25 Years

Pretty special 25th birthday this year. Not in terms of celebrations (like my 21st birthday), but in terms of significance.

When I was planning my timetable for my final semester in NUS, I realised that my final paper would be on my birthday, 28 November. I initially thought that it was sucky to have a paper on my birthday (the prospect of it still sucks). However, given that it is my last paper in a formal education setting, I think it’s pretty apt.

The semester was pretty tiring. I would have thought that my Year 5 Sem 1 would be one that would be relatively a breeze – after all, I am not taking Honours for my Economics degree, and I’m only taking two Accountancy modules. Turned out that it was still a busy semester, with projects for every module (and large projects for the level 4000 Accountancy mods) that suck up a lot of time and energy and effort. It was nice meeting new people and working with them, but by the time week 13 went by, I was surprised that I was able to weather through the multiple overlapping deadlines.

Still, throughout my 13 weeks in school (plus the two weeks for recess and studying), I was always aware that studying life is better than working life, and really am thankful for the extra semester to spend in school, to savour the last bits of life as a full-time student before plunging head-on into the workforce early next year.

Given my short break – my five weeks of break start now – I didn’t want to wait to hear “pens down” (nor did I want to wait for the invigilators to collect all the papers), so off I went after finishing (and checking) the EL1101E paper. Quite cool to be taking a final paper with so many first-year students, including my youngest sister who was seated right in front of me.

What’s next? Turns out my studying life won’t really come to a standstill yet, as I will attend (what is probably) the final Pre-Admission Course at ISCA over the next two weekends. And of course… things like completing the Standard Chartered Marathon – the full distance this year.

I do have trips to look forward to, before going into work. A family trip to Japan (!) and then a solo grad trip (somewhat) to Hong Kong in the new year.

Maybe I’ll update this blog with some of those adventures 🙂

End of Year 4

Four days ago, I ended my last exam as a fourth-year student in NUS. I’m now left with one semester to go before I complete my NUS journey (if all goes well on results day at least).

It’s been not a very good semester, the past 13 weeks. I would like to think that the semester could have been better, but it’s quite difficult to be so optimistic because of the interim results received during the semester.

Content-wise, there were modules I enjoyed (but that does not necessarily mean that I would score well) – particularly ACC3606 (Advanced Accounting) where I did my first few journal entries since Year 2 Sem 2 (2 years ago!). I thought consolidation was interesting, but final exam was so challenging that I felt immediately disappointed in my liking for the module.

I also enjoyed ACC3613 – Advanced Audit, more of the general topics that we covered, which include government audit. But just like the basic audit module, it’s very theoretical and very difficult to really ‘apply’ in real life.

Accounting theory – ACC3615 – is not too bad in terms of capturing my interest. My third module under Prof Stephen Lynn (something I was quite amused with). Enjoyable lessons but content-heavy, with essays and argumentative things.

Didn’t enjoy risk management however, mostly due to the theoretical nature of the module and I felt the instructors were not as effective as the instructors for the other modules I’ve had in NUS, which is a pity.

I did take two non-accounting modules this semester… MKT4417 Consumer Decision Making which is a marketing module which is tough for me as a non-accounting student, but thankful to my friends for helping me catch up in the project. And my only econs module this sem – EC3361 Labour Economics – was actually quite interesting and I pretty much enjoyed the module. Could have done better for finals though, because it did not help to have ACC3606 and EC3361 finals on the same day, just a hour apart. (BAD BAD IDEA)

And that’s pretty much it for the semester. Met many juniors this semester ‘cos I’m doing the modules mostly with year 3s, and made some new friends. It’s great in that sense, but in the academic sense it generally had a disappointing undertone. Sigh. Hope results day will be okay…

Next monday, summer holiday officially starts, which also means my internship begins. Internship at MOH Holdings as an internal audit intern is something really interesting and I hope it gives me an idea as to what internal auditing entails before I enter the working world full-time (and got less ‘risk-free’ opportunities to try try).

 

Penultimate Semester

Tomorrow will be the last semester in university for most of my friends. For me, it will be (hopefully) my second last semester in NUS. Even the ‘extended’ stay in NUS afforded to me as a double degree student is coming to an end… Hahaha.

