It’s the Chinese new year and of course no new year celebration to welcome to Lunar new year is complete without the inclusion of food! And lots of them. This year’s celebrations was held at the Queens college junior combination room. I’ve never been to Queen’s JCR before, only their halls for formals and apartments of friends in the area. Apparently it’s situated right on top of a loft proving rather good views of the River Cam via Sliver street and the adjacent University center (where the gyms are). Despite it’s rather small size, the JCR was decked out with plenty of sofas and furniture, not to mention being able to accommodate an odd 30 over people who turned up for the gathering.

It was organized by mainly the second and third years of the CuMaS association, the Cambridge Malaysian society (why can’t the Singaporean cookouts be just as awesome?), with many new faces, namely several year ones where we spent most of the evening meeting and integrating into the group.

CNY Reunion!

Foodies!

Yu Sheng!

Huge servings of variety of local Malaysian and Singaporean delicacies such as noodles, (Mee goreng style), Curry chicken, omelettes and Bak kut teh just to name afew. The huge group turnout calls for at least 6 rice-cooker pots of home cooked chicken rice and a double tossing Yusheng at the end of the dinner session. It was quite a big feat to prepare all the food for so many people as well.

The Lunar new year is just like any other day here in the UK, a typical work day buzzing with people on the streets, with school still on and lectures to attend, with the exception of Chinese restaurants and takeaways all closed. Chinese new year for me this year was a rather simple and fat-free one too, considering I was more selective on the ones I am able to go this year given my leg injury. Also with most of the awesome seniors who graduated last year not around in Cambridge to organize their trademarked annual steamboat dinner, I am happy to say that the food standards had not dropped either. This new year mass pot luck is one which still lives up to the legacy set by the seniors of last year.

Having said that, in the light of the Chinese new year, wishing you good health and a prosperous Lunar new year of the dragon ahead!

And so it’s December and time for a much needed blog post on the happenings so far here. Guess I was just too busy with stuff and the end of the that I had not found much time to share the happenings here as of date. The sad fact is that there is actually quite a lack of things happening here, with the exception of homework and loads of end of term pile ups and deadline reports to submit (and finally done with whew).

Having said that, Christmas here in the UK is also the time where almost everybody head back home and out of college for Christmas. Everywhere here in college seems pretty much like a dead town now in comparison to the term time buzz. The kitchens and halls get progressively quieter over the days as the holidays finally hit. The streets are all quiet, bare and empty with most stores all closed until next year. This is of course in stark contrast to the situation back home, particularly most shopping districts in Asian countries, like those in Japan, Seoul and Singapore, with the streets buzzing even with extended store opening hours till midnight.

Christmas here in the UK on the contrary is one for the family- Christmas tradition holds as a get together period for all family member and relatives alike. This means getting together back at home on Christmas day enjoying a scrumptious Christmas dinner (which also means the most expensive time of the year to travel too). This is my first year where I get to spend Christmas grounded in Cambridge due to a leg injury. Which kept me pretty much grounded here in college and made me very acquainted with Taxi drivers in getting around town as well as the hospital outpatient’s department. Due to the inconvenience of travel, I didn’t get to spent at my aunt Jenny’s place, though she never fails to always delight with her wonderful roast and Christmas cheesecake. Just a pity I can’t join her family this year.

Pre-Xmas dinner!

Roast!

Desserts!

Anyway, I won’t just stop there and call it quits. Christmas is a time of feasting and celebrations. So the least to do is to have few get people together, particularly those who remained in college during the period. There was a pre-Christmas day dinner at an upmarket restaurant in town as well as a wonderful Christmas lunch and dinner with university mates at a large rented out-of-college accommodation flat courtesy of an old friend of mine. The flat was big enough to house our Christmas day party of 25 and we had Turkey! Loads of it. Well too much turkey, 2 large birds in fact to the extent where leftovers the next few days were literally Turkey days as well.

Weather-wise this is my first winter here in Cambridge without snow. It seems this year the snow decided to head home too, it’s pretty much snow-less Christmas in Cambridge. Not to mention rather warm for winter now too. Surprisingly, there are still many trees out there with their leaves on and lush green patches of autumn grass dotted everywhere around town. Temperates here range from 5 to 11 degrees here at night which is nearly autumn weather in comparison to the sub freezing temperatures of last year and the year before.

In comparison, lets take alook at the snow that was in Cambridge the years before. Surprisingly this exact panorama taken 2 years ago by yours truly was used by my college as the official college Christmas card this year. I am honored!

Snow here in Cambridge is known to come in one big flop in December just before Christmas (well at least for the last 2 years I was here) and very much sits around slushy like a sore thumb throughout January at least. Commendably, the weather here in Cambridge is as good as it can get in the UK. Cambridge is pretty much sheltered from harsh storms and snow, given it’s location in land just north of London. So if the weather is bad here, chances it might even be worst else where.

So that’s for Christmas this year now, there was lots to eat and not as bad as I thought to be, despite being grounded. And oh thanks for the Christmas cards to those who sent yours, I had to find more wall space to pin all of them up this year.

In the meantime, Cheers and have a great Happy new year ahead!

And heyho! Summer break’s over, it’s the my third year in college and the start of Michaelmas now. A whole new world of exciting studying, homework-rejoicing and sociallife-killing fun awaits! Oh bummer.

Third year engineering here in Cambridge is where the specialization in your field actually starts, as you actually get to learn what you (or for most Singaporeans here, what your scholarship provider) want to study, with specific modules students get to choose beforehand. The case here is different to those in other UK universities, say Imperial college, where they are known for engineering themselves and where specialization of the course starts explicitly on day one (just like what they do in NUS and NTU too). The last 2 years beforehand here on the other hand were spent literally learning everything an engineer should know under the sun- electronics, thermodynamics, statics, dynamics, information, computing, mathematics, etc. That’s why my first 2 years (particularly the second) here are usually the toughest years for engineers in Cambridge university.

Looking back, as what my Directors of Studies like to say, it offers somewhat a more holistic learning viewpoint to engineering, the interesting stand here in Cambridge is that even if you intend to be an electrical engineer, you will have to understand at least civil, structure and mechanical engineering. So you won’t be a complete idiot in the other fields with at least tertiary understanding how buildings stand, mobile phones or turbine engines work. But of course at the expense of your sanity with the breakneck speeds they teach their courses here. I don’t think there is anywhere else in the world where you get to pack on so much to study in such short term time here.

But what doesn’t kill you does make you stronger. Having said that, you will get to some what specialize in your third year, choosing relevant modules in your chosen field of specialization. Each module has it’s own set of requirement like laboratory sessions, supervisions (often with TA, PhD students) and technical reports to write, which will be grade on positive credit.

In comparison, this is somewhat similar to the system in the States where you can jump all about different kinds of unrelated modules in your first 2 years, but not to the extent of completely going of engineering, say taking physiology, anthropology or arabic studies for instance. Only that the choices are more structured and related to engineering here. It’s somewhat a free, but not so what-free based engineering course in terms of the compulsory courses you have to go through in the first 2 years, namely called the part I and part II of the course.

Time do flies as a third year now, long are the excuses of being naive anymore, in no time I will be on my senior graduating year soon. So lets take on the new academic year in a positive light.

Gong xi fa cai! What other better way to welcome the year of the rabbit than a back to back Chinese new year feast for 5 consecutive days? And I thought last year’s 3 day steamboat affair was good. I guess it’s get better this year knowing where are all the parties are.

Before Chinese new year, (1st Feb) Day 1. We gathered our juniors and few invited guests to have a taste of tossing the traditional yusheng. Yes it was a mass yusheng event all right in college. Most of the yusheng ingredients were bought off local supermarkets in towns, with the exception of the sauces and crispy crackers brought in from Singapore by my junior. Surprisingly tossing the yusheng is still an exclusive Singaporean and Malaysian get-together traditional before the lunar new year- something even my Chinese and Taiwanese friends do not know or practice either. Our yusheng appetite is followed by a get together Formal in the college dining hall!

Steam boat gathering

Yusheng Day!

Cheers!

Day 2 of the celebrations, which is the actual new year’s day eve saw a reunion steamboat dinner at Pembroke college common room. Hosted by our “uncle” Justin, a follow Malaysian known for his awesome dinner parties. He never fail to surprise us again this year with the variety of food, all simmering in various rice cooker “steamboats” (we even had halal and non-halal pots). There were a 30 odd attendee and many new faces from the juniors, not to mention old friends from other colleges.

Day 3 saw myself being invited by my dorm mate John for a steamboat dinner at Emmanuel college with his bible study friends. We tossed yusheng again before settling down on food for the evening. We even had special Bakgua porkfloss buns, and I never thought I could ever have a go at these delicacies all the way form home right here in the UK.

Day 4 was my only low key day, and a much needed breather from all the massive calorie loading from the previous nights. It was Pasta night in my kitchen with my block mates, our only non-chinese day and man was the pasta good! :3

My 5th and last day of my Chinese new year celebration saw a massive gathering of friends in college for a steamboat in the J-block kitchens, which can accommodate big cookouts for 20 or more people at a go. I saw myself going for so many steamboat dinners in other colleges but of course no other better way to end it with my fellow college mates. This last one is memorable as I made the iconic Wanton for the steamboat, which was kinda like an experiment. To my surprise everyone loved it, even I can’t believe it myself! Kudos going out to my aunt and mum who taught me how to make them as a kid.

