JYSim for jobless-yokel Sim

When we first started using friendster writing people testimonials was the in-thing to do. Testimonials - it represents how much the person you’re writing to is viewed as important in your life, and needless to say a good way to show off your English (or Manglish) skills. All of us remember the sheer joy and excitement when we log into our friendster accounts and saw the ‘new testimonial’ signage. We would approve them, whether the testi was good or bad, or rather, like Jun Yi’s, spent hald of the 1000 characters writing about other things which seem none related to the current topic he’s supposed to write about.

Not more than 3 years ago, our testimonials are lines - sentences and phrases composed from the deepest of another’s heart. We found joy in lines after lines of description and we never forget to re-post for the opposite party after we approved ours. And up to this point I can conceal no longer - during our happy fifth form year Jun Yi invented a new style of writing testimonials. For more information do visit Kee Wai and Sheng Yu’s blog. Both blog dated in the middle of 2005. It was in the lines that we found the testimonials to be meaningful and exciting.

However, one fine day, some pea-brain invented how you can post weird picture, animation and music on friendster’s blog. Not even does these ‘modern stuff’ disrupt our mood when you open a page (as in your speaker is on full blast and upon entering Jun Yi’s page all 6 animated testimonials blasted off different music), it became less…human. To me, those animated testimonials are like people who’re lazy to write (or couldn’t write a complete, mistake-free sentence) and just copied these animations from somewhere else. We know your sincerity, but can’t you at least add another ‘happy birthday (or whatever), wherever you are’ below the animation?

I’d like to say sorry for all those who sent me animated testimonials during my birthday, new year, christmas and chinese new year. You all had been dear and caring. But I can never approve them because to me testimonials are supposed to be written (handwritten would be the best), and not some 3 frongs singing an out-of-tune ‘happy birthday’ (no specific person named). I never rejected them, they’re all in my ‘to be approved’ list. To me, at least, a short, purely written ‘happy birthday, wish you had a good one’ is far more powerful than pasting 3 animations together.

I noticed friendster changed our memorable ‘testimonials’ to ‘comments’ recently. I missed ‘testimonials’, but I guess judging by other world citizen’s trend today changing to ‘comments’ is inevitable. How could testimonials be animations you saw on e-cards made by pixar?

I’m typing on my friend’s completely new computer now, and he’s getting angrier by the minute. Anyway, my last word before he shooed me off would be - at least try writing some sentences for one’s testimonials, not pictures or animations (except homemade ones).

With heavy reference to Mr. Chong Jieyang’s post: http://jieyang.blogs.friendster.com/yangs_blogs/2005/10/sad_reminiscenc.html
It was late one night during October 2005. I was online, having nothing to do after repeating Chapter 6 (whatever) of Biology. Jieyang was online, too, but he should sleep not later than 12. We were chatting as usual like we did during those unimaginable nights of solemnity and hopelessness. He told me he was crying, and I remember asking if Shi Lin finally decided to break up with him, and he said no. He sent me the exact link I pasted on top. Halfway through his post, I was tearing too. And all those thoughts I forced myself not to think of exploded inside my brain - what’s next after this? we will never see each other like we used to again, in a matter of days all of this will be lost all together, and in years to come we can only reminisce these tormenting yet memorable days before the SPM, we will no longer be able to (continue paragraph 5 of Jieyang’s essay).
And that’s when we started appreciating our remaining every day. That’s when ‘together’ matters. Libraries, McDonald’s, and my house became our gathering places. And even though we knew we almost always studied nothing during our times together, we never mind (I did mind then, but that’s no difference now). Having someone to talk to during those miserable days was much better than being able to cover 12 chapters of physics for me.
18 months after that, here we are, 3 (or 4) of us spanning 3 countries across the globe. Reading that same essay after 18 months, I find the sadness less puncturing now, but the poignant feeling of the hope of being together again speaking light-heartedly became stronger than ever. And as we become more and more busy with our future lives, we will be more and more appreciative and anticipative towards all the holiday seasons (summer especially). While we may not be as closely bonded to each other as before (as I noticed during our last reunion), there will always be that happy memories of 2005 to stitch us together. And I’d always appreciate all the special and meaningful times we spent together.
It was also late one night when I started remembering those exercise books we used in school and I made a promise to myself buying them and using them for my daily note-taking next year that I suddenly remember this essay stored deep in a corner of my memory and friendster’s database. A few days after that, I had it printed out and shared it with some of my classmates (when doing so you’d have to sit patiently beside them and explain to them that SPM is equivalent to Great Britain’s ‘O’ Levels and the American SAT or the Taiwanese High School Unified Examinations, and all those capitalized two-word phrases are actually Englished Chinese names, and that I had one too, and that’s Jun Yi etc). They were touched nonetheless. High school never ends it seems, at least in our hearts.
And as we pace forward to whatever is in store for us in the future, we should always preserve all those good virtues we had in high school - being innocent, the crude sense of humour, and working hard (as in not skipping lessons). And I know 9.5 years from now our 10-year reunion would be one everybody remembers and tears for the good old times. High school never ends.