In many ways the coming semester is crucial for me. I will be taking 5 of my remaining 7 modules required for my Accountancy degree, so how I fare for these five mods will really determine my final CAP for my 4.5 years in NUS. And of course, these are accounting/business modules, which may (or may not) be useful in the future.

Finally taking ‘Basket D’ for the accounting modules – that includes ACC3606 Advanced Accounting, ACC3612 Risk, ACC3613 Advanced Audit and ACC3615 Accounting Theory. I may be one year late but I guess it’s better late than never. I’m also taking a level 4000 marketing module as part of my thesis replacement (MKT4417 Consumer Behaviour) which I am quite nervous about because it’s marketing and I never took marketing in NUS before (I mapped it overseas).

On the econs side I may be taking EC3351 if I can get it in CORS Round 3 tomorrow. Because it fits my timetable and it would even out the workload for my last semester. (My interest in my econs degree is probably at an all-time low)

For my friends who are still reading this blog, have a great final sem ahead! 🙂

Year 4 Sem 1

Finally! It’s December and I can take a breather from school, and update this little blog. It’s been a while, sorry to anyone who still reads this and hopes for an update. (Here it is!)

Quite a lot has happened in November school-wise. I also celebrated my 23rd birthday with Chelsea and my family on 28th November, but perhaps I can leave that for another post. Today, I feel like writing some thoughts on the semester that just concluded at 11am (for me) at the end of my final paper for EC3312 Game Theory.

Another semester with six modules worth of study. Overloading is now the new norm for me, and I expect to complete another 12 modules in the next 2 semesters so that I can graduate in a year’s time. It’s not easy…

This semester I cut myself some slack by ‘dedicating’ my time to my second degree. I have quite a comfortable buffer for the FASS CAP because I am not taking double honours, so my CAP classification does not matter much. Which is good, as it allows me to take risky modules, hahaha!

To fulfill my Econ requirements, I took EC3102 Macroeconomics II, EC3303 Econometrics I, EC3312 Game Theory and NM1101E Communications and New Media. The first two are compulsory modules, and the last one is used to fulfill my FASS requirements. And the third one… well, it’s for “interest” which turned out to be suffering.

EC3102 was okay, and I guess I will perform absolutely average, which is disappointing because I think I could have done better for the finals but it just didn’t go smoothly. Thinking about it now makes me sigh a little. I don’t know why but I’ve always struggled with macroeconomics compared to microeconomics since JC. Oh well. (That’s where I need the buffer to come in)

EC3303 was quite manageable and in fact at points felt a little trivial. It’s puzzling because it didn’t feel like a level 3000 module. Very introductory, very easy to follow. I think it’s an anomaly this semester because looking at past-year papers, the seniors definitely had it worse. This semester, a Singaporean lecturer taught the module. My first Singaporean lecturer from Economics. Indeed a rare species.

NM1101E was an introductory level module, which is exciting because there are year 1s taking it! Except it appears that there are quite few Year 1s taking it… many were Year 2s and 3s taking it to fulfill their breadth requirements. Dewei convinced me to take this module with him during our internship at PwC. There’s a project for this module which is SUPER guided and spoon-fed… as a Year 4 business student, it feels a little too guided. Somewhat interesting module, enjoyed the many videos during lecture. That’s pretty much it. MCQs for mid-terms and finals, for what I thought would have been a crazy content-memorisation and writing module.

EC3312… Game Theory. Bane of my semester. During the course, the lecturer sent out an interim survey asking for opinions regarding the course. There was a question that asked:

What do you think about the difficulty of this course?

It’s so funny because I thought it was INCREDIBLY difficult. So I picked the first option: Very hard – most difficult module in NUS I’ve ever taken.

And that’s true – at least in FASS. Even EC2104, which I struggled with, was nowhere near this.

It’s not really a difficult module if you are attuned to logic combined with many mathematical notations and superscripts and stuff, along with differentiation and some integration. If you can visualise how games work extremely well (and we’re not talking about the basic prisoner’s dilemma) perhaps you stand a chance.

