ZAY Blog

Why?

Was I actually as busy as I thought?

Or I just pretend that I was busy so that I would not be held accountable for the silly things I’ve done?

I could not answer those questions, nor I could explain what I’ve done for the past couple of weeks.

Sometimes I criticize a lot about what others have been doing, without knowing that I actually did the same.

Worst of all, sometimes I was a victim of certain incidents, and I, without any particular thought of revenge, chose to have others to be in the same position as I was once in.

Was I really a villain? A charlatan?

Forgive me, because I really meant no harm.

I could use the excuse to say that I am a Cancer, who is notoriously famous for being sensitive and having temper swings.

But I hate to use that because I would consider myself a man.

Which means, I have to be responsible for whatever that I have done, no matter what the circumstance was.

And I really hope, that if by any means I caused any harm to anyone else, I could be forgiven for what I’ve done.

And I really hope, that I could still be considered as a good person after all.

And I really hope, that more time could be spent on doing meaningful things, on doing things that needs to be done in my life, and things that are better to be done earlier than later.

And I hope, that all those three hopes listed above could become true.

Studied for the whole day yesterday and the whole day today…

I was very confident in the exam, until certain unexpected personal problems started to kick in, until my whole plan was messed up.

But I am glad that it ends the way it should, without giving me too much long-term headaches…

Anyway, good luck to anyone writing MFE tomorrow afternoon, and good luck to anyone writing MLC tomorrow morning as well.

Of course, good luck to myself, LOL.

A person who’s living without a dream is like a fish living without water.

I remembered one of my friends used to criticize me, saying that I am someone who do not realize one basic fact about human beings, is that we are all greedy creatures, and we all stand for our own rights.

I prefer to interpret that in a positive way: because we are greedy, because we are selfish, therefore we always have desire to do better, we always have dreams for us to pursue.

If we were just too comfortable walking around, carrying heavy stuff, then there is no wheel to be invented from, if we are just too comfortable that people who are in different continent should never meet, then there will be no such thing as airplanes, ships and so on.

The question is, how to realize those dreams?

And one thing I remembered that I heard from some seminars is to visualize them, to break down your big dreams to realistic goals that you can see them.

For example, the dream of becoming a successful person is a big dream to me. But what is success? Well, at least one aspect of it is to get a good job with a decent income. How? Taking actuarial exams, make sure I become an FSA as soon as I can. How? Get ready for the next exam. How? Do the study manuals. How? Two chapters a day.

So basically, I broke down a dream that are difficult to be visualized at into much smaller steps.

I am not saying that I am a model person whatsoever, but I do tend to think, whatever those psychologists or mentor coaches said must have a reason behind it.

And I choose to believe in them.

And now I am back to Toronto again….

Just logged into Quest and checked the results…

Well, 3 are out, 2 are not. Out of the 3, some I did better than expected, some I did worse.

Still, it hurts me that my last hope to at least get perfect for one of my undergraduate courses is gone.

And I always thought I could.

Guess one of my friends is right:

“Whatever that is not meant to be yours will not be yours, ever.”

The SOA exam is now less than a month away, and frankly speaking, I have not done anything about it yet.

Hopefully a week of hard work should be enough for this.

Sometimes, we just have to think a little less, leave a little past behind, to focus on the things that we need to focus on.

I still remember that many years ago, when I first informed my fellow teachers and classmates my decision of leaving China, my Chinese teacher actually told me this:

“I know you are smart and hardworking, and you should have a bright future, however, if you ever fall, that will be because of your mouth”.

Indeed, after countless number of incidents have happened because of what I said (that should not be said), I have to say that teacher of mine was really brilliant in understanding people.

I hate myself for saying so much once I while. Especially when I am stressed.

Somehow, when I am stressed, I would be talking like a Martian who first is speaking human language for the first time, and has no idea what they meant.

I tend to say things that are exactly opposite to what I think, and making jokes that are not funny at all.

Indeed, my extrovert character has brought me many opportunities, both in career and in personal life. On the other hand, many doors are shutting in front of me exactly due to that trait in my personality as well.

My sincere apologies for people who are hurt by what I said, and I am willing to pay all to make me really start saying things that make sense and things that are really what I intend to say.

