A letter from Emma

So it's finally here, the letter arrived at home a couple of days ago but I didn't let my parents open it. Instead they came to KTJ with it (and alot of tasty food and cookies :D ).

A very inconspicuous looking brown envelope.

Slitting the brown envelope with surgical precision

Didn't know how to go about it, I just stared at the brown package for like 5 minutes. Adam came by, and I decided to just go ahead and open it. I suppose the email sort of took away the suspense, but either way, I probably wouldn't have survived the two week long wait had they not emailed me.

Criminal deceleration form, fee status form, offer letter! :D
Well, I'm glad I can finally hold it in hard copy and like sniff it( yes I did. :/ ) and know that Cambridge hadn't made a mistake and emailed me wrong information or something like that. Lovely.

Sorry I keep going on about Cambridge, I promise the next post won't be.

**

Funny how I can sit down for hours and hours if I’m doing Photoshop design work or designing a new blog layout and just be 110% focused(to the point my eyes start smarting), but when I study things directly pertinent to my school syllabus, I can barely sit my butt down for 5 minutes. It’s different though if I find an interesting topic on Wikipedia. Things like that often displace my work when I plan to study. Spent like 3 hours straight putting this together:

Anyhow, I hope you like the new blog design; much less vomit-inducing if you ask me. Do you like it?

Is it fair to say things are going well for me?

Here are some reasons that some people would use as proof that I am not entitled to feel sad or unhappy, at least for the time being:

1. I got an offer from Cambridge to do Medicine (:D :D :D AHHHH)
2. I'm not sitting for S1 or S2 this month
3. After my D1 and C4 papers, I will have no more Maths class for the rest of my 'A' Levels. (10 double free periods for me to waste away, whee!)
4. I'm blogging while others are slogging away preparing for Statistics exams
5. I don't really have to worry about Medical interviews so much anymore
6. I got an offer from Cambridge to do MEDICINE! (XD OH MY GAWD :D)

(Did I mention Cambridge twice? Sorry, my brain still gets excited about it.)

In fact, those might be reasons for some people to ha- intensely dislike me. Well of course, those things are really great and they definitely make me very happy. Despite all this, there are some things that exist on the other end of the spectrum; things which disappoint and frustrate. 

Things like my band falling apart just days before the Woodstock concert; things like realising that I've lost some of my ability in drumming; things like difficult social problems affecting my friends; things like an apathetic friend who just doesn't want to save himself; things like a disrespectful encounter; things like my computer showing the blue screen of death! D:


Those things do get me down sometimes but when I really think about it, I actually have no excuse at all to be an angry/sad panda. 

Why? Because everyday for the past week, something has come along and made my day. Whether major or miniscule, there was definitely something.
Where to begin; the offer from Cambridge? I'm not sure if that so much made my day as it made my year or young adulthood. But I suppose it could suffice to say it made my day.
Then there was the C4 trial which I had not prepared for but scored 71/75 having not seen a leaf of C4 papers since the end of last term. 
Or the day I looked up at the cloudy (often unforgiving) sky and decided I was going to brave doing my laundry-and what do you know; all of them dry in time for me to fold them at night. That's something that never usually happens.
The other day I was even given cupcakes! 

C for Christopher and for Cambridge. How awesome is that. Few things in life are more happy-making than cupcakes. 
Happy-making too was the lovely response to my first blog post to restart this blog!
Today, a few things made my day.

We found a "No Parking" sign outside and decided to bring it into Physics class. "No Physics!" Mr. Muthu really humours us too much...

• A hilarious, hilarious Physics class
• Realising that tomorrow is a public holiday AND I have no exams on it!
• That I printed Mr. Lai's application notes and stapled them into a beautiful booklet so succesfully!

There were alot of other good things that made my days the past couple of days, but I can't remember. Perhaps it's the refreshed perspective or perhaps it's just a good week for me, but I sure feel like happy things are popping up more frequently for me. Before I forget; if you are taking S1 or S2, all the best to you! :)

What has made your days the past few days? Comment below! 
(Yessss... audience participation ;) )

Cambridge: They made me an offer I cannot refuse.