I thought I stood a chance, so I tried. Came out deflated. After the second lecture, the entire module is humble pie. I’m definitely not a logical thinker (at least in terms of game theory) and all the weird game types just knocked me off. My friends may know how much I dislike this module. I dreaded every lecture, and dreaded doing every tutorial. I’m so relieved every time I’m done with this module for the week.

I guess all the above would sound quite extreme to someone who may find game theory easy… it’s true I guess. Some things are more intuitive to me, and some things are not so intuitive. This is firmly in the latter camp.

Thankfully I have the CAP buffer. If not I would have regretted taking this module because I don’t think I will do well.

Do I regret taking it? Probably not… it was enlightening and eye-opening, at least on a personal level.

Lastly, I also completed my one-semester Field Service Project, which is a Business School honours requirement. It’s 8 MCs and meant to be completed within a year, but my teammates (comprising my sister, Chelsea and Isabella) and I, as well as our supervising prof, wanted to finish it quickly and so we did.

Our project was on developing a risk management mobile app. Interestingly I had not taken the module on risk management yet, but decided to give this a try with my group because it sounded interesting.

And it was! 14 or so weeks of fun and sometimes pain. There were many things I’ve learnt from this, but probably the biggest insight was how the business world is very different from the academic world that we live in, and how we have trapped ourselves in this academic bubble for so long. Can’t be helped as we’re basically in it since 7 years old! (With a 2-year break for guys)

So this project allowed us to place a perspective on the things we learn in school, and really, gave me a better idea of what I should be getting away from university. Hard skills? Perhaps, some of the modules may be relevant. (Note “some” and “may”) But I think the bigger takeaway is the soft skills – time management, interpersonal relationships, understanding others, and adaptability. Just that the soft skills we practise subconsciously are set in an academic setting.

That being said, there were enough ups and downs throughout the duration of the project. When we were done with our 281-page deliverable (app specification), it felt like a huge stone was lifted. It’s probably one of the biggest checkpoints that a business honours student needed to clear to graduate.

One year to go.

Next semester would be challenging for me. Planning it already thanks to Business Module Preference Exercise underway, but that’s a post for the future. Till then, there’s still December! A whole month of excitement.

And I will try to update this blog a bit more 😉

Recess Week

End of Recess Week. Half the semester is over by now!

Didn’t really have the time nor the motivation to update this blog. It really was meant for more exciting times, such as when I was in the United States for exchange, or when I had quite a vibrant student life as a student in Tembusu College. But now that those days have long past, and me just being a Year 4 student, there really isn’t much to write about here that would be interesting enough.

Recess week was once again, short. Quite glad to have spent some hours in the week with my friends, beit my girlfriend (hehehe!), accounting friends, or even the interns from ACRA. Also managed to meet my Tembusu friends when we sent Sherman off to the UK for his master’s degree (master’s degree at Year 4… wow amazeballs indeed).

Of course, the week was mired with haze as well. The haze situation reminds me of two years ago, in 2013, when the haze hit hazardous levels too. Hated those days, and now that these days are back, I’m very much unhappy. After the postponement of the Yellow Ribbon Run, many of my own runs had to be called off due to the haze. In the end, no choice, had to run on the treadmills (the hamster wheels) to maintain my stamina at a somewhat reasonable level. The great thing is that I think I am fully recovered from my right leg injury, and running doesn’t hurt anymore (for now)! Then the haze comes in and my stamina goes into the dumps. Hopefully the haze goes away in a while.

Four mid-terms this semester. One down, one on Wed, and two more next week. I’m totally regretting taking EC3312 Game Theory and Applications to Economics because it’s so darn hard. It’s meant for people who think in mathematical formulas and are superb at differentiation and logical thinking. I realise how lacking I am in this after going for week after week of tutorial and lecture and feeling somewhat lost. Sigh. We’ll see how I fare on Wednesday (expecting a knockout).

To my few friends who are still visiting this blog, I’m alive and well! Hahaha.

The Year 4 Feel

Taking a double degree programme forces you to be behind your cohort, sooner or later. Unless you decide to drop the second degree early, you’ll soon face a semester taking modules with your “juniors”. Intake year makes no sense anymore.

For accounting students, this is particularly painful thanks to the large number of projects involved in the higher-level modules. But that’s a problem for the next semester because I’m doing 100% FASS modules this semester!