That’s all for now, I hope your Lunar new year was just as eventful. Happy Chinese New Year. Cheers!

Check out the Chinese new year 2011 photo gallery.

The Cambridge student diaries- 2nd term of sophomore year.

Hey mum, shez,

It had been sometime since I last wrote a decent update to you and dad, so I figured I do one now since I have some time before bed, juggling between a modest 4 hours of sleep, a project presentation and a judging panel in 5 hours time. It had been 1 week since my time back here in Cambridge from California. It’s the Lent term now and if you remember from the last year, it’s the 2nd term of the three we have here in the university.

Things are going on fine here. This term we get to get together with engineers from other colleges for an integrated project (IDP for short), where we get few weeks to build robot to perform tasks set by the lecturers and pit them against other teams. There is a prize for the best performing team. I do hope that my prior experience with robotics will give my team an edge, not to mention a headstart on our project. Interestingly, the common pitfalls for the project, as told by lecturers and my seniors are teammates being too egoistic about their potential in contributing to the team. Take it like a bunch of Red Indian chiefs in a team who only give directions and gets nothing done with no followers, or doers- definitely not good.

This came not much of a surprise for me, considering it a side effect coming from the world’s no.1 ranking university (yes, glad we beat Harvard this year:) )- You’d expect almost every student here to be somebody- once or at least a leader in a part of their lives, raging in their blood to “lead” the team to oblivion as if their lives depend on it. Initially I intended to adopt a “follow and get things done” attitude when first meeting my team, not to mention make personal sacrifices- reining myself in as a team leader for the benefit of the team and only intervene when I see the dire need to pull the team only just as they are running off a cliff.

Thankfully I have a fantastic team, everyone found themselves well into their positions and work in unison without much coaching or intervention, really what could be better? We work in teams of 6, paired 3 sub-groups of 2 (mechanical, electrical and software). My teammate is this big guy who plays for the college rugby team, despite my bulk from athletics/track and field, I just feel so tiny standing beside him.

Things back in the college dormitories gets, oh well, better too. Besides a broken fridge door in the communal kitchen which left my dorm mates stumped on how to fix it (I was the only available engineer, so it’s not a matter of choice), we got a new microwave oven just late last month- only just because some idiot tried microwaving food in a metallic bowl which completely fried the magnetron in the old oven, completely junking it.

Milk and utensil thief is evident, but not common from the fridges. Well, guess not until we all started marking all our groceries in the kitchen with permanent ink as if our livelihood depends on it. Guess that’s what you get staying with people who are so smart on the block, that common sense evades them. Then there’s the rumor of people from other dorms coming over to nick the items too. I once lost a large 2 liter tub of ice cream!

But I guess that what makes my block interesting this term. It’s these very people who I get together every weekend cooking potlucks and trying different cuisines from all over the world, it’s an ethnic melting pot, not to mention having regular games of pool, table soccer or hanging out at the pub over a good beer and drinks by the college clubroom after a long day. My immediate neighbors on my floor is a guy from Nigeria, and a girl from Denmark. Then there is this Irish and Indian girl, a Chinese and American boy who lives on the upper floors. My good friend John and this neighbor Andrew, from Canada lives on the floor below me.

Technically I had not done my laundry from my US trip, yet, mainly because I only lug off to the washer after my laundry basket’s overflowing in typical bachelor-pad style and partly, because I did a fair bit of washing and washed my blankets/duvet/bedsheets before my trip so I can leave them to completely dry for a reasonable time in my room until my return from the states (and pack them thereafter). Currently, my basket is only half-full. And no, the £2.00 fee to do a wash and dry does not give me an incentive to do more washes than I really need.

On academics, I am getting the hang of work and starting revision for the big tripos exams in less than 6 months time- not because I could, but because I know I will need it- knowing how often I usually side-track from my school work on other commitments now. Moving on, I technically… well ok, I failed my start-of-term mock exams which took place on the first day of school this term. But you can blame me on it for spending only 12 hours studying for it (lesser if you count the few hours I dosed off at the study table) once I arrived Jetlagged back at London Heathrow.

Remarkably, my supervisor wasn’t cross with my results, despite him not knowing of my blatant ordeal the night before, which I guess is synonymous to the barrage of “excuses” he receives from students everyday even if I told him anyway. He cited that “I could do better” and also considering the fact that my score was actually on the upper 70 percentile of the class, despite it being a failure. It’s hilarious in class when everybody started comparing scores to see who was the biggest loser. It turns out there was no incentive to score better or even pass- much to my supervisor’s dismay.

Currently I am up for applying for an exchange to study next year at MIT under the Cambridge University-MIT exchange program. They are quite selective on who they are bringing up this year, considering the lack of funding from the university side, completely eliminating all students from all the other departments (chemistry, physics, etc) to go. This with the exception of us lucky engineers who are fortunate enough to get a sponsorship from BP to send only 16 students over to Boston next year. You think cleaning up their oily agenda could have anything to do with it?

Jokes aside, I do hope I get selected, my grades were not totally spectacular last year, and a second class honors is the bare minimum you have to even poke your letter out of the horde of applications they receive every year. I do hope my involvement in non-academic activities and college representation will make up for it, considering that too, being the main reason why I didn’t have much time to study last year.

The weather here in Cambridge is definitely warming up. I need not dress up like a Michelin man when heading out anymore, nor being engulfed with my freezing breath fog each time I speak or during my runs. Things are warmer in London, where I do see myself frequenting more often with good friends I meet every other month. The clubs, parties and the drinks there are great too.

Chinese new year will be on in a few days time. I hope things are warming up, well literally back home. I was told by college mates (who flew back home over the holidays) of the Christmas decorations coming down around town and it’s up with the decks of Red now, particularly all around Orchard road with Chingay coming too. It’s just too cold here to even think about it. I mean the highest temperature here is like 5 degrees and that is the lowest it can ever get in California when I was there 2 weeks ago! Can’t say the same for it back home, where it’s always scorching. Anyway, I have plans lined up for the magical 3 days of the new year ushering the year of the Rabbit, with mainly college formal dinners and steam boat impromptu potlucks over at friends. I miss the reunion dinners we used to have together as a family back at home, I wish you guys at home the best for the coming lunar year. Say, talking about that, I guess it’s also time of the year where you should receive those red packets from my scholarship provider again. Amusingly and “eye-rollingly”, they always never fail to do that every year.

I still have all your Xmas card on my wall, as well as a few additional ones from friends, dormmates, acquaintances and many new buddies I made when I was in the states, yours sit at the top of all of them. The Paris trip was excellent and I got to climb up (and down) the Eiffel tower. In between a tour from San Francisco, I stayed with a friend just off the San Francisco bay, who kindly offered me to crash his couch before I toured the Santa Clara (silicon valley) and San Jose area. It was at this friend’s place where we chill out with the whole house to ourselves, watching movies over large 60 inch screens and playing Rock Band with 6 others almost everyday in the basement. There is just this much I can note down this late at night, will tell you more about my trip adventures in a separate email.

Lastly, I am thinking of fixing my ankle injury this summer when I am back in Singapore, it’s a great annoyance on my long runs and when ice-skating (as raised with my last email to you), also so I can recover proper so I can build the strength of my left leg- so I can finally get back into athletics in college and make the Varsity team. It had been ages since I last ran a marathon and very itching do be back at it again in form. I am trying to properly draft an email to docs and ask for his recommendations, which I will CC that to you and sis. This means putting me out of action for my time back home and possibly on crutches with only one good right leg. Thinking about it, I feel sorry if that might possibly foil any of your plans if you have planned for during my short return back home. It was a blast for you and dad to show my around the Marina Sands development last summer, I couldn’t feel any more loved, yet guilty for this plan now.

Oh yes, one thing, can sis do me a favor? I feel that Dad is seriously lacking in our conversations here, will it be possible to teach him how to email? I believe it won’t be as hard as the time we taught him to SMS. Possible to set him off running with an email you can setup for him? (try *censored*@gmail.com). Maybe that will help.

P.S I noticed that I’ve not updated my blog in ages, it’s real hard to keep track on what I actually do in my diaries now, and rather than trying to do dated blog posts with memories vaguely supplemented with contents dug off my Outlook “sent folder”, I will be posting excerpts of this email on my post as an update of what I am doing now to my readers. Hope you don’t mind.

Lots of Love, best regards and take care,
Shaun
=)

I noticed the obvious lack of updates here on the site for quite sometime. Don’t worry I am not dead. But pretty much caught on other forms of work, travel which kept me away from my computer at time. My move to microblogging on twitter also placed me on a different light for update on this site too.

So time and again, I do not have time to actually update my blog (gosh I am THAT busy?) in ages, it’s real hard to balance work, training, creating a new Cambridge-university exclusive social network website and keep track on what I actually do in my day to day activities and blog down the interesting bits.

I send emails regularly to my family, updating on key moments and interesting things I do worth noting, so that can provide a good indicator of what I can actually note down on this site’s blog. Well, provided if you are actually interested in reading my mediocre rambles and happenings of life, that might float your boat.

So I guess, rather than trying to do dated blog posts with memories vaguely supplemented with contents dug off my Outlook “sent folder”, I will be posting excerpts of this email on my post as an update of what I am doing now to my readers.

The student diaries, so it will be.