I've decided to start blogging from 2011 onwards, in an effort to document my life in this time of rapid change and progression. I will, in all likelihood, be facing a lot of interesting new challenges and excitement as I brave the overseas for tertiary education. Perhaps blogging for the public would also encourage me to do more exciting and fulfilling things for it's sake.
(I hope you get the "The Godfather" reference in the title.)

**

All 10 of us Cambridge applicants had been waiting anxiously for the time to come; when we hear from Cambridge. Like all the others, I generally avoided thinking about it too much. Doing so could really make one a mad insomniac.
Term started on January 5th, 2011, the same day that Cambridge officially posted the outcome, but nobody would know until they either email us or we receive the postal. It wasn't long after that some replies came, starting off with rejection, rejection, rejection. Disheartening though it may have been, all of us remaining hung on to that little hope that maybe we may have it different.
And then came an email one evening after dinner. All it said was, "(blank) Regards, Lesley" and attached was a document called "sng.pdf." Lesley Shaw is the admissions tutor at Emmanuel college. So in all likelihood, the document that I had just gotten was a reply letter. Immediately, my heart began to race. The answer to conclude all the effort, hope and waiting was finally here. I called out to some of the Nadzi upper sixers who were around that I had just got a reply! They came rushing but I decided that I needed to open it on my own so I made them leave again.
After what seemed like forever waiting for the document to load, a grainy copy of a letter appeared before me and I quickly scanned it for clues as to what would come next. I did as I always do in times like these, I made myself believe that the worst was to come. I made myself believe it was a rejection letter.

"Dear Christopher," it began. And in the most foreboding tone it said: "We have now considered your application..." *sigh* Still believing I was reading a rejection letter, I scrolled down haphazardly as my eyes caught sight of an "A*AA." I paused for a moment and then scrolled back up to the first sentence. And then read the next.
"I am pleased to be able to tell you that we have decided to offer you a place for October 2011,..."

Mind disconnected from eyes and speech, it took a while for me to register what had just happened. Not very proud of this but the first two words I yelled out after that were "holy" and then, no not our bovine friends, but another word for biological excrement. Jon, Win Sern and Saiful quickly came running.
Reading the letter the first time really generated some heavy emotions, and then some. Tears began to welt in my eyes as I hugged my friends. I could not really believe what I was seeing but as I began to fathom the magnitude of the letter I had just received, it really hit me like a huge rubber mallet. 
I had done it. Somehow, I had done it. Cramming the entire Bio AS during the summer holiday, working day and night on the personal statement and the tricky Cambridge Overseas Admission Form, studying the entire Immunology Online text book, reading up medical ethics for the interview, doing so many mock interviews and everything academically oriented years before this all had become justified and worth it, if not more than so. The odds are insane – 22 Medicine places for non-UK/non-EU applicants and of those usually around 3 are from Malaysia. I am truly, truly blessed and grateful to be one of the fortunate Malaysians to get in for Medicine.
If there are two people in this world that I succeed to make proud, it would be my Mum and Ms. Sarah. So those are the first two people I called. Saiful immediately posted it on Facebook before I could stop him and the news began spreading like wildfire, oh the wonders of Facebook. Well of course it's great for so many people to be congratulating you and all, but what really touched me most was the utter and genuine self-less kind of happiness many had for me. Someone said it was like she was Charlie's friend and Charlie had found the Golden ticket. :') 

"The kids who are going to find the Golden Tickets are the ones who can afford to buy bars of chocolate every day. Our Charlie gets only one a year. There isn't a hope." - Grandpa George

There's always hope.
All we can do now is hope and pray hard that Daniel and Patrick will get a Golden ticket too. There is a good chance they will be picked out of the pool, I am very hopeful. If four is the number to beat, then these two must get it!


Meanwhile, I thought I'd leave you with some pictures of this kid who just got an offer to study Medicine at Cambridge:

Heh. Well at least I make Mummy happy.

:)