Coming to a Close

Despite exams starting in a week's time, I've still been able to do a bit besides studying! On Monday I caught up with Alice who brought her Sony Vaio to uni and we shared stuff over bluetooth during lunch. Later that day I got a surprise text from Jacqueline, old Rutherford pal that she, Ben and Shen were going to catch up and asked if I wanted to meet up later that afternoon, so I caught up with them at Albert Park and we went over to the barber shop to watch Shen get his hair cut. We later went over to Atrium on Elliot where we sat around in the foodcourt while Shen had a bit of a feed and I ate my homemade sandwiches!

We then walked over to this huge arcade (Asian hotspot!) where we got into this Asian photo sticker booth thing and took a few photos. That was my very first time! I have lost my photo sticker booth thing virginity! One of the photos turned out good but in the others I seemed to blend in with the bright light in the background! After that we hopped on those car racing arcade games and had a couple races at Ben's expense (thanks Ben!!!!). Jacqueline surprised all of us guys buy whipping us and beating us all. I only managed second after constantly trying to ram into the back of her and spin her out!

As it got late we had to go our separate ways, but not before coming across Zeeman! (sorry if I spelt his name wrong) A bit weird seeing someone in a Rutherford College uniform down Queen Street at night!

On Tuesday we had a guest lecturer from Harvard University talking to us on poverty...or something... Now I was going to try stay awake for the whole lecture, and I managed to for three quarters of it, but I just had to lightly doze off in the last ten minutes! During the lecture I was listening to this Japanese guy talk and thinking to myself that his accent didn't quite sound American. At the end of the lecture it was announced he was from New Zealand, but graduated at the OTHER university Otago. We'll let that one go!

Later that evening for the first time, I managed to catch a bus to Avondale College to catch the debate between Rutherford and Rutherford, but not without a bit of trouble! I had never caught that bus before and so I wasn't sure which stop to get off at! I ended up getting off the stop before the one I was meant to get off at and had to walk further. I managed to make it to the debate on time, to make up the largest audience the debating teams had had all year! It was amusing watching the debates from the audience when usually you're the one in the debate. I'm glad the right team won..*cough* Aonghas's *cough*

Yesterday was a bit sad. It was the last time we'd ever have a Population Health 101 lecture and tutorial on a Wednesday! Actually Population Health 101 is pretty boring so maybe not that sad... I missed the bus back to the city when I got a photo together with my tutor Dee, and so I hung around Tamaki with my German friend Micheal, just eating and watching Dr Phil in the cafeteria.

Later that night while I was studying in the library, this loud siren went off at the Information Commons across the road. Being the sorta guy who likes to know what's going on, I packed up my gear, crossed the road and went to check out what was going on. There were at least five fire trucks parked outside the building, with all these firemen gathered around The Maidment Theatre's backstage door. After taking a few photos and nothing much happening, I thought I'd walk down to the ATM, get myself some money and buy some food and come back. When I got back, nothing much had happened..

Today I only had a chemistry and population health lecture, as the biosci lectures have finished for the semester (saaad!!!). Our biosci quiz was due today though so all these biosci people were frantically completing the quizzes on the library computers.

At the beginning of the population health lecture evaluation forms were passed around. I arrived late and so I didn't get one, but I was sitting next to this girl who was filling one out and read her responses:

What did you like about this course? "Not a lot"
What didn't you like about this course?

"Nothing"

When the girl saw me smiling at her responses she asked me if I wanted to add anything to hers, and I just told her I would've written exactly the same thing!

Later in the day I was told I had a request available in the library, Neuroscience: Exploring the Brain, this book that is hot in demand amongst the biosci students. I thought man I must be having a lucky day! Unfortunately it wasn't to be. I was told the wrong book was transferred to the General Library, so I had to go over to the Philson Library (the library at the medical school campus) to pick up another copy they had saved for me. When I got there though, they couldn't find it and came to the conclusion that the book saved for me was the lost copy!