So what did I do for Halloween this year, well I made my own costume this year, 2 in fact. I had quite a number of parties to attend this year, so I figured I diversify my arsenal a li’ ol bit. I made a Half-life zombie costume using a bloodied labcoat and shirt, coupled with my iconic head crab hat I’ve got from the Valve store few years back, but didn’t had the chance to use it proper till now. I wore the hat to lectures on halloween day too, which gave me many thumbs up among the school crowd. Awesome experience. The college parties is a very good way to get to meet people and new friends alike. There was a werewolf pack, the undead pack (guess I am part of the undead) as well as a large number of drag (lady gaga) queens.

The wolf pack!

College halloween party!

Spin the tunes baby!

There were party events such a performances and best costume auditions. Music kept going courtesy of our resident deejay Timothy, who is an English senior from Singapore too. I made a space pirate costume for another 2 more Halloween parties in other venues, namely a pub/club called revolution, we students call it Revs here for short, which feature a pub on the ground floor and the club/dance floor on the upper. My costume feature a rather formal looking space captain coat, decked with the Starcraft 2, Matt Horner styled large shoulder pads which I made out of dominos pizza coupon cardboard. The captains/pilot hat I bought off Ebay was customized with an internal red LED circuit I made and integrated into the cap, which glowed a bright red through a plastic acrylic piece like a futuristic argumented reality heads up display.

My niffy HUD!

Saints and Sinners!

Lady ga ga?

The early part of term is a good time to catch up on parties. Chilling out with the Singapore society was fairly interesting- they are not much of a party bunch. Time and always and unlike most other halloween parties I’ve been to (like those with the local British and internationals) most Singaporeans will just wait out by the seats in the club, preferring the sit around, stone rather than party or dance on the floor. I am not implying I am heck a party animal myself, but sometimes I find really weird having to drag them out to dance as if it’s their virgin experience on the dance floor. I mean, why pay to enter a club just to sit down on the sofa the whole night and chat with blaring music all around you? Weird. It’s sad seeing most Singaporeans here in Cambridge such lowlifes, much the study bugs who had not entered a club their whole lives, yesh! And we definitely don’t get this kind of crowd in the Polytechnic, that’s for sure! College is one of the best times of your lives, make the best out of it!

Meet the ghouls

Got punkin?

By the eye!

The last of my Halloween party saw an awesome boat party along the river Thames in London. The boat is more or less a self contained floating club with active lighting on the dance floor itself. You party on any of the decks on the boat which loops around the Thames from the London docksides to Westminster/London Eye. Awesome!

Check out more photos of the Halloween event here.

As part of my university internship and industrial experience requirements, I spent the last summer back in Singapore working 8 weeks from the 26th of July to the 17th of September. I’ve got the opportunity to work on improving a large caliber weapons system currently actively employed in the Singapore Armed forces. The organisation is no Stark industries, but with some of it’s bells and whistles as a defence agency almost like Darpa in the US or the DSTL in UK. A little background, the Defence Science and Technology Agency (DSTA) is a statutory board set up under the Ministry of Defence (MINDEF) in Singapore. It is responsible for implementing defence technology plans, acquiring defence material, engineering, innovation and developing defence infrastructure for MINDEF.

In a hind side, DSTA aims to provide leading-edge technological solutions to the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) so that it continues to be a formidable fighting force for the defence and security of Singapore. I am tasked to work under the Guided Weapon & Armament (GW&A) Competency Community under Systems Management. The security in the organisation is much more strict than most military intuitions I’ve been to, despite the fact with interns having one of the lower security clearance in the whole building. Working in a high security environment is definitely an eye opener for me, we deal with a greater deal of classified material, it’s unreal yet cool at the same time.

With an allocated mentor supervisor, I was given the role as a junior engineer, taking on the mini project of my own. Tasked a project to independently assess, work and suggest the most cost effective solution to improve and fulfill the night engagement capabilities of a locally developed weapon system. I am given the flexibility to manage the project directly, working autonomously and deliver the project findings with respect to project milestones and datelines.

There, I’ve given the opportunity to research and work with several interesting technologies and hardware to go with it, namely:

With the following engineering procedures I applied on my own in my analysis of my options and eventual result:

Extensive life cycle analysis, including product disposal were considered. It was concluded that a modular add-on to the weapons system will give the army the flexibility to operationally deploy a variety of night aids found in the SAF inventory, which is both cost efficient and easy to implement/deploy logistically and on the field for the soldier. The suggestion of the weapon enhancement does not stop here, with areas open for further improvement as well as noting future technological possibilities which can be used to further employed to enhance the solution in the future. Following my presentation to my superiors and department head on the last week of internship, the presentation feedback is largely positive with a good chance of the recommended solution being implemented in the Singapore army itself!

Awesome!

Disclaimer: Please mind the vagueness of this post, particularly the mention of any specific weapons system. There are just so much information I can share openly besides the obvious already on the public domain. Cheerios!

7 day work week, 9am to 2am, no work or health benefits

Haha, that very much describes my employment benefits on my current occupation. Life as a student do have their ups and downs and I bet no one can deny that exam time is one of the main nightmares one can face. Where it’s not the long late nights studying, surviving only on coffee or energy drinks.

The picture on the left is my college library at 2am today, something I myself will see more often in the coming days. There are usually many sides to this at this time of the year, most will start studying, some will just laugh at it in their face only for reality to set in later, some just don’t study at all. Ironically, for most overseas students including Singaporeans, it’s the “mugging season” (a term strangely only synonymous among Singaporeans).

Everyone here all have an ‘A’ level background and most Singaporean students here are either scholars and/or top students from their Junior colleges. With it comes their own set of expectations and habits which in my observation can be quite hard to break! Not to mention the perception of relativity as well. For instance saying “fail” does not physically mean failing, it means that they did not get their string of “As” which they are so accustomed to getting, go figure!

I still have lots to learn about them, just like an anthropologist curiously discovering a new sapient species- somehow what I’ve discovered so far are that they are able to withstand spending all their time studying locked up in their room without any social interaction & they most often do it in secrecy. It really interesting for a Polytechnic kid like me to see how they “tick”, considering I am the only of my kind here!

For my effective study methods, I tend to prefer group studies, as it allows interaction and able to “know and learn what you don’t know” but it seems that the culture here (or maybe in my immediate group of Singaporeans) things are rather different, everyone here is like all out for themselves. I did manage to form a study group with some locals and Malaysians but strangely it seems that most Singaporeans here prefer to study alone, well until I drag them out of their closets! Blunder!

Time ticks towards the exams I never thought would come so soon, time is as precious as something money can’t buy even there are opportunity costs for typing this blog post now even at 4am after my night revisions and lacking sleep the next day- a viscous cycle. I never saw myself studying so hard before, I have 4 papers to take in a little more than a week’s time and I am no where close to even finishing revision let be having enough time to do past year papers. Then there will always come the time where you just keep asking yourself why are you doing this to yourself, or how the heck did you get yourself into this shit, is really studying so hard all that matters? In the end, does it even matter?

All my seniors seeing our state will simply smile and shrug us off, telling us to relax, it’s only our first year! But mind you I am not looking for a reason to be complacent and the thought of the workload being harder next year is simply not reassuring as well.

It’s a fact that given more than enough time, anyone can get good grades in an exam. It’s the ability to do well with a given set of restrictions, in this case a breakneck lecture pace and lack of time which sets students apart, irregardless of their intelligence or abilities. Somehow it seems not about being the brightest of the lot but the most exam smart (which makes you wonder whether is it against exam objectives) and one of the reasons why I personally prefer coursework and projects (Seconded by my director of studies too). We do get projects on the third year, but there are still exams! After all, the exams here as exclaimed by lecturers are “designed to tax even the most capable students”. Bummer!

Anyway, the grades for the first and second years here in Cambridge don’t count to the final grade. So somehow the thought of just being able to get on the second year is a simple objective for many here, including my of the local British kids here (who are still partying and playing this time of the year). Few medics I know in other colleges are still playing computer games with exams just next week.

I hate studying!

“I tried so hard and got so far. But in the end, it doesn’t even matter” – Linkin Park

Today marks the date where I finally finished all my example papers (tutorial homework) for my freshman year. These little buggers always try to get the best of you as homework in it’s worst form, they just sap the life out of you when you try to tackle them all day long, to the extent of sometimes taking a week for the to be done. What’s more these homework just keep coming, with about 10 of them for this last term in Easter, with only 5 weeks of curriculum, I never thought I did get them all finished, with time to spare for exam revision. With that, I can formally start on revision for my exams which is due sadly in 2 weeks time.

I never saw myself working so hard before, well not that I can actually remember myself doing so neither did I ever saw myself doing in Polytechnic as well. Back then I was strictly an afternoon worker with my evenings for leisure, I was flexible with my time for my commitments such as working part-time or track & field training. Presently, I often seeing myself taking sacrifices from my personal time to get work done. Currently, my sleep pattern’s screwed and I always see myself working ploughing through school in the mornings and working on school work in my room or library till late. Even time on hour-long train journeys are good time for revisions!

I am not here to complain the obvious, these are of course, part and parcel of university studies. The pace of learning is very fast indeed. In comparison, something which takes 1 semester (6 months) in polytechnic (e.g the CAD course) are all taught within 1 month here. And it’s generally the same for all the other subjects as well. Go figure! And catch your breath while you are at it!

