today is the first of many days i did not wake up later than planned.great improvement for me. training was really cold today. it was raining non-stop. really dampened my moods. but nevertheless, still had to work hard for nationals next year. during running, chia jone beat me and i got second. somehow i deproved today. on water,  took k2 wth jon hu at first. but later, he had a really bad leg cramp and couldn't paddle. so  paddled with jon lee, who was at first paddling a k1. i really admire jon lee in a way. he is really grateful to Wei Chang. he remembers deeds that had been done to him. few people do it nowadays. when something good is given to you. most people would just say a thank you. soon later, they would just forget it as if it had never happened at all. but when it comes to bad stuff even when it is accidental, they would probably remember it for the rest of their life. we had to change our culture. as the saying goes. forgetting is human, forgiveness is divine. try taking little steps to go closer to God. and this is defintely a good way. a just found out that a lot of content in my recent entries had to do with religion. pardon me. after lunch, ivan and i went to take 961. it was pretty fast today. much faster than i had expected. throughout the whole trip, he was telling me about the outdoor pursuit camp he went for in new zealand. really sounded pretty impressive. but most probably i cannot go because of the cost of the trip. because of the AAR, i could not go for the NTUC volunteer session today. but t was the best and most insightful AAR i have ever been to. there were lots of suggestions and discussion, almost like a mini SLC. hehe. during the AAR, we talked quite a lot about culture of our year 1 juniors. being brought up by seniors like erik. we had a totally different experience. unlike them, our council duties were not as easy. culture is really very important. culture is a general term. most "good" schools in singapore are well known because of their history and rich culture. ths is perhaps the reason why i left catholic high. what i feel is that the new principal was changing too much things. the mission, vision and the structure of the school. he was just practically throwing away our heritage. throwing away the objective of catholic high. humans should learn to accept things. change is inevitable. as the saying goes, change is the only constant. however, many humans misunderstood the true meaning in that phrase. they think that since change is inevitable, they could initiate change. but solemnly speaking, humans should stop playing God. the only person that could control change should be God and him alone. this change by humans are against nature, against normality. we should let change take place, not stop it or start it. i agree that without unnatural changes, there are many things that we cannot do today. however, because of change, there are also more diffculties to face. did our ancestors have DOTA, LSD, drugs and cigarettes to get addicted too? no. everything has pro and cons. we should always keep in mind about causes and effects. i will stop writing for now. see you soon!

 

REMEMBER!

- everything has PROs and CONs

- always take note of the effects of your cause

- never throw away your own culture

- change is inevitable

- try not to go against nature

 

with love,

~matt