This semester is exciting because I’m taking some (what I think) difficult economics modules, such as EC3102 (Macroeconomics II; difficult because I didn’t take EC2102), EC3303 (I’ve lost touch with statistics since… DSC1007, which was all the way in Year 1 Sem 2), and EC3312 (‘cos many reviews state how difficult the module is). I’m also doing my Field Service Project in one semester, so that will really amp up the intensity of the FSP. With all the MCs added up, I’m overloading this semester again!

It has been week 2 already, but thanks to the National Day holiday on Monday, I felt like I just finished a proper week of school. Frankly, it’s not much. Without tutorials I have a 2 day week (and with tutorials, 3 day week), to the envy of my youngest sister who’s still in JC (all in good time…). I’m also taking an exposure module this semester – NM1101E, the new media exposure module. Taking the mod with De Wei, fellow Year 4 and Acct DDP student, should be great.

The year 4 feel has definitely kicked in. Walking around school, thinking that we are the oldest undergrads in the school (with the exception of rare Year 5 students) really make you look at the wide-eyed freshmen with some sense of envy. And probably vice versa too – they probably look to us as the seniors who have battled the bell curve for 3 years already, and who are on the cusp of entering the next phase of life, when they are just starting out with university. Would really love to go back to those more energetic days. Hahahaha. (But please spare me the painful business core modules like leadership and business communication, yucks)

So Week 2 is underway. Semester promises to fly past quickly because of my lack of school days and FSP. Case in point: Tomorrow is my last day for the week. So Week 2 is almost over.

Undergrad life is ending sooner and sooner.

Results Day

Today is the release of results for the second semester of the 2014/15 academic year, and it is also my fifth time receiving results from NUS. Somehow, it just feels harder to receive results as the semesters go by. It’s supposed to feel easier, right? Especially as the CAP becomes more and more ‘sticky’ as time progresses?

Even as the relative ‘importance’ of each semester’s results decreases, I feel the increased pressure. I think, for me at least, that results act as a signalling device for the amount of work you have put in for the previous semester. Of course, it is not the most accurate signalling device because there are so many variables that go into a single grade, especially in business school where class participation matters. And class participation has got to be the most subjective thing to grade. So it’s at best a relative signal.

I think I also feel the increased pressure for my Biz CAP compared to my Economics CAP because of the Honours system. Ultimately I will be only taking Honours for my Business (Accounting) degree, so my Economics CAP really doesn’t matter that much (as long as I meet the minimum to stay in the double degree programme). The previous semester was one where I had five Biz modules (four accounting) – all graded – and one Economics module (overloading is stressful too). I think the fact that the Accountancy cohort is so tiny (less than 100 students for this basket of modules) makes the bell curve very steep too.

While last semester was fun, with many fun modules and an awesome group, it may not translate to good academic results. Furthermore I felt my concentration span at home is quite a bit worse than when I was staying in Tembusu College. So I was mentally prepared (as far as possible) for a significant dip in my CAP.

Thankfully my worries were unfounded as my CAP dropped just slightly. (And the Econs CAP increased, which didn’t really matter, hahaha) But the cycle will repeat itself again, for four more times.

And now I can study (more or less) in a less stressed manner because besides the Field Service Project I will be taking mostly Econs modules next semester. Less pressure = better study life?

And this also marks the official completion of approximately 60% of my NUS life. Two more years to go.

(And six more weeks of internship to go!)

LDOC 6

Yesterday was the last day of class again… it was my sixth ‘last’ day of classes. Five semesters completed in NUS, one semester completed almost 1.5 years ago in UNC. (Wow, it’s been that long?!)

It also marked the last day of classes for me as a third-year student. Seriously, the semesters are so short and the breaks between semesters are so long, it’s no wonder why time seems to fly past the quickest in university compared to secondary school or JC.

This semester has been so great ‘cos it was a semester mostly spent in the business school with my close friends. It’s hard to have a broad circle of friends (for me at least) so I’m glad a few of us (Chelsea, Paul and Danny) managed to stay together for one last semester. Danny is graduating, Paul will be doing his finance modules next semester, and I’ll be continuing my lonely double degree journey after this semester (Hello FASS next semester!).

