Archive for February, 2009

Michael W. Smith – Missing Person

Friday, February 27th, 2009

Been going through my WOW collection on the bus to Uni and the lyrics of this song really struck out at me. I certainly feel it speaks a great deal about how I’ve been feeling about my life.


Another question in me
One for the powers that be
It’s got me thrown
And so I put on my poker face
And try to figure it out
This undeniable doubt
A common occurrence
Feeling so out of place
Guarded and cynical now
Can’t help but wondering how
My heart evolved into
A rock beating inside of me
So I reel such a stoic ordeal
Where’s that feeling that I don’t feel

There was a boy who had the faith to move a mountain
And like a child he would believe without a reason
Without a trace he disappeared into the void and
I’ve been searching for that missing person

Under a lavender moon
So many thoughts consume me
Who dimmed that glowing light
That once burned so bright in me
Is this a radical phase
A problematical age
That keeps me running
From all that I used to be
Is there a way to return?
Is there a way to unlearn?
That carnal knowledge
That’s chipping away at my soul
Have I been gone too long
Will I ever find my way home

There was a boy who had the faith to move a mountain
And like a child he would believe without a reason
Without a trace he disappeared into the void and
I’ve been searching for that missing person

He used to want to try to walk the straight and narrow
He had a fire and he could feel it in the marrow
It’s been a long time and I haven’t seen him lately, though
I’ve been searching for that missing person

Induction week nearly over

Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

So far in induction week, we’ve sat through literally HOURS of people telling us about specialisations and first year courses. And finally today, we got to set our timetables.

Before I get into that, here’s the distribution of AP students in each specialisation:

Biomedical Engineering: 2
Civil Engineering: 7
Chemical and Materials Engineering: 5
Computer Systems Engineering: 8
Electrical and Electronic Engineering: 2
Engineering Science: 7
Mechanical Engineering: 4
Mechatronics Engineering: 8
Software Engineering: 4

No prizes for guessing which specialisation I chose :P

We filled in our timetables today – 10 papers/year, 2 papers in two separate summer school periods, and 800 hours of work experience, split into “general work” and “sub-professional”.

The good news is that by entering straight into the second year, some of the first year courses can be skipped, leaving me with 3 extra papers, which can be filled with “anything”. Naturally, when the time comes, I’m going to pick Japanese – probably JAPANESE 132, 231 and 232. I might get lucky and be able to enter straight into second year (2xx) if I know enough :D

Tomorrow and Friday is a Matlab crash course, crammed into 4 lectures and 4 labs. Am I looking forward to this? I’m actually not too sure :S

If you actually read this blog, you’re a good friend :)

~Echo

Scholarship results~!

Thursday, February 19th, 2009

I kinda expected at least one outstanding, but you get what you get. Probably not going for reassessment because I’ll need three outstandings to get the $5000/year for 3 years anyway.

So I get $2000/year for 3 years, as long as I maintain a B+ grade average. That should be easy enough.

Haven’t got papers back in the mail yet.

Hope everyone else gets good results!

俺、教えられないな~

Tuesday, February 17th, 2009

Vintage car/rails fair

Saturday, February 7th, 2009

Yesterday we drove ~45 minutes to southwest Auckland to see some fair with old stuff. It was pretty uneventful.

There were wooden car models, plates, etc. that you could buy. Naturally, we didn’t buy any. Some of the old cars were pretty interesting, but I’m not much of a car fan. There were also old train heads. In another field there were old farming machinery. There was one that was used for compressing hay (straw?) into bales. It took … 5 minutes? To compress the straw for one bale of hay! Honestly, it would’ve been quicker to just get a wooden box and squash the hay in that way.

There were ripoff rides as well. I spotted a “scissor lift ride” for $2. All you do is get in a scissor lift and they take you up. There was also a helicopter ride for $40.

The funniest thing was when we got on a train. We thought it’d only go round a short distance. We all got on, thinking it was going to be cheap… then my uncle came and told us it cost $14 per person. And then after we hurried off, I read the description properly and found out it was an hour long trip to another station somewhere far off.

There were also street organs, preprogrammed with various tunes. Those were pretty cool.

All in all, a very good day wasted.

If you were wondering, we’d lent out our camera to someone else. So no photos :/

Cubing record: 25.83

Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009

12: 22.34
11: 27.71
10: 27.95
9: 25.17
8: 24.68
7: 28.67
6: 25.95
5: 23.77
4: 24.49
3: 29.80
2: 25.76
1: 24.19

Average (10 of 12): 25.83

嵐 – 僕が僕のすべて

Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009

ありのままで もう一回歩き出そう 悲しみ越えて
誰のでもない 名もなき道を
明日もそう 夢に 向かって 悩んで 笑って 笑って
今ここにいる 僕が僕のすべて それだけは変わらない

僕は僕の 人生も運命も 抱きしめてゆこう
ひとつひとつが 輝くために
春夏秋冬を 走って 走って 走って 走って
確かな事は 僕が創った道 それだけは変わらない

Once more come out and traverse the sadness
No matter who you are, overcome the nameless road
Tomorrow, bearing laughter and worries, go towards the dream
For I’m all that I am, right here right now,
This part of me will never change.

Whether in my life or facing my fate I will go,
Holding tight onto every single thing, so that I may shine
I will run, run through all the seasons
Because, on the road of life I create, the sure thing is,
This part of me will never change.

Cubing record: 25.91

Monday, February 2nd, 2009

12: 00:24.82
11: 00:22.57
10: 00:26.20
9: 00:28.26
8: 00:27.21
7: 00:24.12
6: 00:24.60
5: 00:29.14
4: 00:26.19
3: 00:29.15
2: 00:24.86
1: 00:23.70

Average (10 of 12):  25.91