to work out his name!) around campus. Oh yeah! And Andromeda (I've probably spelt her name wrong), who used to go to Rangeview! I was amazed at how many people from school we came across!

At 1pm us three attended the 'How to Read Korean in 10 Minutes' class. That was fun! We each got a prize. While Jacqueline and this guy got a Winnie the Pooh pencil case and Hannah got a Barbie pencil case, I got a Hello Kitty one. Cool!

My parents came to pick me up at about 2pm so that we could all go to the Lewis Eady Junior Music Contest at Dilworth Junior School to support Rangeview's two orchestras there. We're still close to Ms Rai, their music teacher, so we try to go watch their school orchestra perform as much as we can. The orchestras performed William Tell Overture and a song from Swan Lake (can't remember which one). They played very well but unfortunately didn't get a placing.

Dress up + Talent Quest

Today at school was Korean, Kiwi and Other Day! (how I like to consider it anyway!) It was cool to see quite a few students dress up in their cultural costume! I was a little worried because I came to school dressed as a Scotsman, wearing a kilt, a hat and one of those Scottish fannypacks (lol I don't know what the Scottish call it!)

I got some weird and interesting looks and comments from staring people as I walked through school:

"Shot dude!! You're wearin a skirt!!"
"Are you wearing a G-string underneath that?"
"Cool costume" (thanks!) "I was being sarcastic" (me then gives her a sad face)
"Look! That guy's wearin a skirt!"

I kept telling them it was a kilt! Oh well in the end I gave up and just told them I wanted to see what it felt like for a day. People didn't have to worry about underneath, as I was wearing shorts!

Apparently there were people joking about me wearing a skirt, and saying that I needed to shave my legs. I didn't really think people would scrutinise my legs that closely! I don't really know about shaving/waxing legs...apparently it's gay to do it, but girls prefer smooth hairless legs? That's why I wear trousers to school!

This was a comment from one of my brother's friends:

"Hey Aonghas I saw your brother today. It's probably the first time I've seen his legs...or maybe I've already seen them before?"

My physics teacher, the careers lady, my dean and Esther also wore Scottish clothes so we were all like family! Other people wore cool costumes like Shen, who looked like an Indian prince! Jacqueline wore her Indian dance costume. Shirley and this other Korean girl (pianist for the orchestra I should know her name!!!) wore their pink Korean dresses. Phoebe wore a cool Chinese dress (I think?) while Azza kinda just covered herself completely!

All this International Languages Week, fundraising and charity drives are starting to make me poor! I spent a dollar on a daffodil earlier in the week. I then gave some money to my friend. Then today I bought one of those Daffodil Day wristbands (just out of curiosity as I've never had one of those before...and it just has to be munted by the sun) for $4 (I think?), another daffodil (because I lost the other and was feeling generous at the time) and then Shirley's friends asked me to help them fundraise for their Wider Living Week trip by buying a Snickers bar from them, which cost another  $2! Now I'm left with nearly....zilch.

Tonight was the talent quest. I was filming with Aonghas, and I must say it was really, really good! Joanne did a great job this year with it. The programme was divided into three sections - dance, singing, bands. We had three judges, Oscar Kightley (ex-Rutherford), Liana Hape (ex-Rutherford), and then this other girl who was also in Sione's Wedding. The judges' table was set up in a similar way to how Rutherford Idol was in the previous two years, and one judge gave a comment after each performance. Ewen Gilmour and Heather were really good and entertaining MC's too!

It was surprising to see such a strong rock presence at our school and very little hip-hop/r n b! I guess that all came in on the Fia-Fia Night. Anyway, in the end Janet won the singing (good on her!), Danielle and Tasha won the dance, and Corona won the band. Nick and Shrikkanth's band performed tonight. It was cool seeing Shrikkanth again, back at Rutherford! Their band was really cool! Another performance which was really good too was Michaela, who sang jazz accapella. She was probably the most professional out of all the singers, but I think the judges went with the audience. One unlucky performance though was a duet by two girls who sang Unfaithful by Rihanna. The first time the corded microphone wasn't working. They started the backing track again, but then the battery-powered wireless microphone died! It was such a shame!

However the Talent Quest went really well! Hopefully it will continue in the future at Rutherford, and become a permanent fixture like Studio Shows and Fia-Fia Nights.

Self-Discovery

Today was Chinese Day at school. They played Chinese music out loud during interval. Funnily enough there were fewer people in that area! We cooked dumplings during our free Chinese period. Well...Shiu Tai and Bronwen and Jacqueline were cooking them, while the rest of us watched. I know now why our Chinese teacher didn't originally ask us to help out! We kinda stuffed up a whole batch of dumplings, when someone poured too much water in the pan!

 

The dumplings were being sold for 50c each while other snacks were about the same price. There were also a couple of Chinese people who were teaching students how to play with that Chinese yo-yo. Fortunately there was quite a huge turnout during lunch! I was originally assigned the task of selling the dumplings, but the year 12's got to the table first and took my job, so I didn't get to. That was OK though, as I had to set up the projector in the hall for assembly as well as go to the Auckland University Scholarship talk in the careers centre.

