Juniors and Atonement

Hehheh I think we try too hard, as senior class people, to seem friendly and welcoming to our junior class. It was a bit odd today, when we were preparing those pacifiers as mass gifts to 1A01A. Well, it started out as a good idea, seemingly...it was just cute, pleasantly non-committal. But then when we stopped 1A01A outside their room to hand them the gifts, we kept em waiting there too long as we assembled our ranks, and in the end it was kinda uncomfortable. Seems to me like us big bros and sis-es are really fumbling around. And how contrived is this seinor junior bonding thing called the Angel-Mortal game anyway? I'd rather let it unfold as it will, with a bit of natural pushing from my part. Nothing formal, something low-intensity and diffused over more than one buddy. I've got plenty of attention to give to the juniors, anyway - why restrict it to one guy?

But not to say that Sam Jo isn't a nice chap...I think he's kind of like me last year at this time, except that he didn't have the environmental dislocation. And apparently he's a pro scriptwriter/actor/dramatist kind of guy, and I know these people can't be all bad =P Heh I got the feeling that I was imposing on him, really, with that pacifier and the short letter. When I was giving it to him, my overwhelming impression was that neither of us knew what to do with it.

Some funny moments with the juniors...somehow, I got dubbed Mr. Kiasu =P And we couldn't decide how to spell U-Glen's name (that's right, no Y, only one N and it has a hyphen). Hehheh, they seem so bubbly and young that it's almost painful to be with them. Their energy really drives home the point that you're a senior. While seniorhood in CHS was just a vague wonderment at how small and short the Sec1s were, seniorhood in JC is something that you can't ignore. The juniors haven't lost their shiny sec sch veneer yet, and they have the whole of J1 still ahead of them...and from the benefit of hindsight, I'm anticipating their year already, even though they still don't know what to expect. Hmph...It's easy to get along with them, but I can't seem to get rid of the impression that they're kids. It makes me feel old, almost. Or rather, it's like everyone else is getting younger, since I really don't feel that much older. Wizened, but not senile yet =P

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Rats, PE was quite demoralising today. Out of the four NAPFA items tested today, I passed the sit and reach. The SBJ I missed by 4cm, the 2.4 I missed by 20 sec, and I couldn't do one pull up at all. Bleh...part of me says that it's because I did exercises yesterday...dumb bells (interesting why they're called that) and a jog. But the thing is that I could do it before...I could have run faster, and I have done pull ups before. But now, despite increased training, I don't have enough strength left to enjoy the view from the top of the pull up bar. And now I can't even stretch properly...raising my arms uses too many sore muscles. Bleh, I guess the only solution is to do more.

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In other news, Atonement is a brilliant book! It's like a story about a writer, and how she changes her perception of the world as she grows from early teenage to septagenerian-ship. It has beautiful descriptions of the fluctuations in her moral stands, and her philosophy behind becoming a writer. It has the most startling descriptions and viewpoints on the creative process of a writer that I've ever seen.

The most ingenius thing was that the whole narrative novel is allegedly written by the main character. So it's not supposed to be Ian McEwan's work, but the autobiography of Briony Tallis. And Briony's creative development, as described by the narrative of her writing processes in the story, culminates at the end when it is revealed that the entire story was her creation. So at the beginning it seems like McEwan writing about Briony's writing, but in the end it dawns on you in a spectacular twist that it really is Briony writing about her own writing.

Okay. Not really Briony writing at all, but McEwan choosing to accredit his work to his own fictional creation. It's most intriguing, how these conceptual loops work out. Who's writing what? Who's really in control of the narrative? This books is kind of like a mobius strip in that way...you're taken on a whole narrative journey only to arrive back at the start but with a different point of view.

I think I'm definitely doing this book for Lit S. It's too intriguing to be put aside just like this. But now that I'm done with Atonement, I must return to reading Hist notes, which have been happily piling up. The opportunity to retreat into fiction has expired, and factual reading beckons. Ah well, but it was well worth it. And to think that I almost started to read Graham Greene's Brighton Rock first!

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The simple pleasures in life include eating crackers with a wedge of smoked cheddar with a good book in your hand, and munching away at fresh puffy bread and homemade corned beef on a free Sunday morning. There's a certain taste in an unhewn piece of cheese, and a certain fragrance in the roughly sliced fresh bread, the crust crunchy and the inside perfectly elastic, that hearkens to something more primal in me. It's in this simple fare that one detects the declaration of self-sufficiency - it may not be pretty to eat, but you can make it yourself, and that makes it delicious.

It's just like walking is a declaration of independence; the longer you can walk, the more self-sufficient you are. And you can go anywhere on your own too legs; the real key is to go where you want to go. And it's just like a fully topped up metro card in a foreign city is the ideal ticket to inner freedom.

pondered by phoenican @ 24.1.05