Coming from a polytechnic background did somewhat give me a headstart in some of the content taught here. As a matter of fact, I was actually familiar with about 60% of the content taught in school. With the exception of myself having forgotten most of what I’ve learnt (my bad, that’s why I have my poly notes here too!), most of the content are more theoretical as I come to realize- Much of the content learnt in Poly is down and dirty and straight to point application of methods or formulas to get things done. University engineering goes very much deeper on the surface of what I’ve learnt, such as in-depth derivations & theories, which often always seems to have to uncanny ability to derive powerful formulas from first principles (or literally nothing)- something which will make any poly student squirm if they encountered it in the poly curriculum. Well, at least that’s making sense into all the formulas which I used to take for granted.

On the other hand, much of my current studies focuses on theories and not much of practical applications and processes, something which I only have the advantage of being exposed to in the polytechnic. For instance, for engineering techniques, “injection molding”, “CNC milling techniques”, “radiography non-destructive testing”, “3D printing”, or “Investment casting” are just plain text on the notes without any substance to most students here, particularly those without a technical background.

With the exception of the availability of such facilities here only on special request or specialist university engineering clubs (such as my engineering eco-racing club), to most students here (particularly most Singaporean ‘A’ level students here) they are only focused on just exams, memorization and route learning, who can get really freaky if you see how they study (or “mug”) at times.

I can’t deny all study gives you the good grades, but that makes you a dull person nor a better engineer. Sometimes, I wonder am I putting myself at a disadvantage by being more of a practical person- preferring tackling real engineering projects, research than studying for exams (belch).

Well, I guess it’s back to study then, if that gives you the grades, then I guess I have to be in for it, after all there’s only less than 3 weeks before the exams, when I will be too finally done with my freshman year.

Before ending I would like to quote an anonymous but rather popular-wise college saying: “Getting into the university of your choice is one part of the story, surviving your freshman year is a whole different thing!”

How true, haha!

Good news come early this may. Apparently, my Polytechnic junior Kuriakin Zeng, who’s notoriously labeled now as the “Harvard, Poly reject” is the first Singapore polytechnic student who’ve been offered a place to study in Harvard university.

As I was told by him, he will be doing engineering science in place of liberal arts. Looking back, I remembered him as a humble junior who sought my advice for overseas university applications last autumn, presumably where I guess he was busy with all his university applications. He’s a guru in the electronics engineering lab and almost everyone I talked to in the polytechnic robotics laboratory knows of the legendary Kuriakin. Ironically, I have not met him in person!

He’s all over the Straits times too. Somehow, after reading the article and coffee shop talk among my peers, it gave many an impression of “first” as in the first polytechnic student. Though I think in the context of the article, it’s actually meant only Singapore polytechnic’s first student. So I am not particular sure of the accuracy of the report by Amelia Tan in the papers- I do know of polytechnic students who are studying undergrad in Harvard, so I am not particularly sure of the context of the “first” claim.

Nonetheless, we do have quite alot to learn from these stories. Particularly about rejects, personally I was rejected by NUS and NTU for 2 consecutive years. I never looked back nor accepted any of their offers when I was given the offer to study at my current university. It goes to show that sometimes, there will never be a roadblock on the road. Just keep trying and you will make it in life, and that’s how it should always be.

Well done for Kuriakin, I believe his achievement is not only a milestone for his family and himself, but for the polytechnic as well. My only small gripe is that he broke my polytechnic record for distinctions (which stood for only one short year!) obtained in the polytechnic by only subject (Grrrr) .

Strangely somehow I often get pats on back from students in my graduation year (jokingly) comforting me about the shattering of the distinction record, often citing along the lines of: “For your time, you were the best”, well not that it actually bothers me. Haha, guess the old will always have to make in for the new, which can only get better!

Anyway records are meant to be broken right? GO SP!

You can read more on the ST article here.

Cheers

The iMech Greenpower race (25th April 2010) is an annual eco-race organised by the institution of mechanical engineers (iMechE) in conjunction with secondary schools, colleges and manufacturers to introduce and promote the engineering profession to students in the UK. This blog entry covers much in a nutshell what my team of 4 did to prepare ourselves for the national race, which included building an electric race car from scratch and pitting it again other schools and colleges to a grueling 4 hour all electric race on the Goodwood racetrack to the finish. This was done during my first year in university as a freshman.

The event is supported by companies such as Siemens, Ford, Prodrive and Sembcorp just to name afew, the program aims to advance education in the subjects of sustainable engineering and technology to young people.

Building the car
The thought of participating in the competition under representation of Cambridge university eco-racing club, their most prominent creations being Infinity and Endeavor solar cars which competed in the world solar challenge in Australia last year. This Greenpower race is a subset of the eco-racing events we all participate in.

Chassis done!

Looking finished already !

Loaded and ready to go

The car was first conceived through in campus discussions near the start of term, mainly through pen and paper talks over coffee or planned meetings by our workstations, where the final plans are put on CAD model and evaluated before putting the solid plans down for the planned final build.

We were fortunate to have Jan from Tag-on, a friend our team manager got us in contact with. He had participated in the Greenpower race for many years before, with lots of experience on the races behind him. He serves much as a technical consultant in my team’s build with his engineering and technical expertise, as well as sponsoring supplies, tools and providing a sizable and equipped workshop for us to work in.

We started off with purchased tubular steel tubes where they are all marked, band-sawed and bent to shape and size to form the whole steel chassis and roll cage. Thereafter the sub assemblies such as the drive train, steering mechanism and brakes are individually custom fabricated with off-the-shelf parts are bolted onto the main chassis. The steering column was interesting as we planned on an anti-Ackerman design with reasonable camber and caster angles for less over steer on the corners. We employed a composite home made carbon fiber body shell laid over painstalking made foam molds for the body work.

At Goodwood!

Pre-race scrutineering

Shaun’s not the Stig!

Jan is a nice guy, to the extent of allowing us to work on the car in his home yard over the weekend and providing transport back to Cambridge (when we work too late and miss the last hour-long bus ride home) as well. The lunch treats prepared by his wife were always something to look forward to after a whole long day of fabrication. Did I mention he have 2 nice dogs (a lad and a collie) as well?

We entered the Greenpower race as a corporate challenger, on the same line as the manufacturer teams such as Jaguar land rover. The car build took approximately 100 man hours of work, it was completed in time for the race on 25th April 2010 and transported via trailer to the Goodwood track early on race day for the afternoon race.

The race
There where about 30 teams who participated in our race event. There were the favorites, veterans, defending champions as well as rookie newcomers like us. To us the race was all completely new to us, particularly the experience to plan and manage a racing team with team strategies, pit stops and driver changes, it was literally almost racing poetry in motion. The best part is that it’s all pure fun for a motorhead like me.

The busy pit lanes

Grandstand pass

It did well.

We got through the pre-race scrutineering in time on race day for a picture perfect flag off and race. We started the race with a 3 driver strategy with one battery swap (refuel) in mid point of the 4 hour race. Our build mate, Fred got to go first at the starting grid, followed by myself and Jan finishing the third of the driver shift for the checkered flag.

Our car broke down a few times, but it’s quite a fighter with our quick MacGyver slap on fixes which got it back in running in no time. It finally succumbed after 3 hours of continuous running when the motor burned out on Jan’s stint where he pushed the motor for overtaking.

We didn’t expect to win, but to let this participation be an eye-opener and to gain as much experience for next’s year’s race- where we have a better understanding of the race functions. There were limitations too in this first race too, considering the lack of time and a rush job to actually have any final finishings for the car. There are lessons to learn for many too, especially for most students in the team not street smart with technical or practical expertise and only armed with theoretical knowledge of the A levels- what you learn in the text books will not always apply and work in real situations. And I am glad my path in the Singapore Polytechnic served me greatly- simplicity is the key! But it all went better than expected, anyway, it could had been worse.

It was my first time racing at Goodwood too and I can say, it’s not a bad race after all.

View more photos of the racing weekend trip in the Greenpower photo album.

It’s the start of the easter term break and no what other better way to start it but getting all engrossed in building an electric racing car to compete in Greenpower. Greenpower is an annual racing event organised by the Institution of mechanical engineers (iMechE). It electric car racing for schools, colleges, apprentices and youth groups. colleges, apprentices and youth groups. The event goes in the aims of IMechE Greenpower- To promote engineering and technology as exciting careers.

There are few categories for racing, namely the formula 24 and corporate challenges, where manufacturer teams such as Ford & Jaguar LandRover get to compete as well. Schools can either design and build their own cars or use customised kits to compete in regional endurance heats using standard motors and batteries. The final race at Goodwood lasts 4 hours and is an exciting event with 75 finalists competing.

Our team managed to get a workshop out of Cambridge to work in, the car was literally built from scratch, starting today with nothing but some newly procured 1.25mm mild steel tubes, a band saw and a mig welder. That pretty got all 3 of us busy with lots of cutting, grinding and welding- literally getting our hands dirty.

Zing!

Welds on spot!

Vroom vroom!

With packed lunch and lots of coffee (we had to wake up early to travel over 2 hours to get to our workshop) to keep us going, surprisingly we all managed to get our chassis space frame up in one day! There will still be much done tomorrow, namely getting all the other fine bits done up, welded installing the drive train and steering for the car.

Next week will come to real messy (& choking part) of dealing with fiberglass and carbon-fiber for the car body shell, part of the aerodynamic works planned for the 2nd phase of the race car build.