A couple of years ago, when I was in the airport, about to leave Singapore for my month-long vacation in China and then leave for Canada, I sent an email to a friend of mine, telling her: I wanted to tell you something, but wait when I come back.

I was not trying to tease her or to make her thought I was funny. In fact, when I sent her the email, I was about 5 minutes before the boarding gate was closed, and I was in the lobby that is about 2 minutes of walking away from the boarding gate.

Then I went to China, with no Internet access whatsoever and had a rather peaceful vacation.

When I finally got to Canada and checked my email box, I saw a message from that friend of mine: Don’t keep me in suspense. That is the cruelest thing you can do to someone.

I apologized, not knowing exactly why I received such harsh comments from her. After all, I did have the plan to tell her something, but I was just out of time and afterwards, out of Internet!

I guess our almighty Lord finally gave me an answer. He put me through a similar trial.

This time, I was the one who was told: I want to tell you something, but wait when I come back.

And now, I know what kind of jerk I was at that time.

I am not that much of a religious person to be very honest, nor I am someone who usually believes in retributions. I do things that I deem are necessary and never look back after I’ve done them, for most of the time.

But I guess I was just lucky enough not to be hurt that much by the bad things I’ve committed.

And sometimes, while I thought someone else was the unreasonable one, I turned out to be the bad guy.

I am not sure that friend of mine still reads my blog as we’ve been out of touch for a while, but if she does:

I am sorry for being such an idiot.

I hate being a busybody, but somehow I just turn out to be one…

And I hate to hurt myself for something that completely has nothing to do with myself, but yet I kept doing that…

Perhaps, I am meant to be born with those characters, and although I was praised by someone (whom I really appreciate) as “gems”, and I should be proud of it, but really, this traits of me have offered me more pain than anything else, if there is anything else it has ever given me at all,

I hate to see certain things from happening, but I know I can not help myself, because those things are not even relevant to me. Why, then, I am just wondering, why should I be pissed over something that I can not even be in control? Or something that is not even relevant to me?

I do not understand about myself, and I do not know….

To those who have been reading my blog all these days, you must have found that I have not updated my blog for a while.

And the true reason behind it, is simply there is nothing to write.

I know I may be weird when I am saying this, but somehow my mind will only run wild when I am busy or under pressure and felt helpless, I would then look at my blog and tell myself:”mmm…it is probably the time I need to add something to my blog…”

However, I do know I owe a lot of people some form of gratitude, such as my dear goddaughter, who was nice enough to support me throughout my entire struggle of the final exam, thanks a lot Dewi (and the list will go quite long as well)

The main reason why, though, that I am typing on my keyboard at 2am in the morning, is that I really thought it would be a great time for me to think about Year 2007, which is waving its farewell to us pretty soon.

On the up side, I have to say that I have accomplished some things in 2007, including get my first ever coop job in actuarial science field, but those are just some trivial things that I would be more than reluctant to mention the details.

On the down side, however, many things that I hope have not happened have happened, and many things that I have hoped for their occurrence did not.

If I’ve made a list for all those things, I am pretty sure they will fill up 20 pages, However, there are just a few words I want to say about.

To the friends of mine who mentioned that my stubbornness have hurt so many people who loved me and wished me well, all I can say is that once I’ve decided to do certain things, I just go ahead and do them. I confess that sometimes I did not recognize the cost of them, and most of the time I tend to underestimate them, but unless one day I own a time machine, there is simply no way of going back.

To the friends of mine who mentioned that in my world, there is only black and white, and no grey, all I can say is that I tend to look at things to extremes, but those are just measures to protect myself. It is weird for me to say this, but I think one thing about Cancer people in general, is that we are willing to try out new things, yet we are so afraid of getting hurt by them, and once we are hurt, we reject them for a long time before we could convince ourselves that it is safe enough to pick those things up again.

To the friends of mine who mentioned that I am not trying hard enough (on certain things), all I can say is that the only reason why I am not trying hard is because I am not interested in them. Well, I know someone is going to say that I am saying that only because I can not get those things done, and I would agree if the word “only” is removed. That is one of the reason, because I do not, as someone who is studying in a field that has all about investing and return, do not want to invest on things that offers me zero, or even negative returns. However, the even bigger reason is simply the fact that I think I’ve found some sorts of balance in my life, and I hate to disturb the balance.