Earlier in the day I tried borrowing this book Principles of Anatomy and Physiology but when the self-service machine wouldn't work I took it to the desk and it turned out that the book was already placed on hold!

We had a medicine and nursing information evening tonight. HEAPS of people attended, and we were told there would only be about 110 places available for medicine. I was sitting with a friend when I saw this girl in front of me who looked so much like Gwen I had to take a second look and even commented to my friend who probably thought I was a twat! Well it wasn't Gwen anyway. I got in touch with her for the first time in aaages yesterday morning for a little while which was cool. I haven't been in much contact with anyone at Rutherford for quite some time! I chatted to another friend from Rutherford just tonight though who told me heaps has been going on over there!

Anyway back to the information evening...After listening to the whole process of how to get into medicine, I have to say I'm a little turned off from trying to get into medicine now, not that I really wanted to in the first place! I just recently wasted $200 on registering for this UMAT test (which I now regret!), so I might as well carry out the rest of the year!

Friday's my FRYday!!

Thursday was my last lab session for chemistry which was slightly sad as I enjoy my lab buddies! There was a bit of tension during that lab session though. The guy or whatever his name is got a higher mark than my partner and me, even though he used my answers for the lab assignment! It turns out it was because his crystals looked nicer! We were planning on sabbotaging his next assignment by misleading him (as he's always checking what we've done to see how things SHOULDN'T be done and making sure he's done the correct thing, while forcing his poor lab partner Candy to do all the hard work!) but in the end us nice guys couldn't resist helping him. To think we're competing with each other to get into medicine!

To make the lab session worse we had to do titrations! ARRRGGHHHHH If you know what happened with me and titrations last year then you'll know why I dislike them! It wasn't too bad in the end though. Stupid me cracked a beaker though. I was drying it with a paper towel when I probably squeezed too hard and snapped a bit off! There were a few OOOOOOOOOOO's and AAAAAAAAAAH's from the people who heard and saw me do it, with me telling them to SSHHHHHHHHHHH! In the end though I came clean and owned up to breaking a beaker to my supervisor who took it well and gave me a new one! Phew! I also weirdly felt some chest pains in the middle of the lab session which wasn't a good sign! My lab partner was hoping I would die on him either!

Fortunately the experiment didn't go too badly, it was just the heaps of calculations we had to do! Towards the end of the three hour lab session we were all rushing to complete our assignment. It was actually kinda fun! Too bad it's the last one!

Prior to the lab session an announcement had been posted that some people wouldn't get their last lab assignment marks back as they'd need to speak to the course coordinator first regarding copying answers off other people. I was originally worried it was going to be me as I knew the other guy used some of my answers. I was planning on writing a great post for my blog! Un/Fortunately it didn't eventuate, although I was surprised when I discovered I know who the accused is!

Today was all about coping through the lectures. Our biosci lecture had an abrupt end as the overflow lecture theatre with the videolink's sound system wasn't working. It ended up being cancelled. I was lucky to be in the 'live' lecture theatre with my friends for the first time in a while!

I was on the bus to Tamaki with Kevin my ex-Howick College friend, when he was talking to this guy sitting in front of us. When I discovered they didn't go to the same school together and that he used to go to Mt Roskill Grammar, I used my perfect conversation starter..

"Do you know Diane? Or Alice? Or Tobi? Or Disha? Or Anuprita?" (They're bound to know at least one of them!!)

He knew them all except for Disha! And so the connections continue! The population health lecture was pretty boring, with the only interesting part being when the lecturer compared health systems of different countries to different makes of cars.

USA = SUV
Germany = BMW
NZ = Honda Civic

After the lecture I decided I'd stay for the workshop which turned out to be a bit of a waste of time as we didn't learn too much in the two hours except for stuff about children pedestrian injuries. As soon as I got back into the city I renewed my bus pass and then started wandering around looking for the cheapest fries to buy! What started two weeks ago now has become a bit of a habit, to treat myself to fries every Friday as a reward for getting through the week! It costs $2 a cup at uni but Aonghas told me I should be able to buy more for the same price somewhere else. I couldn't find anywhere else to buy them from and was getting a little desperate so I went back to buy my fries! I caught up with Alice who happened to be talking to Josh, the guy I met on the bus! After Josh left I caught the free bus with Alice to Downtown where she had to buy a birthday present for a couple of friends.