 

Later tonight we had FiaFia night, which is a bit like a cultural festival. It was the first I've ever been to at Rutherford! I was performing as part of the choir. We performed the same Samoan song we did at the Big Sing, as well as this other African song which I didn't really know, so I skipped physics to learn it with the music teacher. The FiaFia night was pretty interesting, with a loud noisy and supportive audience! The Indian dance group were really impressive! Go Shen!!

 

Some things I've come to notice today are that I've come to realise I've been annoying the hell out of heaps of people in my attempt to capture my last year at high school through obsessive photo-taking. I apologise to everyone that I've annoyed already, and promise to take them more discreetly from now on!

 

I also realised that I have no idea how to make people feel better! Well not on MSN anyway. I end up trying to lighten up the mood but in the end probably don't sound as if I'm taking things seriously and then cap it off by giving regurgitated advice that I don't even know makes sense at all or will even work! Maybe I should just hide somewhere or not go on MSN for a while so I don't make things worse for people!

Crazy Stuff!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GREG!

I just finished watching the NZ vs Japan basketball game at the world champs. Man did NZ play so badly! It's just so lucky they managed to come back from 18 points down to win by 3 and keep their hopes of making it to the knockout round alive!!

Hopefully you all didn't watch High School Musical on Saturday night like I did. I've had some of the songs from that movie stuck in my mind ever since for nearly a whole week now! I've been trying to drain it out of my head by listening to other music and I did have that Over my Head by The Fray stuck in my mind till that High School Musical song came back to me! ARGGGGH!!

Yesterday was German Day at school. Because I had choir rehearsal at lunch I didn't get a chance to check out the German activities and food on sale. After lunch though I did walk past and saw the German students start to tidy up and pack things up. They had a bit of spare food left over, so I asked them how much it cost and offered to buy some, but they gave it to me for free, for being headboy!! lol!! Nah seriously I offered them money but they refused to accept it.

Tonight I have to perform at the Fia Fia Night at school. I'm singing in the choir, as one half of the boys. We're singing the school song and that involves a lot of bellowing which I don't do too well, being a little white boy. The next day will be the talent quest which looks set to be an interesting night! Can't wait!

Spanish Flavour

Today was Spanish Day of International Languages Week at our school. It was also Funny Hat Day. At first it didn't seem as though too many people had brought funny hats to school. Most were teachers, as well as a few students. I brought my umbrella hat, thinking it would rain. I wanted to wear a cooking pot but my mum couldn't find one she wasn't using for cooking with.

Sports photos were taking place in the hall all day. I had to get one taken as part of the Senior Boys Squash team. I forgot all about it, until I saw Nikki being called for senior girls squash. At that time I remembered it was during chemistry the squash team photos were being taken! I looked at the notices and realised they had been taken ten minutes ago, so I rushed to the hall, hoping that maybe things were delayed. Well...they weren't, but our team was having their photo re shot because the teacher in charge wasn't present for the first one! PHEW

During lunch outside the B Block the Spanish students were selling Spanish food, as well as running a pinata competition. I'm sure that thing got whacked down several times! My umbrella hat blew off and there were these girls who asked me if they could have it! Before I rushed off to orchestra after feeling guilty, I came across Angie and Gwen who were selling boxes of joy and after promising them several times to buy one, I finally decided to buy one, so there went $2.50 of my money.

During form period I was about to leave the music room when some of the students of the form class based in that room asked me to donate some money for Daffodil Day, so there went another dollar!

After school we had a salsa dancing lesson! It was really complicated. There were only four guys - Shen (after pressuring him to come along!), Aonghas, me and this other guy. The rest were girls. The girls opted to pair up with each other, leaving us guys to dance with the teachers. At first I danced with this Indian dance teacher (I can't spell her name!) until one of the girls became free, so I danced with this year 12 girl for the rest of the lesson. We learnt all these moves. I don't think we were doing them right though. Mr Moore the principal came over half way through probably after his soccer training with the soccer team, and joined in. I think he was having a bit of trouble too! It was all a bit of fun in the end and something different!

Dental Journey Continues

This morning during third period I had to go to the dentist (Dr Wong!) for not just a check-up, but to have a couple teeth pulled out. I was a bit apprehensive, but I suppose I was more concerned about how long it would take, hoping either it would take long enough or that I wouldn't feel too well so that I'd get to miss out on chemistry period in 5th period (OK wishful thinking there) because I had an organics test then!

 

Anyway my mum and I arrived there on time but Dr was still working on someone else, so we had to wait a while. Finally it was my turn, so I went into the room and sat in the chair. It reclined and I lay back as Dr Wong went over to get a needle and inject me on either side of my mouth. I was gripping the chair, but fortunately the needle wasn't in for too long! After he had done that, I thought he had pulled my teeth out already and that it was all done, but no that was just the anaesthetic! My hearing started to feel weird and my sight was starting to go white, and so I was about to faint, so the dentist reclined the chair for me to rest for a little while. They told me it was common, and that a few people had collapsed in the doorway after getting out of the chair!