It was great. There were many projects but doing projects with this bunch is so fun and easy because we know how each other’s working style, and we managed to get things done quite efficiently. And there was time for more fun things like rushing to the ‘outside world’ for lunch during some 2-hour breaks. Thanks my friends. (Oh yes, and not forgetting Isabella for valuation)

It was also a mad semester, where I had a 12-hour day on Thursday. ACC3604 (Corp law), ACC3611 (Corp governance), and BSP3001 (Strategic management) from 8am to 8pm. The benefit of squeezing the timetable like that is that the week seemed to be over by Thursday night. Looking back, I really enjoyed my 3.5 day workweek (my first class was on Tues 6-8pm – EC3381 Urban Economics).

Generally I quite like the modules this semester. BSP3001 was just a 3-hour ‘chit-chat’ seminar. My professor (Dr Sampsa Samila) has a ‘let’s look at the Harvard Business Case’ approach to teaching strategy and it is definitely more engaging than listening to lectures talking about strategic models. My group was great too – wildly efficient considering how little time we spent on our projects. Thanks to my groupmates – Sean, Jacinda, Eliza and dude from UBC Chris.

ACC3602 – Managerial Planning and Control – is the zzz module this semester – taught by Zhu Zinan. I liked her from ACC2002 and this time round it’s the same. Nothing to complain about. Somewhat fluffy module with a lot of managerial accounting content. Didn’t like the ‘MNO1001’ fluffy presentation styles though, too bad she enjoyed them tremendously.

ACC3604, corporate law, was quite good I think. Mixed feelings. It’s a module I dread studying for, but being in class it’s quite interesting. Julie Huan has a good approach to teaching and I enjoyed her class. I guess being class rep helped also, hahahaha. Again, I dread studying for it because there’s just so much subjectivity in law and too many topics and sections floating around the Companies Act (with its oft-delayed Amendment Act – saw that coming)

ACC3611 is corporate governance. Don’t have much to talk about… some of the lessons were interesting and some were not so much. I thought the case project at the end was fun. Our group had to do a case write-up on ST Marine’s recent corruption scandal. A lot of fun coming up with the case and digging as much dirt as we could from a Temasek-owned firm.

ACC3614 is valuation. Supposedly the most difficult module in NUS Accounting, but my friends all claim that ACC3606 is harder – they are probably right. Finance is not really my thing, and I’m half lost every class, even up till now. Need to study a lot for it. The best part about this module is the prof. Stephen Lynn is the most hilarious, funny professor I’ve ever had in NUS.

The only module I didn’t enjoy so much this sem is surprisingly my only economics module. EC3381, Urban Economics… I had high hopes for the module because it sounded so interesting! It’s a pity that the professor teaching this module previously had passed away recently and this semester some Department of Real Estate (from the School of Design and Environment) professors decided to teach this module. Very heavy emphasis on housing (no surprise). Group work was a report on housing affordability, and was randomly allocated. Some of my group mates were not the best members I would have preferred, but oh well, at least it was a learning experience.

Yesterday was poignant for some of my friends because they are graduating, and decided to take photos around the business school. I still have two years to go. No wonder no feels.

Time for yet another reading week. Five finals this time, from next Saturday until 8 May. Really 包头包尾.

Week 1

School has started and the first week is (almost) over! Well, after five modules worth of classes in the equivalent of two days, it really feels like the week has ended. Especially after the incredibly long day today… but too bad there’s still one class (Valuation) tomorrow, taught by the same professor who lectured us for financial accounting two and a half years ago (!).

Today – and the rest of the Thursdays for this semester – was particularly bad, with 9 hours worth of classes, with the day starting at 8am and only ending at 8pm. 12-hour days… I can totally graduate from NUS ‘proud’ to say that I have completed a semester with long days – and that’s in a semester where I’m not taking any Field Service Project or Honours thesis. Corporate law, corporate governance, and strategic management every Thursday… it’s really like class participation hell (or heaven, if you are good at this kind of thing). Thankfully corporate governance appears to be a chill-kind of seminar, no participation really necessary, but for strategic management, the way classes are being taught, you can feel the pressure of the 30% on your final grade (again).