Hope all goes well!

Welcome the year of the tiger! A whole new year on the lunar calendar. There had been much talk among the Chinese group here in Cambridge with regards to the new year, particularly how it is celebrated in various countries, with experiences of their own, let be in China or Malaysia.

Things here in the UK are very different from what it will be at home- No fancy Chinese new year lighting, blaring music from homeland shops, the endless looping of Chinese new year songs in most public areas, let be departmental stores. Things here are just as it is of a normal work day, not a single piece of decoration on the streets and bummer it’s not a holiday too. Angbaos were literally non-existent.

Though most Chinese new year festive and event lineups can be found in most Chinese cultural clubs in the university, there was an obvious lacking of the fun and joy of Chinese new year we all grew up with anticipating every year back home. The main sizable celebrations closest to us will be the Chinese new year celebrations in London itself- to our dismay an event held smacked right in the middle of our school term, so we can’t do anything much about it. There are of course some exceptional few I was told about from China who literally flew back home just for 3 days so they can have reunion dinner, that’s crazy but I dwell more about that.

Personally I did not have any festive plans lined up over the Chinese new year weekend, with only plans to attend a Chinese new year formal (dinner) in college on the Friday (12th) before Chinese new year. Planned for the actual day with be only a video conference (virtual pai-nian) with my family, wishing them a happy new year and calling it done by rewarding myself with a good home cooked meal in the evening. Little do I know things won’t go quite as intended.

College CNY formal (Fri)
The formal hall I planned on going was quite a bunch. And I am glad my college did have Chinese new year specific plans and a Chinese menu for that day as well and man was the turnout exceptional as well- full house! We had a 6 course meal with appetizers, Peking duck, chow mien (fried noodles) and bean sprout vegetable mix. Though much attempt had been tried to make the dishes as authentic as possible, it still does not taste as good as the ones prepared by Chinese chefs back home. Desserts, coffee and fruits followed after. Free flow of Wine, Champagne and port (dessert wine) was served as well.

Queen’s reunion dinner (Sat)
Just few days before the weekend. I received an invite to an engineer’s reunion dinner on that following Saturday from a fellow 1st year course mate in Queen’s college. Apparently we will be having a steamboat style dinner with all the year one Engineers as well as some 2nd year Singaporean lawyers. The setup was simple: 4 rice cookers (which doubled up as boilers for the steamboat), a spread of food for about 10 persons and lots of Chinese new year songs from a laptop courtesy of Youtube. It was a rather fun informal steamboat dinner all huddled and eating from our temporary “floor table” in the host’s dorm room, which was remarkably large and able to hold over 10 guests with ease. The dinner was simple, but served it’s purpose well as a reunion dinner and I say, a rather proper one.

Steamboat at Queens

Malaysia Steamboat Dinner

Drunk on CNY!

CUMAS Steamboat Dinner (Sun)
Just when I thought 2 events were enough. This 3rd event was held on the actual day (14th) of Chinese new year itself at Pembroke college. I got to attend the event courtesy of my roommate who unexpectedly offered me an invite to the event just few days beforehand. He is a committee member of the Cambridge Uni Malaysian society (CUMAS). There was another small Singaporean cookout which I could not attend as I’ve already RSVP to the latter. I was not disappointed as well- this event was much bigger than the one I went the day before, not to mention with a larger variety of foods and larger turn up as well (about 30 odd people). The food spread was commendably good and comparable to that of commercial steamboat joints. Did we had such a good time, a Chinese new year’s day dinner (aka V day as well) worthy for the occasion itself.

There were yum-sengs and lots of chatter with new friends. With the exception of the absence of yu-sheng not only in this event, but in the other 2 events too, apparently this is something only unique to Singapore and Malaysia. Oh yes then there was the feat of sobering up a few after the event as well.

Seems that my Chinese new year weekend turned out rather more eventful than I initially expected! And I have largely my fellow course and room mates to thank for a fantastic Chinese new year lineup to user in the year of the tigger!

Guess what we get to do in the engineering laboratories today, well it’s not everyday where you get to use the words “copper, steel and liquid nitrogen” in the same sentence nor being able to work with them in the lab at a go. But not when you are during destructive testing of material specimens in the materials laboratory. This experiment investigates and studies the metallurgic properties of ductile metals in extremely cold temperatures.

Our lab technician in charge has some crazy whack for liquid nitrogen, not to mention an immunity to it as well, exclaiming his long years of working with the substance had made his skin so tough, he is immune to it’s gut freezing effects even after completely immersing his hands in a pool of liquid at −196 °C. Humorously, he always does the pour and “finger stir” each time comes over to fill our liquid nitro receptacles, much to the gawking of the students I guess he intends to freak out in the first place!

Notably, the tensometers used here in the labs are ancient. I mean hand crankingly ancient (you even have to dot plot the stress-strain curves out while cranking the specimen) amazing! There is not even a single bit of automated machinery in the aid of conducting the experiment. I remembered the lecturer in-charge telling the class that this will possibly be the first and last time you get to touch these (primitive) tensometers, which is rather true too having used digital automated ones back in Singapore and is already an industry standard worldwide in material destructive testing.

Liquid Nitrogen!

Frozen stiff!

Coolingly woot!

Old? and I mean whoa, even the Vickers hardness testing machines are all hand cranked, I remembered the modern industrial ones I use which takes readings at a touch of a button with digital readouts. Even the tensometers as computer assisted which automatically plots and prints a yield stress strain curve upon specimen failure and data collected. I guess that’s what you get studying in a university department almost a few centuries old. So much for an eye-opening whacky experiments, and I think this is just more of such to come.

Cambridge University Malaysia Singapore Association organized this event last Saturday, the 30th of January which is essential and asian food festival where the society gets to prepare unique Singaporean dishes for everyone to come and enjoy.

I’ve signed up as a helper for the food festival since early last term. So that very much grants me “free” entry to the event, which by itself costs £7 for members and £11 for non-members, not that actually was part of the agenda! I was rather clueless when I placed my name down to help. The day started out with some supervisions in the afternoon (yes I know it’s a bummer to have supervisions over the weekend). Little do I find myself prepared for the daunting task ahead to prepare dinner for well over a 100 guests.

Cumsa Asian Food Festival 2010

Food’s out

More cooking to do!

Nonetheless, that Saturday afternoon was spent preparing Chicken rice, as well as cooking all the chicken. Chicken rice is one of the main courses to be served for the event, which goes hand in hand with Pak choy (vegetables) with other local dishes such as Bak ku teh (pork rib spices soup), Loh bak (black sauce meat and eggs), as well as Laska. There were also appetizers, servings of the famous rose syrup bandung as well as bobochaha for desserts. I opened the place up in the late afternoon so that phase 2 of cooking can be done at the hall venue, where they have a kitchen which we can use too.

Besides cooking the rice and chicken, the hard part was myself doing most of the cooking for the vegetable dish, which easily saw me through over 25-30 packets of Pak choy and having to separate, wash and cook over 100 stalks of the vegetable. I guess that will keep me away from it for sometime. We did encounter quite problems ourselves too, such as being unable to reheat the rice, so it was quite a pain to serve all the guest cold food, particularly the rice. But I think everyone received that as OK, with no complains as I know of.

Chicken Rice!

Laska

Bobochaha!

The event was a success, and the guests were all generally happy with the food from the feedback we get as servers. The same can’t be said for all of us though. Sadly, we ourselves as organizers literally have nothing to eat from mid afternoon onwards to late. It’s not until about 10pm where the guests start leaving where everyone started to have dinner.

Well not that we actually prepared dinner for ourselves, but rather savaging-ly dined with whatever food is left in the kitchen as well as those collected/cleared from the guest tables. Not that was bad, but hey at least we get to try what we cooked! We had enough food leftover for everyone (with excess to spare) mainly from the bulk of the leftovers from the last few dishes where many guests could not finish, coining out the term “serve the dishes you want to eat, last”. Much of the the leftovers were all meats and rice, not to mention some half eaten bobochaha, which wasn’t too much of my liking contrary to some who just slurpped them all. There were no left overs of the vegetables I’ve prepared too- they were all wiped clean!

Looking back at what we had prepared, that was really quite some feat we had pulled out, not to mention the number of bowls of food we all went into making for the all the guest. We have pretty much have each other to thank: the committee and the helpers for a job well done.

What other cooler way to mark the end of the university’s 800th anniversary celebration with a cool and ambient lightshow held at night with fire art performances? Apparently, the whole stretch along Cambridge King’s parade street was closed for much of the night’s last week for the event, consisting mostly of laser and light shows. The crowds are evident as well- with the roads packed and queues to the event snaking out onto the streets.

People passing by during the evening will be delighted with much of a treat- Lasers and life performances by the Fire Troupe, consisting of fire breathers and eaters. There was much to see. You will be greeted at entrance to the event with a splash of animation projected onto the senate house. The white walls of the house made an ideal projection surface for the myriad of lively and brightly animated features seemingly “painted” onto it’s walls.

It’s no other painting either, each animation segment is uniquely different and animated to tell a story about the university’s rich history, intentions and foundlings of the university as a global world leader in education with an alumni of 85 Nobel Laureates. Notable figures shown will also include Issac Newton & Charles Darwin.

Woot projection!