 

After cleaning my teeth, the dentist gave me two stress balls to hold on to, telling me I was going to need them! When I saw him holding the pliers, that's when I realised he was going to pull my teeth out! The first one he pulled out wasn't too bad, but the other one was a little sorer. He told me afterwards that maybe he didn't use enough anaesthetic on that side of the mouth! He put two pieces of cotton wool where the teeth used to be and sent me on my way.

 

When I got back to school students were asking me if I had just gotten braces! I looked in the mirror and I looked like a retard with my lip slightly up on one side. I couldn't feel anything at the top of my mouth for the next couple of hours. Fortunately the cello/string quartet teacher went really easy on me and was nice to me!

 

So once again just as I was starting to get used to having braces, I have to go easy again and try get used to eating with missing teeth!

Chinese Speech Competition

Yesterday was the 10th annual Auckland Chinese Speech Competition. Last year I did really badly, as I had only prepared my speech about our family's kitten a couple days before the competition. This year I had written a speech about two weeks before, but the proof-reading process took a bit longer than expected. It was only two days before the speech competition that I had settled on the final version of my speech! A bit of deja vu there...Anyway I spent my last lunchtime on Friday with Phoebe trying to practise my speech to her (trying to avoid all those distractions!) and then spent the rest of Friday night and Saturday morning practising.

Finally the speech competition came at 2pm at Auckland Uni. I met up with Bronwen and Nikki who came and were going to compete as well. I wasn't sure if they were going to or not, since they had had an awful English assessment the day before! There were about 24 students competing in our category, the largest of all categories there! In past competitions the year 12 and 13 categories have been the smallest, but I suppose numbers of Chinese students have been growing over the years.

This year they changed the format of the competition, so that after you gave your speech you had to answer two questions related to China in Mandarin. We were only given the questions and answers to learn two days before the competition!

Bronwen went second. Her speech was pretty good! After when she had to answer the questions my mum (who was filming in the back) and I were trying to tell her the answer, with my mum mouthing it and me holding up a piece of paper with it. Fortunately she got both questions right!

I went right after her. In a late minute decision before I left home I decided to wear a costume to be slightly different, so I got up in my Scottish kilt and a Chinese hat with a fake ponytail. I gave my speech on being a Eurasian. I'm not too sure how it went because I did stumble a little bit! I managed to answer both questions correctly (although I hoped the adjudicators heard correctly too!)

After that I had to listen to another 20 or so speeches before we got to Nikki's. Amongst those other speeches was last year's winner, this Korean girl from Lynfield College. I was anticipating a good speech from her. It turns out she was using the same speech she did last year according to my mum! Nikki finally did her speech and she did hers well too!

The prize-giving is sometime in October so I'll have to wait a while for the results.

My family and I walked around the city for a while after the competition. It was a bit freaky. There was this drunk Maori guy who chucked a glass bottle at the wall. We also came across this big group of emo's. That was scary too!

I had a good chat with a friend and discovered heaps of interesting stuff that fills all these holes in my understanding of certain things, and this morning at church I'm sure I saw another person from our school there - Angie...but then again I always think I see people but they turn out not to be that person (eyes playing tricks on me)

One Long Night

Last night was the conclusion to our Smales Farm 21st Century Career Pathways programme. We had to attend a prize-giving ceremony at Westlake Boys High School in their flash new auditorium.

 

The white lady who was the Chairperson of the Smales Farm Technology Farm was the host, and man did she just talk and talk and talk all night! Anyway Mr Edmeades (past principal of Rutherford) as well as Mr Moore (current principal) was there, with Mr Edmeades giving a speech. It was so good hearing one of his speeches once again! I'm starting to miss him!

 

Each school was then called up alphabetically and then we had to clap as each single person received their certificate. With us being Rutherford, we were towards the end. While they were calling out the students of Rodney College, the lady called out

 

"AMY CHAU"

 

and we all thought they had gotten mixed up with OUR very own Amy! Shen called out to the lady

 

"SHE'S OVER HERE!" 

 

pointing to Amy, who was sitting next to me. Everyone turned and looked at him, including..Mr Moore! Shock horror! Finally our school got called up to the stage. It was funny as the first few of us on stage was Alex, Daak, David, Amy and me. Everyone was so tall except for Amy and me! She made me feel a bit better about my height thanks Amy! After we all got our certificates they took a group photo of us on stage (like they did with each school) and we went back to our seats.

 

After that were the special awards! Alex and I made another bet. He was saying that no one from our school was going to get anything, while I was saying at least one person from our school would get a special award. It turns out there was an award for one student of each school who wrote the best report! Congrats to JOON who did the best report out of all the Rutherford students! Congratulations also to EMILY for one of the most humorous reports and JOSHUA for the best questions! (He wrote 12 questions when we were only supposed to do about 3 or 5!!!)