The amount of international students in a certain country is a symbol of the nation’s success in education as well as a solid representation of how young world citizens love to live there. Hence, each nation with quite a number of international students will always have their version of International Student ID - a card or tag of any kind that seemingly will make your days in your host country more enjoyable, convenient and cost-saving.
I am a holder of the ISIC (International Student Identity Card) which I believe many of us have. I’m not suppose to include any commercial elements in my blogs but I just couldn’t resist boasting I’d always get a 20% discount on train rides, and I can get student-priced tickets for summer and winter (though summer is always considered a high season and even student priced tickets are a little more expensive than wither tickets). I get at least 10% discount on Apple products (though I haven’t really enjoyed this convenience yet), and I as a holder of the card, I get priority as well as discounts in  budget hotels and hostels over 66 countries (though I doubt I’d ever visit one quarter of them in my entire life).
You’re well-pampered and given lots of privileges as an international student. For me, the 20% discount offer is sufficient because for stingy people like me I’d always be happy for the rest of my day when I see my tickets are only NT$333 when others’ are NT$431. Nevertheless, what I like about my ISIC and Taiwan Youth Travel Pass is the freedom it gave - freedom of imagining what you possibly could do but probably couldn’t do without the knowledge beforehand. My Taiwan Youth Travel Pass entitles me to purchasing 10, 20 and 30 days train tickets at approx. RM 300 (maximum). With that, I can travel on some classes of trains to wherever I like. So, this is the plan - buy a 20-day ticket (RM200) and circle Taiwan Island - making stops wherever I like. And since all my 52 classmates are quite equally spread over the entire Taiwan Island, I can probably get free accommodation and perhaps also food. Even when I’m stranded on a town where I knew nobody, my Taiwan Youth Travel Pass can get me into several hostels with special rates. So, how does that sound? 20 days around Taiwan with probably RM500? Man, that’s almost my one month’s expenditure, minus all the entertainment expenses.
There are plenty of options for us international students - so much you sometimes became dazzled by all the choices to be made.
Anyway, back to the same old story, I always have the wild idea to do a round-the-world trip before I graduate. Imagine telling that to Mum and Dad, ‘What? round the world? I won’t be able to afford you even if I’m the CEO of Singapore Airlines.’
Perhaps not anymore now. I was dreamily surfing STA Travel’s (the agency responsible for ISIC) net and I bump into this page that offers you several round-the-world packages. The lowest starts from USD 2500 - maybe it’s still rather expensive, but if you were to book tickets individually from the airlines itself, it’ll definitely cost more than that. LA-Fiji-Sydney-Paris-LA - comprehensive round-the world trip you can join during an idle summer or gap year.
Nevertheless, back to planet earth now, it’s just a blessing being a student (and more being an international student) and we should definitely enjoy our short-lived schooling days when we still get the chance.