Transforming the senate house

Animated pictures & text

The event saw a tour around the King’s college grounds, demarcated by thin green electro-luminescent strips lining the path taking us towards the college chapel and along the river Cambridge. There, another set of animated projections were displayed on the chapel and adjacent building walls. Ambient sounds were played throughout the tour path, giving the area a rather upbeat feel despite the dark eerie setting required for the projections to be effective. The place was packed almost bumper to bumper, as remarked by some: “This is the amount of traffic King’s will get the whole year in one day!”. The tour ends with a globe laser display at the green towards the gate exits, painting the global outreach Cambridge have in education as well as constantly echoing the slogan “transforming tomorrow”.

King’s college chapel

The crowds

The lasers at the end

The show was great, but otherwise not really much an eye opener. However, it actually gave me a chance to tour and see King’s college in the night- something I’ve not had the opportunity to do so. “Apparently it’s the same as what they did for the opening ceremony last year as well” as exclaimed my seniors. Nonetheless, everything was rather new for me and I guess something worth-wide to mark the end of 800th years of achievement. I don’t think we may be seeing another celebration as big as this, well for a long time to come.

And hey, it’s 2010 and we are almost more than a week into it already. A whole new year, a whole new year of possibilities and expectations! So far so good, but still largely very far away from home.

Well not that I actually miss home, much, but I guess the bore of work seems to creep up at you at times, particularly when you think you want to find time out to enjoy and party for the holidays, particularly this new year.

I guess the same can’t be said for school I guess. I always tend to have this strange mixed feel of anticipation attenuated by work over the new year. Something evident since my poly days given our school term smacked right over the new year period.

This is of course in contrast to those carefree days I miss even before my time in poly. It seems the old idea of a new year in January for a fresh start of a new school term with no current work (or deadlines) looming your head is a thing very much of the past now, even in university.

Anyway, at least we do get slightly more holidays. Notably my holidays last Christmas was excellent, so I am not complaining, much. Looking forward, there is much to expect for this new year. Particular looking back at what happened during the new year’s day celebrations in London.

Anyway, to make up for that on a brighter side, at least I can bask with some presents I’ve got over Christmas! Man there are quite afew! I’ve not actually found time to go through all of them, having only returned back home only very recently. It’s like Christmas all over again!

Today is the last day of term! Two months of back to back hectic lectures, supervisions and lab, all over! well for 6 weeks of term break at least. And whoa was it hectic. Quite notably, the pace of classes going on here in the department are so fast it can be compared to almost a half a semester of teaching (5-6 months) in the polytechnic all covered over a span less than 2 months!

It’s remarkable, yet something I am glad I survived even after spending sometime out from studying. In stark comparison, even friends I know in other universities are not that pressed, with still much bumming around even after the first week of term. Maybe it’s just something about the demands of Cambridge which is as synonymous with it’s name.

Christmas get-together
There are quite alot of end term events on these days. There was a Christmas pot luck organsied by the Cambridge CCCJ this evening at the halls, well it’s not really much of a pot luck anyway with home-cooked buffet style serving of dinner, dessert, followed by some acts, performances and lots of Christmas carols throughout the night. It’s the season to be jolly!

Christmas get-together dinner

Performance Skit

Singing christmas carols

With so much free time now comes great responsibility to use it. Man it’s almost like the weekends I look forward to at the end of every week, it that it’s happening everyday now, whee!

With some spare time to spare between classes, I will talk about the college culture here in Cambridge. I believe I touched briefly on this previously on a dated post about Cambridge being a college based university, but didn’t dwell deeper into it

College culture
It comprises of 31 different colleges, including 3 all-girls colleges as well as 4 mature colleges. This is usually puzzling most people at first. A College is the place where students live, eat and socialise. It is also the place where they receive small group teaching sessions, known as supervisions. Each College is an independent institution with its own property, income and history, the oldest are over 800 years old while some less than a century old. The Colleges appoint their own staff and are responsible for selecting students, in accordance with University regulations. This unique culture only evident in Cambridge and Oxford universities allows, you can see them largely as big “houses” in context, particularly where colleges compete among each other in sports or tournaments, particularly in boating.

Exploring!

Sidney sussex college

The wolfson Lee library

Despite colleges being independent entities themselves, all lectures and labs are conducted in common. The teaching of students is shared between the Colleges and University departments. Degrees are awarded by the University themselves. In place of tutorials, we have supervisions, which is more or less a 2-1 tutorial system in a nutshell. The supervision system is a nucleated group teaching system where students receive tuition in small groups and is said to be one of the main reasons for the University’s success and is regarded as one of the best teaching models in the world.

Formal halls
The beauty of having so many colleges is the variety it offers, particularly places to visit, explore and food. You can’t really get enough of will be the myriad of medieval and castle like architecture the streets of Cambridge have to offer.

The formal hall long tables

View of the dining hall

Group shot!

Some colleges have their old boating facilities and attractions of their own (e.g. chapels, halls etc) which are popular tourist destinations in the city as well. Also, each college has their own dining facilities or “butteries” (as we come to know of the slang), these are essentially large communal eating places where the college serve subsidised meals for both staff and students.

Colleges usually have a separate formal hall where a more exquisite 5 course dinners are served in a typical English long table style, often dining with the college seniors or staff who usually sit at the high table.

You will however, require a member of the college to invite you in to attend formal hall. That what makes it so special and generally provides an incentive to know and meet people from other colleges within the department to be invited, not to mention returning the favor by inviting them for formals in your own college as well.

Each college have their own dress policies, serving times and guest invitational policies. Either way, you, moreover as the name suggest such dinners will involve dining in a formal attire, usually with a tie, coat and the college gown over. So far I’ve had a formal at Wolfson & Christ colleges, with few more at Jesus & Newhall planned in the near future. Would definitely be looking forward to clear more throughout the year, happily striking off each college one.

That’s all for formals now I guess. Dudaloo!

No it’s not an aftermath of a zombie vending machine raid, but it always seem to be the case here every weekend in school, particularly those staying within the college dorms. The college generally serves 3 meals a day- breakfast, lunch and supper (aka dinner) everyday, with the exception on Saturdays with only brunch served and lunch on Sundays. So this leaves our weekend dinners open which usually result in very interesting findings- It’s not uncommon to see 2 fully loaded adjacent vending machine selling drinks and sweets full and the one dispensing meals completely wiped out on weekends, so as I discover when passing by the college vending area on few occasions. It seems that this whole place runs off vending sandwiches on the weekends, otherwise it’s takeouts, microwaved meals or pizza.

Generally lets face it, not many people like to cook even if you do it will be most probably be worth while cooking for a group or so, which seem to be the case for myself. My group of about 5-6 Singaporeans friends will usually get together on weekends for a cookout where 7-9 pounds can easily feed 4-5 people for dinner.

In a typical bachelor pad setting, our cooking is not really what we call “restaurant standard”, but rather good enough for tasting eating. We tried cooking pasta with beef and meat sauce which turned out like a minced meat contraption with not much tomato. And there was one weekend where we had fried rice which was actually too wet, we ended up passing it off as claypot rice! and I don’t think I would want to talk about the chicken rice weekend!

Ingredients for dinner

Wet fried rice! (Nice try anyway)

Feeding time…

Cooking at home is not exactly that “cheap” either, though yes the material cost is low, but the time and effort going into actually preparing the food and actually cooking it muddles the justification of the cost (took about 1 hour for our first try). When you though that is it, then there’s the amount of grocery planning and shopping beforehand for the ingredients.

I kinda miss the ease of ready made-food anytime of the day back in Singapore. Not that I actually miss the food but rather the convenience of obtaining them, let be how ridiculously cheap our food is back home compared to here. Chinese food here is expensive, bout $12 SGD for a plate of Singapore fried rice, which is far more expensive than that you get in London as well (maybe due to fewer Chinese stores here).

In a typical English setting here, there are no hawker centers here, only restaurant and eateries which will set you back at least 7 pounds for any dinner. There are no diners here either. Nevertheless, with each passing week with new discoveries town, there are always few popular cheap spots to eat around town, such as pubfood (about 4 pounds for a burger, fries set with drink) or there’s always the sub of the day!

Enrollment in the university of Cambridge is like a ritual in this traditional university. It’s like almost going back into time as well, with all the formal matriculation processes, the setting, formal dress robes and formals to go through to welcome the new cohort. As exclaimed by the seniors, it’s like a “rite of passage, with my great things to come”. I am now officially enrolled and warmly welcomed into Cambridge as a fellow student. All university matriculation are done by the college Praelector, in my case was Dr Brian Cox. His primary role is to matriculate all new undergrad and post grad members of the College. As stated on the student welcome pack: This is a traditional formal registration of the student as a member of the University and the College.

The college panel

The matriculation Dinner

Cheese!

In addition, all students are welcomed into the college with a matriculation formal hosted by the president of the college himself. This is done by department and usually begins with a drinks reception in the President’s lodge before heading to the formal dining hall for the 5 course meal served on the long table. Very much like what you see in traditional English dining halls or in relation, like the dinner Harry Potter had in Hogwarts. The dinner is interesting, I got to meet many different people from all walks of life, not to mention learning about their country, cultures and food alike. A very sociable atmosphere indeed which I am liking in stark contrast to the lifestyles back in Singapore. People are more open, friendly and approachable here.
One college formal done! With 31 different colleges in Cambridge itself, it will be a feat, not to mention an achievement if you are able to conquer all the formals in all the colleges before graduation. 30 more to go!