 

The white lady kept talking and talking and talking and talking...eventually it was 10pm (when the event had started at 6.45pm). There a disgruntled few. Shen was hungry, Amy and Sarena had an English assessment to prepare for the next day. Me...well I had to prepare for my Chinese speech on Saturday. We all just wanted to get out, or have some supper! Supper turned out to be just biscuits and a cup of tea though.

 

It finally ended and everyone left very quickly!

Rock at Rutherford

I finally got my law scholarship application sorted and sent! However, that wasn't the most exciting thing that happened at school today. As part of the NZ Schools Tour, the band Falter came to play at our school. They were really cool, and it was great to see everyone come along, doing the whole moshing thing and everything! There were even some students at the end of the performance who were fighting over who could keep this C4 banner! A cameraman was there too filming students so watch C4 in the next week (I think!) and you'll be able to see our school! Full credit to Joanne and Heather for organising the whole thing!!! 

 

The twins have left for Korea. Fingers crossed they have a safe trip! They have to get their Korean university application sorted out and go for an interview over there.

 

Oh and what a sad day it is to hear of the passing of the Maori Queen. Rest in peace!

Really

Today I had to run around trying to see if I could get anyone to read the blurb I wrote on why I want to be a lawyer for this law scholarship. The maximum word limit is 500 words, and I had trouble reaching half that total, but then last night I was having trouble trying to keep within the limit! I found a few teachers who were happy to have a read through and get it back to me by tomorrow.

Cello lessons and string quartet weren't too bad. The cello teacher wants me to try sit grade 4 cello exams. Hyun tried lying his way out of string quartet again. Joon told the teacher that Hyun had been sick for the whole week. Guess who knocked and came in a few minutes later! Hyun then saved himself telling the teacher he just remembered he had an internal assessment this afternoon and so that's why he was at school. I dunno...twins these days...double trouble...There was a fire alarm (most probably a false one) that cut short our rehearsal so I guess they were saved!

Assembly saw the first time Aonghas spoke at assembly. He didn't do too badly! Afterwards, everyone told me he sounded just like me! Hyun also spoke at assembly on International Languages Week. I'm not too sure why he didn't say what he had originally planned to say hmmm......lol nah anyway it was announced that Monday would be Japanese Day, Tuesday - Spanish, Wednesday - German, Thursday - Chinese, and Friday - Korean/Kiwi (I think that's right...) When I saw the timetable earlier in the day though I saw Friday as Maori/kiwi! I had all these people ask me after assembly where the day for Pacific Islanders/Maoris was, and whether the week was only to celebrate Asian languages. I tried reassuring them that they were just as important! It looks like Aonghas and I might end up staying after school next week for the salsa class, Japanese cooking class and movie afternoon since its so cheap!

Szepo came to visit after school today. Well...mainly to drop off this book she had borrowed from us. She ended up staying for a few hours to catch up with us. She told us about what she's been up to and how's things been getting along. Good I think! She tried making me feel shamed just because I didn't have a partner for the ball and so didn't fulfil one of my New Year's resolutions, and because Aonghas managed to ask a girl to this church ball we performed our accordions at. Well that was because that ball was filled with year 11+12s!! Nah good on him. And just because she has a boyfriend and has been in a relationship for a couple of months now and I been single for what the last ...two years or something.. Well I'll show her...one day...!!

Today's the day I'm going to start a new routine:
-Cut back on MSN
-Cut back on TV
-Study study study
-Go to sleep earlier
-Wake up earlier
-Get to school earlier

I'm going to make sure I stick to this one this time!

Joys of Being all Grown Up

I got this letter in the mail in the weekend from the IRD warning me:

Dear Mr Anderson

OVERDUE IR 3 INCOME TAX RETURN FOR THE PERIOD ENDED 31 MARCH 2006.


We have not received your 2006 Ir 3 income tax return, and the due date has now passed...
If we do not hear from you within 30 days from the date of this letter:
- We will charge you a late filing penalty, and
- We will also estimate the amount of tax that we think you should pay...

Please remember that not filing income tax returns is a serious offence, and we do take legal action against people who do not comply with the tax laws.


Yours faithfully
Steven Whittaker
Area Manager

Well that's nice! It stated in the letter that you only need to fill in one of those forms if you receive any income apart from salary, wages, interest or dividends, or taxable Maori authority distributions (yip that sounds like me...not), but I haven't received any other income! I tried ringing IRD several times, getting a message:

"Due to unforseen circumstances we are unable to attend to your call. Please try again later" beep beep beep beep....

I finally got through, gave my IRD number and the lady told me that when I got paid as the student rep the school considered me as an 'external contractor', so now I've still got to fill in one of those forms! Great fun!

Moving Upwards and Onwards

This morning I woke up and found one of the brackets of my braces had come off a tooth, the same one that came off last week! That means I've got to go back to Middlemore to get it stuck back on AGAIN. I'm sure I haven't been eating hard stuff (or maybe I have but I doubt that's what is causing it!), I think it's just that the surface of the tooth isn't flat so maybe the bracket just isn't sticking properly.