With only two weeks to go till exams, I really should've been studying...but oh well! I'll do that this weekend!

Just in Time!

My population health assignment was due at 4pm today and I hadn't even started on it till last night! For me it takes a while to get started but once I get started I get going! So here I was sitting in front of my laptop just staring at a blank screen. Fortunately Hamish was staying up late that night doing his assignment too, so he helped me out a bit as I had no idea about economics! While Hamish and I were trying to concentrate on our assignments here Aonghas was talking to my dad all about his upcoming one day trip to Wellington (today), lucky guy! The weather wasn't so good today though...

So after a while of sitting in the lounge shuffling papers around, eating potatoes and typing a few words at a time, I decided I'd go lie in bed and do a bit more! So more slowlyslowly...surprisingly I got a text from my German friend Michael who asked me for a website! He was still working on his assignment at 4am in the morning! I wonder what made him assume I was too! I thought I'd try text my other friend Candy to see if she was still up doing it, and hey guess what she was still awake too! She had only started!

Eventually it was 6am and I still had 800 words to go, so I decided I'd have a quick two hour nap before I'd restart. I'd try get everything finished by 11am so I could attend my tutorial over in Tamaki and then my two hour workshop afterwards. Sooo I woke up at 8m, got into the lounge and got going. 11am passed, so I thought I'd try finish by 12 so I could have enough time to attend my workshop. 12pm passed...OK this time my deadline would be 2pm! I would then email my assignment to Hamish at uni by 2.30pm for him to have a read of it and get back to me on improvements by 3pm and then I'd leave and hopefully get to Tamaki by 4pm. Well Hamish didn't reply till 3.15pm and by then I had decided I couldn't wait any longer and had submitted my assignment to TurnItIn.com (the plagiarism site for those of you not at uni!) It was approaching 3.30pm and I really needed to get going!

If it took half an hour for the bus to travel from the city campus to the Tamaki campus, I had no idea how I'd get to Tamaki from Henderson in the same time! While on the motorway encouraging my dad to speed up just that teeny bit faster, I thought I'd try text my friends and see if any of them could print out my assignment and hand it in for me as I was starting to doubt my ability to get to Tamaki in time. When we hit a traffic jam on the motorway I REALLY started to panic! If my assignment was late, I would lose 10% off my mark! I got a reply from one of my friends who said he had just caught the bus out of Tamaki, while I still had no reply from the others!

Traffic gradually got a little faster after we took the exit off the motorway. There were only three minutes to go and we were waiting at the round-about near the campus. As soon as my dad drove up the driveway I jumped out and hit the ground running! When I got to the student centre there were all these other people crowded around the assignment boxes frantically stappling their assignments and making last minute checks before handing it in. The clock's long hand was slightly past 12 as I handed it in, but I JUST made it, so at least I haven't automatically lost 10% off my mark! Now as for the quality of the assignment...

Tight on Time

Lately I've been really short on time. I had a population health test last Wednesday, and then had a chemistry test just last night and now I've got a population health assignment (which I haven't even started!!) to get done by this Wednesday! To add to the pressure the accordion championships are coming up in two weeks time and our trio and duet aren't up to scratch yet!

Last Thursday I caught up with the Student Life guy who wanted to meet me. At first I was a little bit scared he'd make me go out with him and spread the world of GOD! Fortunately though all he wanted to do was buy me coffee (actually hot chocolate..we both were novices) and have a chat. He just graduated from uni last year in engineering, and is working full time for Student Life this year. That's pretty cruisy! We talked for a while and then he answered some stupid questions I had before I had to go and do a bit of studying.