With some time to spare, let me talk about the engineering department along Trumpington street where all freshers will have to go through as a rite of passage here in the university of Cambridge before specializing in their various fields of chosen expertise here or out of the department at West Cambridge.

Built around 1875, this department is about 130 years old, but it still retains much of the old red bricked structure which is typical of the architecture of that time. Even walking through it, particularly some corridors does make you feel that you’ve gone back in time. Much of the old the layout of the building still largely intact, not to mention the old weather wooden doors and oak lecture room seats which are literally give you the sore bums ar some time of sitting. They even kept the building “trademark” smoke furnace smoke stack which can be seen sticking out of the engineering buildings despite it not being used for decades.

The interesting fact is that all these old parts goes hand-in-hand with the various improvements and modern additions seen all around- There are also many various enhancements made to the existing structure, such as modern ceilings, lighting and toilets. It’s quite unreal walking down an ancient corridor only to enter a bright tiled room with lots of modern facilities, typical a Frankenstein contraption of old and new. Moreover, the

The department from the library

Common lectures

The societies fair!

Being an old building, there are many instances of the old building which I always attend lectures in. Almost all lectures and talks are all conducted here for undergraduates- First year lectures are usually common and held in the larger lecture theaters where you will spend more of your senior years in small lecture rooms when you choose to specialize in the third year. The department is also a place for post grad research as well, with 5/5 start ratings for research and laboratories.

I am really liking the myriad of societies and groups available at university level, far more than what I thought SP had oftered was “large”, but it’s still a far cry from the type of CCAs offered in JCs. Signing up for track and field was a no-brainer for me, but sign-ups are usually in for competitive level, let be representing the college at university level. Since I am recovering from a leg injury, I guess I have to put that on hold until maybe next term where I get my fitness backup with training schedules of my own.

The engineering prep course was held over the course of last week, it was organised by the university department as an introductory course for all fresher engineers starting their first year in Cambridge university. There were talks on various engineering topics such as reducing airplane noise and introductory electronics by various speakers and industry partners, such as ARM, BP, etc. The highlight of the course for most students, would be having to get onto building and programming a robot to play soccer autonomously after an hour lecture on robotics. The robot was to be built using parts from the Lego Mindstorms set, something I was familiar with having owned a set myself back at home, only that the one used by the university is a new version (1.5) with the USB infrared tower (mines the version 1.0 serial tower) and they have quite an array of third party sensors to use, such as Infra-red sensors!

Robot soccer matches!

Let the match begin!

Slug fest!

I guess to anybody, to build a robot from virtually zero knowledge in 2 days was quite a bit of a feat. We were split into 12 teams which were formed during the ice-breaker dinner sessions on the first day of the prep course. I was rather niffy with building robots out of Lego, so I offered to design and build the robot based on the team’s requirements. In the end we settled for a single IR sensor with 2 pairs of touch and light sensors, all that’s left was programming which were delegated to the rest of the team of 6 to plan and code. Programming turned out to be rather more of a feat than we thought, but we did turn out with a working robot which actually looked rather cool.

The matches are hilarious, some team’s robots were just moving around blindly bumping into walls while some are just sitting stoned while the teams cheered on the “tortoises” to play soccer. We didn’t win in the end through the process of elimination where one team gets some small prizes, but I guess the new friendships made and the experience gained was more invaluable than anything.

Term will actually start next week, there are much to get around and registering with the engineering department next week. It will be busy!

School starts in a few weeks time and it’s time for my flight to Cambridge before term starts. My flight was seduled on the late night of the 27th, a Sunday at the Changi Terminal 3. After dinner within the airport with my family and a long farewell to friends, relatives and loved ones, I slowly made myself through the departure, which for Singaporeans, is rather fast and brisky, particular for the Passport scanning part- no need to wait in long queues for stamps and such, just scan, thumbprint and go.

There were no gate numbers printed on the board pass, so that needed little hunting on the screens to find yours upon entering the departure walk and duty free areas. The gate check was a little messy, especially those who were carrying laptops with them, I have 2 of them with me and they have to be individually scanned through the x-ray, to my dismay with lots of re-packing to do. My flight is on a A380 and I always particularly hate long haul flights, this 12 and a half hour one is no exception either.

Departure at Singapore Terminal 3

On the A380 to London!

The bus terminal

The journey to Cambridge
On the contrary, the flight on board the plane was quite smooth and slightly quieter than most planes I’ve flown before, it’s so much better than being on a 747 as well. The A380 does not have the typical drowning “airplane smell” which I hate. The food is great, can tell it’s prepared largely by Singapore chefs, not sure what food I will get if I were to fly from London to Singapore tough. Despite sleeping like 5 hours on the plane, man, was I still very tried after that flight. Surprisingly, I still managed to get that much sleep despite tossing and turning round much- the seat is just too small to be comfortable for a sound sleep, managed to catch the movies fast and furious 4 after takeoff and transformers the fallen on the flight before landing.

Back at Singapore before my flight at the SIA check-in, my parents did indicate that I may need some assistance from the airport in Heathrow. Considering that I was still recovering from a stiff ankle following a minor surgery from an injury. The SIA staff were rather helpful, they saw me out of the plane upon arrival and there was an Airport representative staff from SIA which walked me through the whole arrival hall and helped me at the baggage carousel (which weighed over like a helfy 20kg and was too heavy for my injury) glad there was help! Immigration was a breeze as well, with just a need to show my university letter and I am off to the arrival area with 2 hours to spare before my coach arriving timing.

Sat round the airport for an hour or so reading a book and got about chatting with a Hongkong family there before starting on a 15 minute underground walk with all my baggage from Heathrow T3 to the Central bus station. The bus arrived on time as expected and did not wait long before setting off, so it pays to be early or you can easily miss your bus. I did not sleep much on the bus, but did doze off sometime in the journey, but the country side views throughout some parts of the journey were rather nice. Along the highways, you can see nice rolling hills and large open fields. There are always cows and horses on those fields.

Contrary to what my dad always warned about highway truckers and driving in the UK, from my observation, the trucks on the motorway all drive slowly here (no speeding), not like what dad said, maybe he’s just paranoid for my safety. In fact, the highway here is almost like that in Singapore with the trailers. Most with speed limiters as well.

The National Express coach trip (service 787) is about 2 and a half hours from Heathrow, going in and out many airports, rail stations and towns along the way. Despite the rather loopy journey (which effectively almost doubled the traveling time), got to catch many interesting new scenes around town as well. My coach journey terminates at the Parker’s piece in Cambridge where I managed to flag a cab almost instantly to the college which is about 2km away. The cab fare was a 10 minute ride, costing 5.80 pounds. The next and final moment of my journey I saw myself standing right in front of the college flagpole. The stone path in front of the college are not exactly roller luggage friendly, but I am there!

The front of the college

The main building (porter’s lodge)

My accommodation block

The porter there brought me on a short introductory tour and gave me the college welcome pack as well as ran through the administrations required for the wolfson card, which is essentially the college contactless smart card. Got to meet many new faces, particularly my engineering buddies who were already on college few days before me. There are many Singaporeans and Malaysians studying in this college as well. Had lunch and dinner within the college grounds for the day which is really a great life saver having not to cook or prepare my meals, anyway I will see myself eating often in the college dining hall. I am just too lazy to cook! Oh yes, there’s free pizza form dominos for freshers as well!

It’s official!

My room, well always in a mess

Time for an update!

There much to unpack and organize myself around. Will be up exploring much of the town in the days to come. It should not be too different from what I last recall of it. As you can see, my room is kind of quite a mess. Had not slept at all since lunch though I did had some coffee then and been up till like 10pm London time (which is about 5am Singapore time here) since yesterday. I should be hitting the bed soon and maybe prepare breakfast myself as I might be too lazy to rise early enough to catch breakfast in the dining hall tomorrow morning.

More to come!

This is the second part of my guide for applying to UK universities via UCAS for polytechnic students in Singapore, covering the remaining sections, employment, personal statement and reference.

5. Personal statement
Many will shriek in fright when first faced with a daunting task to write a personal statement, you should see a personal statement is your way of picturing yourself, the applicant, towards the university admissions staff. Yes though it can make or even break your application, the low down is that your personal statement is a powerful way for you to strike the lasting impression as well as stand out from monotonous grades, particularly in situations where universities have to choose between 2 academically evenly matched applicants.

What should I write?
Everybody is unique and everybody will definitely have much to say about themselves, talk about a hobby, a sport you enjoy doing, your Co-circular activities, a person you’ve helped or your community service work. The key things to mention here are anything you’ve NOT mentioned in any other part of your application, that is, do not mention what fantastic grades you have or what bombastic company you worked for, that will turn against you and whats more, that’s repetition and wasting valuable space in your statement which can be put to other good use.

It’s like telling a story, but not your life story!
Usually write in a first person perspective, using “I have done various activities”, rather than “Joe has done various activities, ranging…” it gives it a more personal touch and paints a better picture of you to those accessing your application and please do yourself a favor by not starting each paragraph with an “I”, be creative!

Those thinking of taking a year out or doing a deferment because of national service may want to justify why and what you intend to do and achieve during that year out. Also, be straight to the point and do not include hangers, ambiguity or areas open in your statement which requires interpretation. If you are applying for language majors and wish to show off your skills here, I say, leave it to the barrage of entry essays from your college after your application is submitted, remember we are here not to access the people accessing your application!