This morning I had recorder classes to teach. Thank goodness this other teacher came to help out in the class where I had a complete beginner and another student who was a little further down the line. She offered to help try catch the girl up, while I continued with the other guy student. One of my advanced students (year 7 or somewhere around there?), this girl who is pretty negative and gets bored easily, told me

"The recorder's dumb anyone can play it it's not an instrument a proper instrument is like a piano or a violin"

I started to feel a little down, knowing I was teaching a dumb instrument that wasn't even a 'proper' instrument! (nah I wasn't too down) But then she went on...

"Like the flute...the flute's dumb. My school orchestra's dumb"

That made me feel better, especially since the other girl in the class, her friend, plays the flute!

Yesterday was interesting. these people from University of Auckland came over to our school to talk to students about how to plan their courses for next year. I went during my free period, and along with Melissa and Lindsey we got told all about law. While sitting there looking through the booklets waiting before that though, I started thinking, is law really me? To be honest I would much rather prefer some sort of career involving a bit of creativity, and film/media still gets me quite interested, as well as computer science after reading about it in the Science degrees booklet! The only thing is determining whether it is just a hobby or possible career option though. I really have no idea! I'll just stick to law for now and see where I get...or if I change my mind in a month's time.

I had finally finished writing my Chinese speeches - two speeches - one on being a Eurasian and one on how to find an Asian girlfriend, so that I could let the Chinese teacher choose which was best. She preferred the speech about being a Eurasian because I had personal experience (probably thinking I've never had an Asian girlfriend!). Other people thought the one about getting an Asian girlfriend was more interesting though, so I'm a bit stuck here too. I sat with Phoebe and her friends again by the International Village at lunch while she helped improve my Chinese speech again (which I'm grateful for!), when there were a few people shouting interesting things out at us, which I haven't come across in a while. I decided to stay put for form period, when all these Thai teachers came by, and one of the female Thai teachers with a guy holding a video camera came over to Phoebe, Lisa, Julie and me and started asking us questions while the guy was filming. She then thanked us in what seemed like an abrupt ending and went off.

After school I went to Rangeview to visit Miss Rai, dearly beloved music teacher. They've shifted the music room from beside the hall to the old art room, and the art room has moved to the opposite classroom. She told us that their orchestra is still going strong, and that they'll be entering two groups + a few soloists in the upcoming Lewis Eady Junior Music Contest coming up in two weeks time. I might try go to watch them if I can make it! It's good that there is at least one teacher I still know at Rangeview, as most of the teachers that were there when I was at Rangeview have since left. While I was walking through the school, all these past memories came flooding back. I could picture things such as
- Alistar and me posing for the headboy+headgirl photo in the school magazine outside the art room,
- all the kids hanging out by the steps of Room 8 (Mr Goodison's class back then) including Allen Giang and Grainam (don't know why those guys in particular!) waiting for the teacher to unlock their room,
- Nga Toi where in year 7 our class for Maori learnt how to do these Maori moves with sticks (which were actually just newspapers rolled up) and because there was a shortage of 'sticks', Sarena (or Linh back then!) gave me hers awwwwwww,
- ooh and the water fight in year 7 outside our classroom Rm 16, with Robyn the main culprit. Us guys distanced ourselves from the girls group as soon as the teachers came by, and I think the girls got in trouble!
-The field where us guys often played cops and robbers or something like that (one group chase the other), soccer and piggyback fights, and when Hyun got into a fight with Tynan (not too sure if that's how you spell it) YES the Hyun!! It wasn't really much of a fight just a little kick and punch here and there and then I think it ended in a draw
I could probably keep going on, but this post is already long enough! Maybe I might recall a few more later on..

Famous Face!

Kat's in the newspaper!

Expo Excitement!

Today I only had two periods of class so I didn't have to bring a schoolbag! :D OK that wasn't the highlight of the day. The hightlight of theday was the Coke Careers Expo at the ASB Showgrounds. We went there for periods 2,3, and 4, which meant no stats and chem!! Period 5 was my free so that was even better! Everyone was really looking forward to it because they wanted free stuff! Well there was a lot of it, and a lot of display stands everywhere. Before I went in, Alex and I made a bet on who could collect the most pens, with $1 at stake!

I walked around and talked to all these people about all sorts of stuff. The most interesting must have been the film and animation schools + Natcoll (computer design etc) The whole 3D animation and video post-production thing sounds really interesting! I wish I was as artistic as some OTHER people I know! I think Aonghas would be interested in something to do with that, so I collected a bit of information for him.