Sim Jun Yi was born with congenital ventricular septal defect. He was not gifted and not trained in any kind of sports under the sky when he was young. He isn’t gifted in any kind of ability as well, such as solving pages of mathematics questions in a fraction of a second or memorising all Malaysia Airlines offices numbers worldwide. But there’s one thing he liked to do but was never really good at, and that was singing, especially of that in choir.
I was trained under Mr. Chin during my Standard 2-3-4 years. I wasn’t a very good student back then. Nobody gave me a prize when I participated in any form of singing competition, nobody ever invited me to sing in the grand opera ‘Turandot’ by Giacomo Puccini when it staged its premiere in Penang. The in-thing during that period (for children) was to sing in falsetto. And I never thought my falsetto was good.
Anyway, I went into my first choir as a tenor during my 5th year in Union Institution. That was right after my first week of my fifth year, and that choir was massive. I can’t remember our sound quality back then but children choirs almost always produce the best voices in town. We went to a competiton that mid-year and banged 3rd (although during those years the 1st, 2nd and 3rd prizes are usually those of Penang Chinese Girls’ Primary School (who accepts boys), Union, and Kwang Hwa Primary). My affair with choir started slowly then.
In fact my participation in choir saved my position in class. Back then you can add marks to your exam results if whatever competition you participated in won. And during my 6th year I was saved from dropping into the second class by 10 marks contributed by the choir. And I was so glad I can’t be rid off by our evil class tutor Mdm. Zhao. During our 6th year we got 4th place, but we were always the same merry group as I would now remember - practice sessions every Tuesday afternoon 2 to 4pm.
Stepping into CLHS I had already made up my mind to participate in our school choir. My first day was of fond and shocking memories. It’s a norm not to have teachers to be present during practice sessions, and the attendants were really little. Sometimes less than 10 people turn up and we would ask those with mobile phones to emergency-call other members to come. Sometimes the teacher came in, and we would realize that we forgot to photocopy our songs today, and he once stormed out of the room with us totally dumbfounded. In short, our CLHS choir was never on par with that of other schools. Nevertheless being a lifelong member I can certainly state they’re improving slowly but gradually as years go by.
My CLHS Choir added many fond and saddening memories to my high school life. We participated in events (and were never appreciated, due to our below-expectation quality), we were together all the time, we shared the poor fragile piano, and we went to competitions together (though usually as the losing team). However, due to political interference I was not even a high committee even though I spent all my 5 years in choir. I still remember the day I went home tearing to find Dad because I was only named a minute director in the club. Nevertheless, the heart of a young, innocent boy back then was easily recomposed and soon I was back, though not completely indulged.
A lapse of 1 year followed after that. I did not sing in any choir after I graduate from high school. I went to Italy, I traveled half the globe with KLM - the reliably cramped airline, and I spent idle times staying at home - and falling in love with my house and its shades of white and coffee-brown. I read a wide collection of books, and tried my fingers in piano again, though never truly successful as before, but I never sang. And I never missed singing.
Fast forward to September 06 I was the youngest freshman in perhaps whole of Taiwan - idle and so infatuated in studying I had no thoughts of any co-curricular activities my university education might offer me. I was empty - my days consisting of long hours in the classrooms, and later longer hours in the library or gross anatomy classroom (though I’m not doing any anatomy until I’m in Y3), and a quick shower in the bathroom and later sleeping in my dorm. I was unusual compared to other students, who deliberately participated in 5 clubs and councils and find himself running for one after the other - time completely dominated by (occasionally stupid) activities and (time-consuming) meetings.
I was dragged into our U’s choir by my friend who later took a gap semester out of the choir himself. Remembering my first practice things were so primitive compared to what we had in CLHS. We have to stand on the lecture stage in a common classroom while the piano - a refurbished Kawai, faces the wall, and the poor pianist has to always turn to his back to see if the teacher is on-tempo with his music. We sang hymns and Christian songs mostly at first, which I would later find out is useful for training harmonics. I skipped some practice sessions myself, sometimes, and find myself in complete confusion when they choose to sing the song in Taiwanese Hokkien. Nevertheless, my seniors were always good to me in choir (perhaps due to the low ‘reproduction rate’ of new members). We had a humorous teacher and we had perhaps most beautiful girls in choir.
This semester things began to sparkle as we prepare to participate in the Nationwide Music Festival. Every week I would anticipate our practice sessions as my weekends are usually dull, and I would get that ‘flying’ feeling minus the drugs during and after I sang. I loved attending practice sessions, though I lost my book once and I was always late because I wanted to savour the pancakes sold by a breakfast bar opposite of the school for breakfast.
Our choir was small, even if measured by the amount of people the band or orchestra have. But our competition remarks this year states that we’re a well-balanced and expressive group. I guess that’s how we’re special compared to others (though our score are still 1 to 3 marks behind other matured choirs).
And now as we all wait for our conductor-cum-teacher to come back from his trip to another part of Taiwan, I wait in anticipation of another practice session-cum-celebration of our success for this year’s competition. I guess choir is just a part of my life after all, and I would really like to make a vow never to leave our choir in the next 5 years, but I’d like to first see how Anatomy in Y3 would be before being punished by the God of Choirs for not fulfilling my vow.