Church on Sunday was the usual. Angie turned up. I should probably stop making jokes about her only turning up three times in the last two months! Oh oh oh and I remembered my Sunday School teacher's name! It was a little embarrassing last week. I had to do the closing prayer and was in the middle of thanking my Sunday School teachers when...I couldn't remember her name! I think it must've been the last class for the term because the teacher brought food which was cool. Usually one of our stomachs rumble throughout class!

Yesterday I was considering skipping all my lectures just to study chemistry, which would give me a good ten hours of study! I decided that I might as well attend them all, despite falling asleep in them! I still managed to have about seven hours to study, but unfortunately the test didn't go too great!

I'm really seriously starting to consider Plan B more closely...whatever that may be...I don't think I'm good enough to get into medicine. I don't even know if I have the drive to get into medicine! Law was originally my Plan B, but after seeing how my law friends have heaps of assignments and readings to do, I'm not so sure now. Science is pretty cool in that we just have labs every couple of weeks to do, and the tests consist of short answer questions. We'll see how this plays out...It's not like it's that important, just my future we're talking about here :D

Heather's going down to Christchurch to study Cellular Biology and Molecular....something? I only just asked her last night for the third time as I keep forgetting it! (It just sounds so fancy!) I think she said something about wanting to get into forensics, which means she's going to leave me all alone as the only ex-Rutherfordian in Health Science...for now! It's going to be sad when she goes though! Seven years..all those good times! Hopefully no one else goes anywhere anytime soon!

All Somehow Connected

In the past couple of days it's amazing how many new people I've met and how many people I know that they know! It's like everyone's somehow connected!

After my morning lectures yesterday morning I spent my break studying with my German friend Michael, and afterwards we went to the Quad to have lunch, which is the first time I've had lunch with someone not from Rutherford!...Oh besides Alice of course...So we were just talking when a few of his ex-Howick College friends came along and joined him. It wasn't till we got down to the Library Basement Theatre foyer when I got started talking and getting to know them. Kieran (is that how you spell her name? That's probably the guy's version though), this half Indonesian half Chinese girl asked me what nationality I was and I told her I was half Chinese half kiwi. That's when they told me Andy, this other guy with them, was also a halfy too! I then also found out the other guy with them, Joey, was a friend of Sarena's! That's the only way he's heard of Rutherford College! (Usually people say they've never heard of our school before...)

Anyway Michael and I joined Richard and attended the population health lecture which was on....Maori Health PART TWO (snooooooze) An interesting quote (or something close to it) from our beloved lecturer Paaparangi Reid (probably spelt her name wrong as well!)

"We need to get away from calling it Maori health needs because they're not. They're Maori health RIGHTS" There was a collective sigh amongst the students in our lecture theatre!

I did a bit more studying with Michael in the library for a few mores hours...well if you can call it studying...it was more like sleeping for me! Once Michael had to go though I decided I was going to go buy something from Munchie Mart and fill myself! I ended up buying a big bag of potato chips and was about to sit outside and eat it when I came across Sean Koo and Lenny, who used to go to Rutherford College two years ago (a year ahead of me)! It's weird as just the day before I had lent my physics notes...well actually Lenny's physics notes that I had scanned...to Angie, which got me wondering about Lenny and where she had gotten up to! I ended up following them down to the Information Commons where I met their 2nd year friends, most of who are doing commerce.

Once they had to go off to do their assignment I went off to do some study 'in isolation', expecting to be picked up by my parents at about 10pm. It turns out that Aonghas supposedly sent me a text earlier in the night telling me that plans had changed and that I had to catch a bus home myself, so I missed the bus and had to wait an hour to catch the 10.30 bus! I was just coming down the stairs when I saw Lenny and Sean again, with Melissa!! They know each other from the KiwiAsian Club, which I'm also a member of but haven't done anything in! Next came Sarena with this other guy called Tim, who said he recognised me from somewhere. It turns out he's one of the top guys at the KiwiAsian Club and had recognised me from one of the beginning of the year meetings!