There were a lot of competitions. I think I entered at least three draws for an Ipod, so fingers crossed I'm successful in at least one of those (unlikely!) There was this obstacle course competition thing the Institute of Sport was running, and when I walked past the guys were heckling me, calling the Rutherford College headboy to try beat the time! All I had to do was do 10 pushups, run along this ladder thing along the ground and then putt a golfball into the hole about two metres away. So I took on the challenge. It was really weird doing the push-ups, because while I was doing it, all these people started gathering around watching me, which felt really embarrassing! What was worse was when I got to the golf part. I hardly play golf, and I probably took at least 10 putts before I finally got it in the hole! The guys told me in the end that I didn't get the best time. Fair enough!

One of the exciting things to happen was this fight that nearly broke out! I was hovering around the Otago University stand, before I finally decided to grab one of their bags they had lying on a chair and sneak off with it. Without looking I walked into this big crowd. At first I thought some sort of show or competition was going on, like break-dancing or something, but instead there were these guys stepping each other and taking on each other. So the first thing I could think of...get the camera out hold it high up and TAKE PHOTOS!!! :D (they're in the photo album on my MSN space) OK not the smartest thing to do, but after a few photos I felt a little scared they might turn on me if they saw me taking photos of them so I started walking the opposite direction, and once I was away from that area I just watched from a distance as this policeman took one of the guys outside. They couldn't have picked the best possible place to start a fight - down the same aisle as the Police Recruitment stand!

In the end I lost the bet to Alex 5 pens to his 12. I did manage to get a free ruler, keyring torch, two necklace things and heaps of rubbish for the fireplace!

Tonight was really busy on MSN. My computer restarted for some reason and when I got back online after a few minutes a few people had gone, so I'm sorry to those people I wasn't ignoring you or blocking you!

Oh and by the way, check out The Western Leader, Thursday 10 August edition pg 17. Look who is in the picture ..its Kat!!!

Procrastinating

I've been procrastinating too much this week. Each day I tell myself to write that page on why I want to be a lawyer for that scholarship application form, and to get that Chinese speech done, but after two weeks I still haven't done it! Yesterday after school I was just sitting there on the computer with the speech open, staring at it and then thinking...hmm I'll just chat to a few friends to ask for their opinions. Five hours later, I've added nothing to the speech!

The Chinese speech competition is coming up next Saturday, and I still haven't really decided what to talk about. I can talk about anything in Chinese for 3 minutes. I've been tossing up between two topics: how to find a Chinese girlfriend, and being a Eurasian. I know nothing about finding a Chinese girlfriend (not much experience), and so I tried asking my female Asian friends. They told me you've got to be tall, rich, be able to drive, be ugly (so that the girl can feel good about herself, don't have to worry about competition, and can be the centre of attention) and remember every single anniversary. I might just write two speeches and then get the teacher to decide which is better.

I finally got to go back to Middlemore Hospital on Tuesday to get my braces fixed, as one of the brackets on my teeth had come out last week. It was early in the morning and there were all these South Aucklanders lining up to be treated. I thought that was where I was supposed to line up, so I just stood in the line. It turns out it was the pain relief clinic! I was supposed to be in the appointments line, which was non-existent! So I went in and got my braces fixed. They told me I needed to get my two teeth pulled out before my next check-up at Middlemore. After school I went to see Anthony Wong, my dentist, and told him I needed my wisdom teeth pulled out, but he told me that mine hadn't fully grown and that I'd need an operation to get them taken out. If Middlemore couldn't do it, then he'd have to refer me to a private hospital which could cost $3000 upwards!!! My dad didn't know about this, and we didn't tell him that night because we wanted him to sleep peacefully. Fortunately my mum told him the next day while I was at school. He rang up the hospital, and they told him I needed two other teeth pulled out, not my wisdom teeth, as they would do it as part of my operation next year. Anthony Wong said he could pull those two teeth out himself for about $200. At least that's a lot less than 3000!

After visiting Anthony Wong, I quickly rushed to the netball game to support Rutherford up against Long Bay. It was great to see so many students and teachers supporting our team! All the principals were there, a few deans and the PE teachers. Unfortunately we lost by about 7 goals, but I can't wait to support our school somewhere else now! (Yes now I'm getting TOO attached!)

This girl still thinks I like this girl even though I'm waaaay over her so yeah to that girl I'm over that other girl!

Tomorrow is Coke Careers Expo. That should be good. No stats, no chemistry, come back just in time for free period!

Weekend...Stuff

My new student finally showed up to recorder lessons yesterday. The class she was to join already had another student who was slightly ahead of her, and so it was a bit difficult juggling these two students who were at different levels. The girl's father sat with her during class and he was the sort of blokey bloke sort of guy. He kept telling his daughter

"LISTEN TO CALUM!"

I asked the girl to try blow into the recorder to make a sound, so she went
TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT
I asked her to blow a little softer...
toooo.,...
A little more?
TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT
A little less?
tooooo......

Her dad got a bit frustrated with her, grabbed the recorder off her and started trying himself. It looks like I'll be teaching both of them!

