This is probably the only time in my student life where I get to work on a year-long project with my friends. I would not trade the experience for anything else, and am really glad we finished the project without any major disputes!

Under the caring guidance of our supervisor Assoc Prof May Oo Lwin, my group mates and I worked on a health communication project in the area of food nutrition labelling.

Basically, we experimented with different types of food packaging and studied their effects on participants who seek nutrition information.

We designed and created our own food packaging, and used them as stimuli in the experiment. We were in charge of everything – from design to data collection to report writing. Although it wasn’t our first time designing an experiment, it was within a research area that was completely new to us. But our determination held strong, and we finished the project amidst crazy schedules, tight deadlines and last-minute “heart attacks”.

We were also fortunate enough to get our research paper accepted for an academic conference in Japan. Two of us got to travel to Kyoto for the presentation, thanks to a travel grant from WKWSCI. It was truly an honour to represent the school!

We journeyed to Osaka, where we visited the beautiful Osaka Castle. Then, we shopped till we dropped at the Shinsaibashi-suji shopping district and gorged on delicious okonomiyaki, a Japanese savoury pancake filled with various ingredients.

Kyoto, where the conference was held, proved to be another captivating city, with cherry blossoms at the Kyoto Garden Palace and the historic Kiyomizudera Temple, one of Kyoto’s many cultural heritage sites. However, the most memorable moment was stepping into a restaurant after a weary day of travelling, and being greeted by polite and endearing Japanese staff who served us fresh authentic Japanese food… oishi!

Beautiful flowers and even more beautiful memories

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I’m the sort of person who warms up to people very slowly. Slower than a slow cooker cooks porridge. So when I signed up for a five-week summer school programme in Tianjin last year, I felt a bit nervous… but as it turns out, I had a blast.

All my peers took the same two modules, so we ended up spending a lot of time together. We got to know each other really quickly – something I wasn’t used to before!

There was no shortage of things to do – we went sightseeing in Beijing and Pingyao, and also found time to explore the streets and corners of Tianjin on our own (my roomie’s sense of direction is as bad as mine… he kept straying from the group). It did not take us very long to find out where the cheap meals, good food and even cute vendors were (they chatted up some girls in our group!).

Goods are much more affordable there, and this meant we went on regular shopping sprees. The guys in our group did not “lose out” to the girls when it came to shopping! Luckily, space constraints in our luggage, together with our “protesting” wallets, kept us in check.

Boys’ night out shopping!

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