Well I finally got home at about 11pm and decided to go on MSN for a little while and surprisesurprise caught up with Ruby (this Korean girl who used to go to Rutherford before going back to Korea), another person I haven't talked to in a while! Recently I was thinking about her too, as there's this girl in Health Science who looks like her! I was surprised she still remembers me though, and the last day I saw her when I gave her chocolate for her birthday and to say goodbye! That was more than two years ago which is amazing! She's still her happy self which is good!

The reuniting didn't stop there though. This morning I caught a late bus into the city as I usually do on a Wednesday, and guess who I see on the bus? Dake!!! He's probably the last ex-Rutherford person I've yet to have met at uni this year. I've always been wondering about him, and have been meaning to text him to catch up with him, but finally I got a chance to catch up with him! He's another one of those engineering students, yeah another one of THOSE guys!

I went over to Tamaki for my population health lecture and tutorial. I was sitting at the back at the tutorial with Michael and my other friend Candy with my head in my hands staring into nowhere when our tutor, who was talking up in front called out to us in the back

"Hey you guys in the back! Stop thinking about your POPLHLTH111 test tonight!"

I was actually thinking about my essay!

I got back to uni, studied for several hours till 7pm when I had my test at the new business school. It was a bit more difficult than the first test, but I'll just have to wait for the results!

That's What Friends are For

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ZIPPO!!! (10th May) & HAPPY BIRTHDAY HYUN AND JOON!!! (13th May)

I've got a lot to catch up on since I last posted. I've got a population health test this Wednesday night, a chemistry test next Monday night and a population health essay (on health economics yaaawn) due next Wednesday! Oh well at least all those people back at Rutherford have assessments and exams this week, about time they did some REAL work! Nah I'm sure they've all been working hard!

Even though I've got all these tests coming up, I've managed to hang out with quite a few friends more often lately. On Thursday I spent my spare time in between lectures trying to complete my chemistry worksheet with my lab partner (and new uni friend!) Jerrard. We managed to get most of it done, but when we turned up to the lab we realised it wasn't even going to be assessed! All that worrying and hard work for nothing! At least we know all about spectroscopy now! Anyway our chemistry lab experiment was based around ester hydrolysis, which involved eventually creating crystals. Jerrard burnt himself with the hot plate and asked for some cream. He wasn't just given cream though, he was also given an accident/incident report to fill out! Apparently it is to help make the lab safer. Not too long after I bent a bit too far forward and burnt myself on the same plate! I quickly ran my finger under water and kept quiet so I wouldn't have to fill in one of those forms though.

I've been hanging out with my old Rutherford friends like Shen, Shrikkanth, David and the others, scoping the field...Last week Shen was trying to determine my type of girl. I felt a bit bad telling him what I looked for in a girl (looks wise)! I don't actually know what I look for in terms of looks...

I tried catching up with a friend a few nights ago but I was kinda snubbed. I suppose she was busy or something, but yeah after hanging out with my friends the next day at uni that was really cool. I was also supposed to meet up with some guy from Student Life, this university Christian group, who was going to catch up with me. I was a bit anxious about this meeting as I wasn't sure if he was going to get me to go around talking to random people on campus about Christianity, something I'm not ready to do! I DID wait for the guy at the place we had planned to meet, when I saw Shrikkanth and David come by, so I thought I had waited long enough and decided I'd go with them! In the end I felt bad and so I decided to go back and wait a little while longer but I never saw him so yeah the meeting didn't eventuate.

On Saturday morning I was showing my students the big bass recorder, and to see the kids having fun was really cool and made me once again think about possibly teaching as a career one day! But that ain't gonna happen...for a while anyway.

Mother's Day on Sunday wasn't too eventful, except for church. Jennifer gave a speech (in Cantonese) about how great her mum was, and all the mums at church were each given a rose and a rice spoon. Great for cooking twice as hard and beating us! :D I didn't see Angie at church but I texted her for the first time in a few weeks and she promises she will be coming to church next week. Everyone remember that!