The other accounting class so far is for management control systems, taught by the same professor who taught us managerial accounting two years (!) ago. She’s pretty good, and I quite like her teaching us despite feeling that I may not enjoy the contents of the module that much. (Why do I not enjoy all my accounting modules?!)

On Tuesday I had one lecture from 6pm to 8pm – EC3381 Urban Economics. Interestingly enough this module is taught by faculty from the School of Design and Environment’s Real Estate department, so I really don’t know how much this module has evolved from when it was taught by a professor in the FASS Economics department. But it still feels like an interesting module despite the unbelievable level of boredom I experienced in LT12 so I shall hang on to it and hope that I will find it as interesting as the module synopsis claims it to be.

It’s funny how I end classes on 8pm for two days of the week when I’m no longer staying on campus… I do miss the convenience of staying in school, especially on late days and when I have 9am classes and stuck on Clementi Road waiting for the traffic to move. But I must say that I’m very lucky and thankful to have a pretty comfortable mode of transport to and from school and I live close enough to NUS.

Wonder how the rest of the semester will be like… after all, the first week is the most slack and you get a free 30-minute ‘nua’ time every first lesson reserved for introductions and things like that.

23

365 days ago, I celebrated my 22nd birthday in Georgia, Atlanta. I was travelling with some awesome NUS friends after we were forced out of our dorms in University of North Carolina (gosh I miss Chapel Hill). I remember waking up to a Breaking Bad-inspired breakfast prepared by awesome friends Jake, Ben, Caroline, Sam, Eunice and Hillary. I ended the day with a beautiful sunset at Table Mountain, before witnessing one of the craziest capitalist scenes I’ve ever seen – Black Friday at the stroke of midnight. I’m glad I did a blog post then talking about it.

365 days later, I lost the weight I’ve gained (look at that photo from 2013!) in the States, and instead of travelling around and seeing the world, I’m in the midst of my exams. In fact I finished my EC2373 paper today (what a paper… NUS students should check out the past year papers and laugh at how un-Econs it is), in the morning. Kinda sucky to do an exam on your birthday, takes the morning ‘birthday buzz’ away and replaces it with the seriousness and monotony of the exam hall.

Of course, I’m glad I’m able to celebrate my birthday with my friends and family, and celebrating my birthday with family has been a year overdue.

My birthday celebration sorta-started off early this year, with Swee Choon for supper yesterday evening with 11 other Tembusu friends (incl Heather and Sherman and Ben and Mak and … ). It was so fun. We had so many liu sha baos and xiao long baos and also so much fun. I almost forgot I had an exam the next day (today).

To start off the day, my sweet sister Hui Chee went off to Toastbox early in the morning to get kaya toast, kopi (in an awesome Toastbox mug no less), and tea cakes so that I can escape the monotony of dining hall breakfast in Tembusu. How lovely is that! There’s no better way to start the day. It also reminds me of the breakfast Jake and Co. prepared for me last year.

After the exam and after a swim, I decided that studying today won’t help much. Went home before going out in the evening with my family and Chelsea to Chinatown Point where we had a tour briefing at CTC. Going to China in a week – next Saturday – for ten days. I’m so caught up in the exams (I still have three papers left) that this trip is really an afterthought. But just hearing about Jiuzhaigou (the place where I’m going) is enough to leave me wanting for more.

Had delicious (but damn expensive) dinner at Din Tai Fung before going home to have the usual birthday cake with my family and Chels. Glad to spend this year’s birthday with my grandparents too.

It’s so good that a year ago Thanksgiving fell right smack on my birthday. (This year happens to coincide with Black Friday) With my birthday on the last week of November, it falls within ‘Thanksgiving’ period and every year I am reminded of how lucky I am. How incredibly lucky I am. I am so thankful for everyone I have met in my life. Life would have been different without you guys – so many to name, it wouldn’t be fair to name them all here. (You know who you are!) Especially grateful to my family – my bedrock and my core – and Chelsea, my constant companion and partner who’s always there for me. Thank you.

Early this morning. I’m a Toastbox fan.

Family.

Chels and I

Look at this beautiful cross stitch done by Chelsea! On a pillow some more. Very touched. It’s really beautiful.