Today I went to an Auckland Symphony Orchestra concert. They were playing Mediterranean music, which included Turkish March, Zorba the Greek, Espani Cani and the Can Can. This 17-year-old girl Amalia Hall, an ex-Rangitoto College student performed a solo with the orchestra, playing La Campanella by Paganini. She's the same girl I went up against for a music scholarship back at intermediate school. She got the larger scholarship while I got the smaller one (yeah didn't play too great!) Funnily enough La Campanella is the tune I'm just about to learn for the NZ accordion champs next year!

I've had so much to do this weekend: a history essay, a paragraph on why I want to be a lawyer for this scholarship, a Chinese speech, study for a statistics test, and I had hoped to do it all on Saturday but I ended up wasting the day doing nothing so I've been rushing it all tonight. I was thinking about sitting history scholarship, which would require me to get an excellence in this essay. However I don't think that's likely though...so I think I might give scholarship history a pass...The teacher said you'd need to quit your job and take on a whole lot of extra reading for it as well, which I don't think I have enough time for.

One of my friends has found herself in a bit of a tricky situation regarding relationships, you know the whole is he or isn't he cheating on me thing and what to do about it, and it has actually made me realise how lucky I am to be single! WHATEVER!!! you may say, but you've got to look on the bright side!

Sweet Revenge

If you remember, Joon tricked me into believing he had a girlfriend a couple weeks ago, and then last weekend he tricked me again into believing he liked someone. I wasn't going to let him get away with this! So I thought... REVENGE!

 

I asked people around school to go up to Joon and pretend as if they knew who he liked, with the aim of eventually making him paranoid or something close to that. At first it didn't look as if it was going to work as I don't think anyone remembered, until this morning when Joon told me that he noticed a change in the atmosphere :D He told me that Jacqueline and Shen knew, and after physics he said Patrick and Sarena knew (I don't know what he thought they knew exactly). Anyway I was starting to get the desired effect! Joon accused me of spreading rumours and I denied having spread anything or telling anyone anything!

 

Eventually I decided to come clean, IF he agreed to let me take a photo of him with a sad face (just as evidence this happened ;) ). He agreed and I told him it was all an act and that I didn't tell anyone anything. Just what was it did he think I had told him??????

 

Anyway just to clear things up:

JOON DOESN'T LIKE ANYONE RIGHT NOW (so if you like him then you may have a chance!) 

 

I know it was a little mean, but hey all in good fun and I'd say we're about even now right Joon? ;)

 

Apart from that, during Chinese class we had to take Chinese teachers around our school on a tour. They were especially interested in our cooking room and took heaps of photos of the cooking class.

 

At interval I managed to take a few photos of people having a bit of a feed in the transition room just to remember that we used to eat in the transition room 30 years down the track, but for some funny reason Joon objected to me taking photos and chased me out hte room and down the school driveway! I was going to hide in the toilet but he gave up.

 

During my free period I had to help Noah (sports co-ord) and Mr Breckall (chemistry teacher) set up the projector and sound and everything for the presentation they were doing at Junior assembly on surfing, which was amusing as they mucked around with really tall ladders, freaking out over whether it was going to collapse or not.

 

Anyway tonight we had a surprise party for our aunty who turned 50 today. She managed to figure it out before she even stepped inside! The food was great but it was a shame because one of the things from my braces that's supposed to be glued to my tooth came off while I was in bed this morning so it has started hurting a bit, and I'm afraid of wrecking my braces even more!

Clarification

It's my aunty's birthday today so I'll explain more a little later on but just to clear things up JOON DOESN'T LIKE ANYONE. It was all just an act so that I could have revenge on him after he tricked me twice. I didn't spread any rumours either ;)

Walking Around

Today was an interesting day. We got to do reflux with actual chemicals today, watching condensation happen!! I was working with Daak and we didn't hear Mr Breckall (chemistry teacher) give us instructions and so we set up the equipment slightly wrong and Mr Breckall came over to us and then asked:
"Are any of you going to become a doctor?"

We both said no, and he replied
"Just as well...don't think I'd trust you guys with a knife! But then again I have a friend who's a *** surgeon (can't remember which type he said) who I went to high school with and he's one of the clumsiest people I know so its all good!"

I spent my free period catching up with Julie which was cool. I had just been looking through my Rangeview school magazines from back in 2000 and 2001 and man was everyone so small like little kids! If only I had taken a lot more photos back then! For those of you wondering why I've been taking so many photos this year, that's my reason. I should probably bring the video camera in once in a while so I can film some interesting stuff, like Jacqueline trying to talk with her lost voice, or Shiu Tai viciously stapling a ball of play dough!

I also came across Phoebe and her friend (I forgot her name...) at lunch who were putting up International Languages Week posters around the place, and so I just helped out with them. We still didn't get it finished by form period though so we went through form period and then...6th period came...so (feeling a little guilty here but I suppose it isn't too bad!) I skipped physics while Phoebe was allowed to skip Chinese class and we wandered around school putting up posters. She was a lot braver than me, managing to ask Mr Watson (tough maths teacher) if she could put up a poster in his classroom, and even climbed on top of a rubbish bin to put a poster on the wall while a teacher walked past! Fortunately he was just a PE teacher and they usually don't care about anything.