Today I caught up with Bronwen and her sister, who I haven't seen in a while as well! It's a bit sad how you see some people quite regularly but others not so regularly.

In the evening I had a bit of the munchies after studying. I was thinking about wasting my money by buying chips, but after a lecture we had on how the age we're at now is crucial in terms of developing chronic diseases or something like that (if that even makes any sense!) I wasn't too keen on hot chips with all that salt! So I went potato chip browsing, but managed to resist the temptation! I left uni too early and so I was waiting for the bus for a while when that temptation came back! Fortunately the bus came just in time and saved me! I'll buy those chips after my test on Wednesday instead!

Going on at Uni

It's all going on at university. OK not really that exciting, but I'm managing to get a slightly better work/play balance. I've caught up with my old friends more than once in the past two days!

Yesterday I had a mentoring session with my scholarship mentor, who's putting extra pressure on me to do even better in order to get into medicine (if I want to get in...) I was waiting for him when I came across George! That was interesting. We happened to talk about a certain person...My mentor eventually met up with me and so we went to the Quad to discuss  various things about uni, studies, etc. when Sarena and Amy came over! I haven't seen them in a while! (Sarena anyway...I've seen Amy a few times now)

This week has been Cultural Week at university, with yesterday being Tongan Day. There were Tongan dances and a reggae band with some really funny white guy dancing. He caught the eye of many people passing by, with many people thinking he was drunk! Today the cultural festivities continued.

Another thing going on at uni has been the blood drive that's happening all week. I was thinking that I might donate blood just for fun, since I've never done it before! So I'm looking for anyone who wants to come with me as moral support! Estee did it today and apparently you get a free donut and a bottle of water! Nice!!

On the Down

This morning Aonghas and I competed in the North Shore Performing Arts Competition over in...North Shore. It was the accordion section of the competition, which includes competition classes for piano, violin and other instruments, as well as other stuff like discussing current affairs on stage, reciting poetry, jazz and ballet, and dressing up in costume to act as someone else. I suppose that's performing arts for you!

Anyway I was competing in two classes, with Aonghas in one of them! In the first class I was playing Sonata in D by Haydn, which I have stuffed up twice in two times I have performed it so far. I was hoping I would buck the trend and not stuff it up for a third time...you know third time lucky..but it wasn't to be. I performed it and screwed it up again! There was this part my accordion teacher told me I was going to screw up during accordion lesson yesterday, and as I approached that part I kept thinking to myself that I was going to prove him wrong but I kept hearing him telling me I was going to stuff it up in my mind and guess what? I stuffed it up! So yeah I didn't do so well in that class. Aonghas won it and earned himself $20. That's not even enough to pay for the entry fee and the amount our mum paid to come in to watch!

After that class, I set about ensuring I didn't stuff up my other performance! I went outside and found a corner and practised till my hand died! Not really, just till Aonghas called me in to perform. The second performance went slightly better. I was up against Jessica Chen ARCH NEMESIS again. We were both playing Russian songs, with her playing Russian COWBOY while I was playing Russian DANCE. This time Aonghas wasn't in it. When it came to my performance I managed to keep playing and not stop which was good! I suppose it's because it's a loud, rough, fast piece and I like playing loudly, roughly and fast! My teacher yesterday told me I have a tendency to play TOO loud though! I got a better result for this piece, but the judge's comments were interesting:

"I thought your interpretation of the first half of the piece was strange"

That sounds pretty cool, my interpretation!

--

On an even more solemn note it was sad enough hearing about those two teenagers who died down in Christchurch yesterday after a car plowed into them, but after coming across a Bebo group dedicated to one of the deceased, it really hit me, even though I don't know any of them personally! So I pass on my condolences to those poor poor people down in Christchurch!

