It’s the dreaded mid-term season at university now, where life is rife with project and essay deadlines. Still, there’s no reason why one shouldn’t experience comforting moments now and then. It is during such trying times of a student’s life when one better appreciates the little joys of life – like the friends who stay back to study with you and yummy treats to get you going.
Tip #1:
Share your woes with a loved one.
Takeaway tuna salad from Raffles Place – credits to my loving study buddy.
Hi everyone! I am a first-year student at the School of Art, Design & Media (ADM). Still “super fresh”, I’ll be sharing my ADM experiences here.
I know there are quite a number of you wondering what we “ADMers” do in school. Well, for one of our assignments in Foundation Drawing, we were asked to draw what we eat for a week. So here are some of my sketches… No Instagram! Ha! Because Instagram is too mainstream…
Kueh Pie Tee
So here I am, sitting in front of my laptop stressing out over my Media Law Term Paper… how different life was just a few months back! Then, I was carefree and happily exploring Germany during my student exchange programme at Stuttgart Media University…
I found my soulmate in the form of NTU’s Renaissance Engineering Programme, or REP. It is a holistic programme, one of the few of its kind that brings together the best of both worlds: science and humanities. Fresh out of junior college, I’d fallen hopelessly in love with a course that seemed challenging, exciting and intriguing at the same time. So, I decided to swear fidelity to my one true love and looked forward to an amazing undergraduate learning experience.
So how is married life with REP treating me? I get this a lot, for people in our world are always sceptical of relationships with strangers we don’t know much about. Joining REP was definitely a venture into the unknown, as I am a part of the pioneer batch of students now in our second year. So have I found the elusive marital bliss yet? Or have I succumbed to a premature seven-year itch?
As a true-blue pioneer, I can tell you REP gets frustrating sometimes. Most recently, that happened when I sat down with crayons and markers (for the first time in the past decade) to draw – yes, draw – for a prescribed elective at the School of Art, Design & Media. And it happened when I met my old friend, Electronics and Information Engineering, again, only it had grown more difficult and impossible (why, Fourier, why?). And it happens every second week when I have multiple assignments due, or continuous assessments that clash, or a car (for a build-and-test project) that adamantly refuses to run… and the list goes on.
Then why am I still here?
When the exams were over in May, I shouted “Hurray!”
And scoffed at friends who almost immediately embarked on their professional attachment and voluntary internship programmes.
Admittedly, I was one of those slackers who laughed at the idea of being so kiasu as to go for an internship, even if it wasn’t a part of my academic requirements. It was fun at first – the weeks of travelling, endless binging eating and shopping, but before I knew it, it was July and I found myself surprisingly longing for something more… challenging.
Which was why I spent the last five weeks of my holidays working as an intern for 8 Days. Fans of local magazines would know this weekly entertainment and lifestyle magazine under MediaCorp Publishing for its tongue-in-cheek features and juicy news about celebrities. It has a Singaporean slant with the occasional lah and shiok being used in articles.
It was quite easy to adapt to the office environment in Caldecott. For one, it bore an uncanny resemblance to our very own NTU campus, being sequestered in a tranquil spot on top of a hill with a canteen boasting affordable fare the likes of Canteen A and B. There’s your usual beverage stall, fruit stall, and Malay, Indian and Chinese food stalls with zi char dishes. Plus, yong tau foo, fish soup and vegetarian options for the health nuts.
Daily breakfast indulgence:
Just two dollars for this light spongy piece of pandan cake plus a large
comforting cup of hot Milo – both from the Caldecott canteen.
Shopping for frozen foods hardly comes out tops in an undergrad’s daily list of priorities. After all, there is always someone else to do the groceries and prepare the sumptuous dinners we enjoy after a tough day at school (right?). Well, getting our hands cold and frosty was the order of the day for my fun-loving friends and me the past month! We turned from students to frozen food gurus faster than you can microwave popcorn. And our motivation? Ta-da!