To the friends of mine that I’ve lost in 2007, please accept my apologies if I’ve hurt you by any means, but this is what I am after all, and some times, I have to say that I tried to pretend to be someone that I am not, but it really does not work well in the end.

To the friends of mine that I made in 2007, thanks a lot for your tolerance to accept the most outlandish person with the most cynical view in everything as your friend. (No, I am just kidding…)

To the friends of mine that stayed with me throughout 2007…well, good work buddies!

Oh, finally, to the friends of mine who mentioned that I am not confident enough, I am not sure whether if it counts, but I bought myself a Calcite crystal ball yesterday, which, as the salesgirl claimed, will improve my memory and self-confidence.

And to the friends of mine who mentioned the opposite…well, you can guess the answer

Happy Year 2008!

Something that I scared the most happened, which is quite expected anyway, but still, when it happens, or even when I imagine it happens, that really hurts.

Well, I was kind of anticipate this, but you know, it is just like when girls are waiting for a skirt they love to be on sale, there is always a chance that the skirts are sold out before they are on sale, but I am pretty sure most of them will still feel bad when they saw the skirt were removed from the shelf.

I never own it, so how can I demand to have it forever? How can I deny the rights of someone else who have a bigger wallet than me or simply love that more than I do to purchase it?

I can dream I did own it at some point of time, or even lie to myself to say that I own it.

But at the end of the day, these are all illusions. Just like a bubble that is ready to burst any time.

That remind me of a test that I failed miserably a couple of days ago.

Not any test of the academic category. In fact, I would be happier if that was just a midterm or something.

Since at least, if I screw up the midterm, I could still have a chance in the finals, but not for this one.

I’ve sensed the failure long time ago, but I still proceeded with the test, ignorant of my capability.

And I did badly, as anticipated. And I am feeling bad about it.

Probably I was the stupid one to put myself on the test, even before I am confident that everything is working and I can control them.

However, certain tests are just meant to fail, because you do not gain anything if you pass every time.

I consider this just like the cheque that my dad sends me every term to pay my tuition.

Finally, to all those who are thinking of buying me a new skirt to comfort me, thanks but no thanks. When tigers, which are my favorite animals, are hurt, they would hide somewhere to heal their wounds, before start to be ready for the next hunting again.

Coincidentally, I was born in the Chinese Year of Tiger.

Yap, it is Friday again, and yap, I am still in DC…

I can not remember this is the how many Fridays (or days) I’ve spent my entire nights in the University of Waterloo’s Davis Center Library, some people call it Dating Centre for the acronym, which made me wondering how many people are dating their textbooks and study manuals in the transparent-ceiling building every night.

It has been a while since I posted anything, I tried to use the excuse that I was been busy and so on…but honestly, it is really because I am tired of writing about myself, expose things that are known anyway…

It is kind of disgusting to live in Waterloo, because of the few people here. Everyone’s friends are friends of his/her friends and rumors here are just going more than exponential rate of growth. Sometimes, in fact, it is just amazing to see how people are willing to explode certain trivial thing into something big, so that when friends are sitting with each other, enjoying their bubble teas or Tim Horton’s, they would have some kind of topic to share with.

And the biggest sarcasms is that I, myself, is one of those perpetrators, one of those those ones that I dislike. It is just like once a while I am critical about certain things that are happening among the Chinese, without realizing that I am just one of them.

Ignorant? Maybe. Crazy? Maybe. But thanks to Waterloo, I am what I am now.

Having said that, I am not saying that Waterloo is not a good university. In fact, on the contrary, Waterloo is a wonderful place to study, and it has one of the best Faculty of Mathematics in the world.

The problem is with me…somehow, I’ve been freaked out since the very beginning of this term, somehow, I’ve been…well…anything but not myself since the very beginning of the term.

I know, I know, I am thinking too much again, just like what I’ve been doing before every single major exam…

Another night, another night of me, alone, in DC, trying to figure out what is the probability of a 70-year-old male nonsmoker dies before a 60-year-old female smoker…