We finished by the end of school and walked to where her dad was parked outside the gate (scary!) and as I was walking along the road there an ambulance with flashing lights zoomed by! A few minutes later I saw another ambulance go by, with the driver looking very confused as he did a U-turn. Once my mum picked me up and we were going along the main road, I saw one of those little ambulance cars with flashing lights and sirens go in the direction towards our school! Hopefully something serious didn't go down there!

Leavers hoodies are being sold and apparently you can put a nickname of your choice on the back of it. While everyone else has nicknames, I've been struggling to think of anything that I've been called! I suppose there's been Cal and Calumino even though people don't call me that that often, but someone suggested C-MAN to me which sounds kinda cool (if you ignore the other word it sounds like!)

Needs

I got a lesson in applying for financial assistance scholarships today: EXAGGERATE EVERYTHING. I would share my sad soppy story but...I might do that later...

I made it to physics class on time today big YAY especially since it was first period as well. We got to play with some very expensive chemistry equipment today in chemistry, even though we only spent the whole period learning how to set it up. Favourite line from Mr Breckall (chemistry teacher):

"This looks like something from a P lab aye?"

The principal came to our Junior Council meeting today. Unfortunately the more talkative members didn't show up, but we still got a bit out of him. Looks like our school won't be getting a sports academy YET due to the lack of sports teams in the top grade, but who knows what might happen in ten years time...

The Chinese speech competition is coming up soon and I told the Chinese teacher I'd write my speech by Tuesday. Tuesday came and went, and then Wednesday has come and gone, and I still haven't written it! I can't think of anything to write! I've got unfinished business with this Korean girl from Lynfield College who has beaten me for the past two years, and would like to finish high school on a high by winning again! But...I shouldn't say that because whenever you say you want something to happen...the opposite happens. Just as an experiment I want a lunchtime free of any meetings tomorrow (Thursday). So far I think its free, but surely either something will pop up or I'll regain my lost memory and remember that I'm supposed to be doing something somewhere. Anyway let's see!

RANDOMS

Now here's an interesting thing I found on the Rate My Teachers website (off the top of my head, can't remember word to word):

Teacher's name: Callum Gay

Comment: Tries to crack jokes saying Callum IS gay, very weird teacher"

Sex Drugs and Rock n' Roll

We had this speaker as part of Amped4Life come to speak to us today during last period of school on making right choices in life. The speaker was some ex-druggie who had tried all sorts of drugs but had been clean for the past 12 years and turned his life around, with five kids. The really sad thing though is that he has Hepatitis and so he is dying. It's a real shame because he is a really great speaker and he is doing a service to the community. Just when he has everything right he'll have it all taken away from him...

Anyway he talked to us about thinking before we do DRUGS or ALCOHOL (hear that guys?) or HAVE SEX. After the talk I had this conversation with this guy which wasn't some of my finest work:

"Hey Calum, you keeping it in your pants?"
"Yip! You been keeping yours in your pants?"
"I will now!" [he points to this large mark on his neck]
"Oh did you get that from not keeping it in your pants?"
"Yeah"
"How'd you get that?"
"Not keeping it in my pants"
"Ooooooh.....(at this moment I was thinking it was some permanent disease or skin thing he got) You dumped your girlfriend for that?"
"Nooo!"
"Oh wait that's a bruise aye? So....what gave you that mark?"
"A vacuum cleaner"
"Your girlfriend whacked you with a vacuum cleaner?"
"No!"
"Oh did you...not keep it in your pants...with the vacuum cleaner?"
"No I was joking about the vacuum cleaner!"
"Oh so your girlfriend gave that to you?"
"YES!"
"You still with her?"
"YES!"
"WAIT! THAT'S A HICKEY!"
"YEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSS!!!!!!"

It's a shame to see some of your friends do a complete about turn and end up on the booze and the wackabacka but...what can you do? I suppose just hope that they one day click and realise it ain't good for them.

I've been trying to write a 500 word blurb on why I want to be a lawyer for this scholarship application form but it's turning out to be tricker than I first thought it would be!

"I want to make heaps and heaps of money"

One Line

Happy Chinese Valentine's Day!!
It's nearly over anyway...yet another day to celebrate love... Apparently the story behind Chinese Valentine's Day being on the 7th day of the 7th month of the Chinese Lunar year is that there was some girl and some guy forbi...cut a long story short they were only allowed to meet each other on the 7th day of the month of each Chinese Lunar year and so this has become Chinese Valentine's Day (I think?) and if it rains (which it did today!) then it means its the girl's tears (I think? I've most likely got the story wrong), probably tears of joy from getting to see her lover...yeah...

Anyway bad weather today just rainrainrain I originally thought I was going to get my Chinese speech assessment mark back but we ended up talking about that story above. String quartet wasn't so bad the teacher was nice again this week! I think it must be due to the absence of pressure...