Parent Teacher Interview

Today was parent-teacher interviews for Rutherford College. I got made to tag along with my parents to talk to Aonghas's teachers at school tonight to keep tabs on them and make sure they don't say anything bad about Aonghas (as he had to go off to his basketball game), but it almost felt as if it was me who was having the parent-teacher interviews! One teacher mistook me for Aonghas, while a few others spent more time asking me how I was doing at university!

We met up with the Chinese teacher who tried speaking to me in Mandarin. Shamefully I had forgotten quite a bit and couldn't understand her as before! She and my dad then started discussing ways of keeping up with Chinese. She suggested I speak more with my brothers and friends. The sad thing though is that my friends don't want to speak to me in Chinese!!! They either think it's too weird speaking Chinese to a white guy, or that I'm too slow or don't understand and so can't be bothered! I even tried asking my Chinese friend at uni to speak to me in Cantonese the other day, but she said NOOOO!! One idea the Chinese teacher put forward was...GET A CHINESE GIRLFRIEND. Yeah that could work...it didn't for my dad though! We'll see what happens. I can't even get A girlfriend right now!

It was graduation day at university today, with all the graduates walking around in their cloaks. Most of them had orange hoods or whatever you call them. I've been told that that's the commerce colour, which explains why a lot of them are Asians! I kinda wish I was one of them graduating today! Then I'd be able to get a life!

I spent my free time catching a bus all the way to the Grafton Campus to return a book, planning on borrowing another copy at the General Library, as any book you borrow from the Grafton Campus library sets off all the alarms at the General Library which is a hassle! I got back to the General Library only to find that the book was gone, so I had to go all the way back to Grafton later on! I ended up having to borrow a different edition of the book. Walking around the Grafton Campus though kinda makes you feel big and important, rather than a no one back in the city! Although very soon you've got to bring yourself back down to Earth and tell yourself Get Real Calum you're not going to make it!!!...unless you become a cleaner...

I caught up with Julie again for lunch and we spent lunch at McDonald's. It's cool having lunch with girls, as they almost never finish everything they buy, and so they just leave all the leftovers to you to finish off! ...Not that that's the reason why I go out to lunch with girls though... It's just sad to see those poor potatoes go to waste!

I also caught up with Shirley again today on the bus, and found out her birthday is a day after mine! I'm unlikely to forget that now! (not that I forget other people's birthdays! ;) )

Where's a Toilet??!!!

This morning I didn't have the privilege of sleeping in as I usually do on a Wednesday morning, but instead had to go in to uni to catch the bus to Tamaki for a course on how to use the library catalogue! I know I know, but it was compulsory for me to do it! Fortunately the bus to Tamaki was not that full, and I met up with my friend Candy once I got there. We went into the computer labs and she soon found out she was in the wrong one, but because there were plenty of seats left she could stay.

The one hour course didn't reveal anything most of us didn't know already. Even though I managed to sleep just slightly before midnight the night before, I still felt a bit tired and nearly fell asleep!

The course was soon over and so we had an hour to kill, which we spent in the cafeteria just mucking around with each other's phones, discovering stuff we're not supposed to! :D (didn't get too far before the phone got snatched off me!)

We had a new lecturer for population health today. He's this American who's teaching us about health economics, and he is certainly the most entertaining lecturer I've had so far this year! We had an auction during the lecture where people bid for and won a Snicker's Bar and a yoghurt-covered muesli bar, as well as learnt quite a bit! We were then handed our next assignment during our tutorial class before we caught the bus back to the city.

Candy had to go off to do her chemistry assignment and so I went to have lunch, when this Student Life (Christian group on campus) guy approached me asking to do a survey, and you know me, who am I to refuse to do a survey!! So this guy started asking me all these questions about my 'degree' of Christianity before asking if I'd like him to go through this 'Getting to Know God' booklet with me. I had about an hour before my bus left, so I thought what the hey OK! I ended up asking some stupid questions and he ended up asking me if I'd like to take part in spreading the word, even though I'm probably the last Christian you'd want telling others about Christianity! I thought what the hey OK! (Yeah I'm going to regret this soon...) We'll see what happens... Apparently there are Satanists (actually I don't know if they deserve a capital S!) around at uni. I'd like to talk to one!

