Wrap up of the semester

Alrightey everyone, exams for the term are finally over. From now, I'm starting my break from SMU for another 8-9 months. That's because I'll be going to Monterrey, Mexico for exchange next semester, from January to May, and then I'll be living in the US with Amanda and her aunt for another 2 months. WHATSUP EVERYONE!!! I am so freaking excited, and right now, I'm just having a mini moment trying to imagine what my next year would be like.

I'll like to take some time to blog about my past semester, some parts in excruciating detail. Let's start with the modules:

Marketing Research - I had good profs for all mods this term, and of course, I definitely liked Prof Cathy Chen for MR. When she first stepped into class, we thought she was a little bimbotic and crazy. (nonetheless, a very smart one) She's the kind of teacher that teaches and then tests you if you've understood what she just said. And that is scary because most of us tell ourselves to figure it all out when the lesson's over. But not Cathy, she will call your name and ask you what she just said. It's ok for me cos I always listen in class (teehee!) but some people just go to class to log on FB which I have no idea why. And it's funny to hear them stutter in front of her. Anyway MR is a marketing mod, meaning I LOVED IT, cos I'm a marketing major.

Business Processes - To be honest, BP was boooooring. Prof Demeester is a handsome, grey-haired 50-year old but his class is really the least interesting. But it's not the instructor's fault, it's BP. Sitting through BP is like sitting through e-math classes. The great thing about BP was there was no project, just 4 group assignments and I totally am so grateful that my assignment mates were normal people. (Will explain that later)

International Economics - I think I met one of the best professors in SMU by attending his IEA class, and he is Tan Kim Song. He's like a really good teacher, cos even though he doesn't use powerpoint, his teaching is so clear. But the project was one of my toughest this semester, cos my project question was this: China will be the key driving force behind economic integration in East Asia, do you agree? Yup, I know, it totally qualifies as a WTH question. And though my group mates worked real hard for it, we got a B+. My heart broke a little. By the way, I just had the last exam for IEA yesterday, and it was essay questions. Truth is, I totally wrote rubbish. At some points I panicked cos I had nothing to write, and that's when the rubbish came in. Sigh, so not looking forward to finding out my grade.

Ethics - Last but certainly not the least, ETHICS! This one was tough. Prof Shubhankar Dam has this crazy way of twisting the facts of the scenario and asking you for your opinion again. So we visited several topics over the term: corruption, environmentalism, discrimination, racism, whistle-blowing, kantianism, utilitarianism, libertarianism, egoism etc. For final exam, it was essay-style. Let me try to describe it: 3 women turned up for an office party, that was strictly casual dresscode, and appeared topless. The next day, they were suspended from work. The 3 women pointed out that 3 men who appeared topless at the party were not given any disciplinary action, hence they being suspended from work is a form of discrimination against women. In this case, analyze if there is indeed a case of discrimination against these women. Well, this question plus another 4 scenarios? Yeah, so it really wasn't easy. But I learnt a lot. It's only in Ethics that I've met some of the sharpest minds in SMU and we really had some great dialogues in class. I mean, this is the real interactive learning that I was promised when I came to SMU.

So this pretty much wraps up my academic term in SMU in the past 4 months. I had choir stuff as well, did you know I performed at the Istana in Week 13 (I know, it was crazy mad!) for the President of Singapore? And the choir took a photo with him :) By the way, Josh and I are still together. Yay. Oh i promised to write about the "normal" people in SMU.

The deal is, SMU is a very culturally diverse university. Just full-time students alone, we have a good mix of Vietnamese, Burmese, Malaysians, Indonesians, Chinese nationals and of course, our own Singaporeans. Then we have exchange students from Europe, Korea, Mexico, US and others. Here's a breakdown of stereotypes, and this is just meant to be teasing ok, I don't mean to be racist and I'm not!

- Exchange students are always MIA-ing. I've heard so many stories of exchange students who don't turn up for project meetings and the stupidest excuses they give for not doing their work properly. And when they do turn up, it's hard to understand them cos of their strange and weird accents, especially the Europeans. They have that Frenchy-German overlay in their accents. OK, but you know why they get away with it? Cos exchange students are hot and cute and tall and blonde. Yeah, so they always get away with it.

- Full-time students from Vietnam, Burma and China have very strong asian accents. They don't have same accents, but it's the same problem for us. On top of that, some have poor English and hence their sentences can be quite broken. It's not so bad if it's spoken, but when it comes in the form of report writing, man, it keeps me up another 2 hours in the night just to rewrite what they have written. In any case, I worked with two Vietnamese on the same project this term and they were wonderful. Just because we have obstacles in language doesn't mean we can't work together. We had many moments of laughter and you know, when you see everyone working together, it can be a very sweet experience.

- And of course, the Singaporeans! The Singaporeans are the bitchy ones. We bitch about others and about own people. Because among "our own people", we have other races right? Like Malay, Indian and Chinese. But because this is Singapore, sorry, it's a restricted zone of conversation. In Ethics, we talked about the different races and stereotypes in Singapore, it was damn funny. Prof went "give me your stereotypes of Chinese, Malays and Indians in Singapore". Man, my classmates sure didn't hold back. Also among Singaporeans, we have different classes of people like the "JC kids", "poly students", "deans lister", "all talk but no work guy", "the powerpoint volunteer because he/she cannot write", "the agressive group member", 'have never heard him/her speak", and the occasional chinese dude who speaks in a very polished, angmoh-ish accent.

So there you go. Isn't SMU a great university? It is, because the people are.