It’s not vacuum packed
I won’t recommend using point form to list details, such as awards or achievements. Though it can be more effectively displayed/listed in that manner, it will effectively take a whole single line off your statement, imagine wasting a single line to “Medisave award 2009″ or “NYAA award 2009″ where you can squeeze in 4 times more content if it were a full line, stick to paragraphs and list multiple instances separated by commas, grammatically you are not wrong.

No nos
Big no nos will include grammar and spelling errors as that reflects very badly not only on you as an applicant but also on the possible quality of work you can produce as a student. Another big no will include lifting or copying someone else’s personal statement, plagiarism is dealt with very seriously in UCAS and they have automated systems to check statements for plagiarism.

Seek opinions and always edit edit edit!
You are strongly recommended to compose and edit your personal statement on a word processor, say Word, or in Open office, which thankfully almost completely eliminate spelling errors (but laughingly at the expense of inviting you to spew more words in). When done, print it out for your teacher or parents to go through, it helps getting views from another party- Is it too boring? Is it trying to hard? This helps you tone out the writing on top of correcting your language as well.

Characters, paragraphs and lines!
Thereafter, confirm your character count using the review function on your word processor, copy and paste your essay into your UCAS application, do note that the line count in Microsoft Word is not the same as that in UCAS due to text formatting differences, so it will take quite a bit of snipping here and there to get your essay in. And yes, do need not have a line break after each paragraph as that effectively steals a precious line off your line count, the next paragraph can always go on cleanly on the next line.

Sample guideline for reference
A general guideline (similar to what I’ve submitted, with explanations in italics):

(This is the header of the statement, serves more or less to address the applicant and acknowledge that you are a valid student)

(An excerpt from my referee in point form for illustration, generally what we are looking here are personal qualities seen from another party, also skills which seem out of place and can’t otherwise “brag” about in your personal statement. These of course have to be genuine and true to paint an accurate picture of you as a candidate)

(End off like how any letter will end, with the details of the referee here)

And that’s it, a reference is totally not that difficult, it is infact easier and shorter than your personal statement.

Ok, that is all I have for this guide for UCAS based on my own successful application. If you have any additional questions, do feel free to leave it in the comments below or reach me via the website contact form. Cheers and all the best in your studies!

Return home

After my successful application as an international student from Singapore via UCAS (guess many found their way here from a dated blog post), I’ve been receiving quite a number of questions about the application process, particular for non-mainstream poly students like myself. I have written a small guide condensed from the replies I’ve given out, going section by section as from the 2008 application year.

This guide follows closely the 6 structured sections applicants will have to go through in their UCAS application and can be completed in any order. Moreover, though this article may cater more to Polytechnic students, it is rather general in nature and can apply to anyone applying via the mainstream route on UCAS. Read on more with my more of my pointers, tips and hints highlighted from my application.

The first section, your personal details:

2. Choices
This section is where you specify all your desired major as offered by your chosen college. You first have to specify the university and additional detail fields will follow:

Campus: Specified if your university has colleges to chose from (e.g in Oxbridge)
Live at home?: Usually it is “No”, this only indicates that you intend to use college dormitory facilities, there is no harm indicating “No” here first unless you already intend to live in a home or rented property already residing in UK, but you can always make arrangements with your college when the term starts.
Start date: October 2009 is the usual start date for normal point of entry
Deferred entry?: No, unless if you intend to take a year out and start your term the following year. This is in particular for guys in Singapore still serving NS and are applying one year before their intended year of study.
Further details: Usually can be left blank, otherwise, do specify other needs such a visual impairment, mature student or otherwise areas of need not covered in the disabled needs section.
Point of entry: This is only for if you are about to do the second or final year of the same course but at another university. Usually you should leave this blank, otherwise, do specify 1, 2, or 3 in the box which would denote the year you are starting the course.

In my application, I used 3 choices in total, but I believe you are only offered 5 choices, so do make the best of what you’ve offered. UCAS will charge an additional application fee if you intend to have more than 5 choices. But remember it’s the quality and not quantity which matters!

Next I will go on an cover the other remaining parts of the UCAS application process, such as your dreaded personal statement and reference.

Next page (page 2)

There was something rather interesting in the mail today. A nice thick white plain envelope addressed from the University of Cambridge identified via a faint stamp on the corner, nothing fancy, but an avenue of anxiety- The time is right at it is this period of the year where admission results are announced, this will definitely be the result of my university application.

I remembered receiving admission rejection letters from NUS and NTU before- they are simply small and skimpily thin “cannot be bothered” letters of pain and sorrow. So this “package” packed quite some punch, so there must be some weight to it, not to mention a calming reassurance of something not just “a rejection letter”.

So I sat down with the envelope in front of me and opened it. To my amazement, right at the top of the pile was a letter stating that I’ve been offered unconditionally to do my undergraduate course and masters in Cambridge University. Whoa! Packed inside are several questionnaire papers and college information leaflets for freshmen as well as internal scholarship application forms.

There is a financial condition however, which I have to provide acceptable evidence that my scholarship provider is indeed genuine and able to meet all the fees of the course. So I guess I will have to refer that to them then.

I cannot believe I’ve got into Cambridge purely on my own ability! I’ve made it! Cambridge 2009 here I come!

Got an email from UCL (University College London) telling me that I’ve been awarded an unconditional offer to do my BA and Masters of Engineering next year. Strangely with my application last September, I didn’t expect an offer to come too soon, as I thought it will only be announced next year around January. They were however, the first the acknowledged my application, followed by Cambridge then Imperial. It turns out that they are the first this time again with the offer!

Things are getting exciting, lets see what Cambridge and Imperial for me. And oh yea, been busy writing a new article for the site the past week, it will be ready soon, I apologize for my long absence from blogging over the last week as well.

Street news, runners rejoice! The official Nike village has opened at Wisma, taking the place of Top Shop.

Sitex is on now in Singapore, but based from what I heard, it’s not too appealing either.

I remembered arriving at RJC in the afternoon for my Cambridge interview, wanting to get there early with time to relax, I took a bus and alighted somewhere around upper Thomson where I took a very short cab trip to RJC itself. The cab driver actually told me that the venue is a short walk away, but he drove me there anyway, so the fare was essentially just surcharge haha.

When it was my turn, the interviewer will actually come out and invite you in, very warm and welcoming indeed which lightened the anxiety- well, a little. In the interview, he told me that I came from a rather interesting background, I was the first person who came from a non-Junior College background which was rather refreshing. So he asked me about what we do in Polytechnic, what we do learn (as polytechnics are essentially considered an institute of higher learning), etc then he asked me about the awards I’ve got.

Then he went on asking me about the Motion simulator which I built in Polytechnic for my final year project, which I wrote about in my personal statement. So I explained it to him how it works together with a sketch and details of it’s axis of motion and the various components which made it tick. So that was pretty much the icebreaker which kept me rather comfortable in the dimly incandescent lamp lit room.

Then next was the question part. As I understand that many students will still be taking the interviews and tests over the coming months, and in the interest of the Director of Studies (DoS) and other candidates, I will not post the exact questions my interviewer asked, only a general picture of what to expect.

There were a series of maths questions which he wrote on a piece of paper, each with increasing difficulty. The first ones were done without a hitch. If you did C3 or C4 maths, let be Mathematics and Further Mathematics at ‘A’ levels in Singapore, you should not have much of a problem getting through the question at all. I had some problems with the last one, but the last question is of course usually planned the hardest where the interviewer will come in and help you out with it. So he kinda nudged me in the right direction at times when I strayed off and eventually we got the solution!

Then came the very general engineering questions where anything under the sun could be asked. I like this part of the interview as it actually allows you to expand on the question from almost any aspects and build on it using the theories you know (or at some points, maybe an educated guess will help!). Then it can just lead to anything else which in-turn leads to you explaining another question/theory. For this part, I can say that you can’t “learn” the thought process, it’s more like testing your raw unlearnt knowledge and your ability to apply what you know in very strange unfamiliar situations. Thereafter, we also talked about my Defence science scholarship on how it will sponsor my whole academia in Cambridge.

My interviewer really made me feel that Cambridge is the right place for me. I was really enjoying myself in the interview and just before you know it, opps we are out of time.

My interviewer opened up for questions. As defence Research & Development will be part of my chosen carrier path, I asked him about the undergrad research opportunities we can take as a student, as well as the Engineering competitions in Cambridge we can participate and contribute to the the university as a student, like the Eco-challenge Solar Race held in Australia next year (which Cambridge will be participating in as well) and the Formula Student, very interesting indeed.

Due to time constraints, I only asked these 2, though I also wanted to ask find out more of the Stimulus project/program I read on the internet which allows undergrads to help out students in need and promote the interest in learning, just like what I did teaching students in Medan Indonesia before.

Initially being the only Polytechnic student in the Singapore race for Cambridge, I thought that I will lose out to the bulk of the ‘A’ level students who are applying for their places in Cambridge as well- considering that they are all still very fresh in their ‘A’ level syllabus with the examinations currently on. But I guess the test the interview will give will tax you far than anything you can learn (or regurgitate) from the textbook, which I feel is very fair indeed.

With the anticipated interviews finally over. It is more than 1 hour after my interview and I am still all jumpy from the adrenaline, maybe I should expend that all out with a 10km run later, at the same time test out my new Nike Luna Racers!