So once this Student Life guy went I decided I better go catch this bus. I thought I better go to the toilet.

UNIVERSITY LIBRARY = 2 TOILETS (G Floor): OCCUPIED

Oh well...so I walked towards Sky City before realising I REALLY had to go to the toilet! By then I was way past Albert Park and the campus to go back, so I decided to try my luck at the public library.

PUBLIC LIBRARY = 1 TOILET (G Floor): OCCUPIED

Off I went in search of another toilet! Seeing as the bus stop was right outside Sky City, why not try the Sky City toilets! I caught up with Gus along the way, and parted ways with him once I got to Sky City.

SKY CITY = 3 TOILETS (G Floor): OCCUPIED

By then my bus had left and I had another hour to wait before the next one so I decided I'd walk all the way to Aotea Centre because there's bound to be a toilet there, and I would've killed some time walking all the way there!

PUBLIC TOILET OUTSIDE AOTEA CENTRE: 2 TOILETS: VACANT! Yay!!!!!!

And so Calum felt much better afterwards!

I caught up with Shirley, this Korean girl from Rutherford along the way home on the bus and once I got home my mum and I went over to Rangeview for a little visit, originally to see how Ms Rai the music teacher there was doing. She wasn't there though, so we ended up talking to the school secretary who introduced me to Rangeview's soon-to-be new principal. We then walked around the school, which brough back many memories! Good times!!

New and the Usual

The weekend started off with a dinner at the cousins', this time because our other relatives from down in Christchurch came up to visit. We ended up getting to meet our long-lost second cousins! Well not exactly long-lost but just unknown! I would say what their names are but...I kinda forgot already...

Anyway us Anderson brothers hung out with the Anderson girls (from the other Anderson family) for a while just mucking around joking and stuff for most of the night, until dinner was served. We even talked quite a bit with our other cousins Jeremy and his girlfriend Asumi, who we don't talk to as much which was cool! We really wanted to try get to know our second cousins though, but they were sitting next to their mum! They seemed really bored too!

It was only right at the end when we were about to leave when we finally got to talk to them! Janice, my cousin went over to hug them and say goodbye, when I thought what the noggin why don't I join her! And so I went over to give out some hugs too! Aonghas then tried to break the ice as well by asking if we could all have a photo, so we did! We ended up talking a little and exchanging contact details. Now remember they're my cousins people!

Church on Sunday was the usual. I fell asleep during the service and Angie didn't show up again! I was adament I was going to share something in Sunday School this time round though! Usually everyone just sits there and say nothing, so I thought I'd try be different for a change and share something about what I read in this little Daily Journey booklet thing. I ended up sharing the same thing as my teacher!

So far uni this week has been OK, although I really need to sleep earlier! I keep falling asleep during lectures. Today I was in the lecture class with the lecturer for a change (usually I'm in the overflow room with the video feed), sitting in the third row from the front. I was hoping he didn't notice me falling asleep, but the guy I was sitting with noticed, telling me he could see my head nodding!

I've managed to catch up with quite a few old friends this week though which has been cool. I met up with Vicki in the library yesterday, and then again today with Amy, and I managed to find Shen and David during lunch as well!

Today after uni I was going to take the bus to Avondale College to support my brother's debating team, and so I was waiting and waiting at Britomart for the bus, but it never came! That's probably the first experience I've had with a bus that hasn't turned up. I ended up catching the bus home instead, and caught up with Michael Poh, who I haven't talked to in a while either!

I also finally got my Windows Vista DVD yesterday! It was originally couriered to me on Saturday morning while I was teaching recorder. Unfortunately though my brothers were fast asleep and didn't get the door, so I had to wait till yesterday to pick it up from the mail centre! Windows Vista isn't that bad. It takes a little longer to start up and shut down, but the graphics are pretty good!