Monday, December 24, 2012

Being Intellectual ... and Not

Hello peeps. Christmas is like in a few hours away. Merry Christmas to you and may your holidays be merry and great. My christmas present came early this year. Last Monday I saw an envelope on my table from Alliance Française and I knew it must be my DELF B2 test result. I didn't expect it to come this fast. I was expecting to get the result in January, but there it was and I was so nervous. It was a bit like opening the envelope about my NUS admission decade ago. What's inside the envelope can be something good but it can be something devastating as well. I was kinda wishing it's not there, but open the envelope I must. As I took the piece of paper out, my eyes just ran. I didn't go through the letter from top to bottom, I just kinda went searching and I saw that my total score was 78 and that means I pass. Oh my God!!! I was jumping up and down upon seeing the result. I think it's crazy. It was totally unexpected!

As I got through the score breakdown, I was even more stunned. I scored highest in the production orale / speaking part. I scored 22 out of 25. You can go Hannah Montana's "say what now?!?" because that was kinda what I felt. Seriously?!? For me, 22 is like almost perfect and I didn't think I was coherent at all. I mean I wouldn't be able to understand myself if I watched myself there. So that was crazy! Well I believe there is always some leniency from the persons marking the orale test, since they really don't want to see the students fail, but I really think the score was really generous for me. The second highest score I got was for the reading comprehension, in which I got 20.5 out of 25. I'm glad. I did well, also unexpected. The questions can be pretty tricky. I remember during our classes when we went through the exercises and Mr. V asked me the answer to a question, I normally got it wrong and even though I got a second try, it was still wrong. So that was how hard it was to understand for me, but it turned out my brain truly did light up during the test. Then I got 20 out of 25 for the writing part. This was supposed to be the part in which I should have scored really well. Not that 20 is bad, it's pretty good. I guess I was just stunned it scores lower than the other 2. I did purposely simplify my writing in the hope that I would make less grammar and spelling mistakes. So perhaps that's the reason I couldn't score higher since I lacked nuance in my writing (as Mr. C liked to put it). Oh well.

I have to admit that I secretly did hope that I would score 80. However it didn't seem possible. That would mean all the parts have to score 20 at least or some parts have to score higher than 20 to lift the weaker part and that is difficult because to score more than 20 means it's close to perfect and I'm not there. So I was right, I didn't make it to 80. For the listening part, I score 15.5 out of 25. It was still good especially considering I barely made it to the required 5 during practice in class. So I actually did really well. However it was too much for the rest of the parts to carry even though they scored more than 20. There was a disappointment in me because I was just shy of 2 points. Still, I didn't expect this result and I actually did really well. So I'm thankful. It's incredible and amazing. That evening I was feeling so good. It reminded me of how awesome I can be and I haven't felt that for a long long time. It was a real good thing that came after so many shitty things over and over again. It also felt amazing that by passing this test, on paper my French knowledge is the same as my Italian, since DELF B2 is equivalent to CELI 3. I actually made it. When I started learning french, reaching this point seemed too long to be foreseen but there I am now, completing my journey. It feels really good to achieve this. I also have to say that I am thankful for the classmates that accompany me in this journey, I am particularly thankful for XF.

However, as I said, that feeling good didn't last long. Life has taken a worse turn. In the last post, I said that I thought I was pretty intellectual. Well to know how worse my life has taken, I actually got hooked into Here Comes Honey Boo Boo. It started when I stumbled upon Toddlers and Tiaras. It was already low no that I watched that? Anyway, I ended up watching Honey Boo Boo and I actually love it. I cannot wait for newer episodes to come. Much has been said about them. Well they are not refined, that I can say. However who are we to say what is proper and not. I am sure my manner will be considered as not refined as well for the royalty of England for example. I wonder how much it matters. Honey Boo Boo and her family always seem happy and they seem to have a lot of love and they always support each other and that is more than what some people like me have. So perhaps they are not so refined but they are happy. I perhaps have more things in my head but I am obviously unhappy in life. There I have said it out loud. That is the truth. If you have known more about that truth, I'm sure you will feel sorry about me or perhaps worried. Maybe, maybe not. I realize that some people whom I thought will care, apparently don't care.

Let's talk about something else which is less depressing. Went to watch Jersey Boys on Saturday. I enjoyed it very much. It was entertaining and nice. I think the guy who played Tommy DeVito was handsome :P The theatre wasn't full though. I wonder if the cast feel bored doing this over and over. After the break, there were these 2 little kids who decided to sit at the front row and I think it's such a treat for the cast, because they were always clapping enthusiastically and they were really cute. The ending was great that I actually felt like standing up, singing and moving, but of course here in Singapore, everyone is boring so noone did that :( I think it's actually bad for the cast since people didn't seem to be responding much but they were really good despite of our lack of appreciation.

After which, me and YeeMaggio went to Gardens by the Bay. I have the annual pass that I really need to make use of and I want to check out their winter theme. It was interesting though I felt that some of the plants and decorations were looking rather miserable. We also managed to watch the OCBC Rhapsody in the super trees but yet again I didn't have the chance to go up to the super trees. We didn't have the time. Anyway, here are some of the pictures. To see more, you can go here.

You gotta have poinsettia, of course.


I took me sometime to get that these suppose to be penguins. Green penguins are just not my kind of thing.


Then there were these cute Teddy Bear Santa.


Christmas commercialization won't be complete without presents ...


... and santa ...


... and let's throw in some sparkling flying reindeers.
Okay, I gotta admit this was cute.


Of course we need a big christmas tree. So there you go, christmas in The Gardens by the Bay.

The following 2 pictures are the super trees during OCBC Rhapsody.

:) eKa @ 11:22:00 AM •