10 Things I've Learnt This Year

1. Home is a feeling, not just a place. You can have a physical home, but without the people you love and care about, it's merely an empty building.

2. I am stronger than I think I am. I always thought that I'd be completely and utterly lost without my family and friends. Yet I've been here 3 months, and I'm surviving. And what's more, I'm actually starting to enjoy myself.

3. With true friends, distance really doesn't matter. We're miles apart, but that bond can't be broken. When we get back together again, it'll be like nothing has changed.

4. Opening yourself up to more people doesn't mean that you're losing the bond you have with the friends you already have. 

5. Most of the things your parents say end up being true. I may have plenty of disagreements with my parents, but being here, I've learnt to see from their point of view and well, they're right.

6. It's okay to feel lonely sometimes, but the important thing is to pick yourself up and to know that you're actually not alone. 

7. It's always easier to stay within your comfort zone, but it's good to step out and well, make friends with the locals. Heh.

8. I'm not good with dealing with peer pressure.

9. Misery loves company. When you're feeling down, talk to someone. There will be people who are feeling the same way but are just waiting for someone to talk to.

10. Be optimistic. Be happy. 

Group 15.

Dayre is starting to get on my nerves. It's not uploading my posts -____- I'll just post here. 

Today was amazing! :) One of the best days I've had here so far, definitely.

We had a lecture in the morning about our ESAs, and well. They were depressing. And boring. Lynn and I were so bored that we iMessaged each other, talking nonsense during the lecture heh. I even iMessaged Leek and we ended up talking about poop. Eventually he told me that I disgust him ;( That's not a very nice thing to say >_____>

After the lecture, we had group work! Instead of our usual clin dems, we had Dr Hsu for our room today. Also, we had a Christmas quiz instead of group work :D And surprisingly, OUR GROUP WON! :D :D :D Guess what our winning answer was! :P

Testicular cancer.

Hehehehe. The question was 'What type of cancer is Father Christmas at risk of, given his profession?' Neil somehow figured that out, I have no idea how. He's the group genius, he is.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand our prize? *drumroll*

Chocolates! :D Well, 5 chocolates to be exact. Coincidentally, Peter and Sarah didn't come so it was a perfect fit for our group! :) Of course, being Group 15, we HAD to argue about who got first pick. 'You first!' 'No you first!' Typical Group 15 behaviour.

After that, we had our Secret Santa! The way we did it was hilarious. What we did was that we just threw our gifts under the table, used our feet to mix them up a bit, then we all crawled under the table to get the gifts :P HAHAHAHA SO CUTE RIGHT ;3 T and I didn't get our pressies tho, because well, our Santas were Peter and Sarah. Oh well. Lynn got a Disney soundtrack CD from Neil, Farihah got gloves from T, and Peter got a rugby ball from Farihah (but he doesn't know it yet). What about Neil, you ask? 

Neil got a penguin hat, a penguin plushie and some chocolates. From me ;) Hehehehe. It was so obvious tho. He opened it, instantly knew who it was from and went 'Pinguuuuuuuuuuuuu!' HE LOVED IT YAYYYYYYYY! :D Especially the cap, he kept showing it off ahhhhh. It makes me feel so happy, how much he likes it :) The joy of giving I guess?

Walked to Nando's for lunch after that. We managed to call Sarah, and she said that she'd meet us there. Peter, on the other hand, was too hungover to join us so yeaaaaah. I was disappointed but well. What can we do, right? But I digress.

Reached Nando's. I was debating with myself about which sauce to choose, because I didn't want to over-spicy myself and not enjoy my meal. Medium, hot, extra hot? Hmm. Or just my favourite, lemon and herb? Hmmm.  In the end I decided on lemon and herb- I could always just get the sauces from the counter anyways. Lynn and I planned to get different side dishes but that failed because we mixed up who's getting what -____- 

While waiting, Sarah gave T her gift. Apparently Sarah didn't know what to give T, but she ended up choosing the perfect gift: a beret for our artist! :) T looks so pretty here (actually she always does) ngeh. She's basically everything I wish I was: pretty, demure and ladylike :P But that's never gonna happen. C'est la vie, c'est la vie. 

And then Sarah opened her present. From Lynn! :) 

Lynn got her Twix, and if I'm not mistaken, a lotion-shampoo set. Sarah's response was so cute ohmygosh especially when she was trying to figure out who got it for her :P She's always so adorbs without even realising it ;)

And then our food arrived! 

THE MASH WAS SO GOOD.

The Asian at work. T had to take the photo multiple times because she was so distracted by the fact that I was taking a picture of her taking a picture of her food. Heh.

More pictures:

Yep you can see my beyootiful chicken. Farihah went 'Jas don't you want to take the food as well?' So yeaaah. 

Sarah, Farihah and a cutie pie ;)

Lynn, Neil and T :)

Afterwards, we all went our separate ways. #drama

We split up. Farihah and Sarah went home, T went back to uni. Neil, Lynn and I went to Primark because Lynn and Neil wanted to get Christmas jumpers. They were such quick shoppers. It was done within minutes. They even forced me to get one as well, even though I was already pokai >____> Grrrrrr.

Went back to halls and helped a friend propose to his medic wife. It's a lil hard to explain about the medic wife thing, so I won't even bother hehehe. Also, I won't be mentioning names because I'm not sure if they'll like it sooooo. Mr and Ms X. The plan was that I would somehow pull Ms X to the piano room, where Mr X would be playing the piano. And then he'd propose with a Haribo ring. So I called Ms X. She didn't pick up the first few times, and when she did,  I went into full drama mode heh. I told her I dropped my necklace in the piano room and  I couldn't find it, so could she pleaaaaaase come over and help? And then the bombshell. She was still in uni -____- That was a fail. But she said she was coming home anyways, so I didn't stop her. Mr X and I then waited for more than an hour. That's how unreliable the buses here are. Ms X didn't get the bus until almost an hour into the call. So Mr X and I took turns playing the piano (HE'S AMAZING FYI. And I'm just meh.) and talking. It was a really good conversation, for me at least :) Then Ms X came! I met her at the reception and pulled her to the piano room. And Mr X started playing the piano. But Ms X was blur so I had to pull/push her forward lulllllll. And then she just stood there going 'what's going on?' -_____- But anyways, the proposal was a success and she said yes! :D I apologised to her afterwards for panicking her tho, prolly shouldn't have done that :P

After that, I went for dinner with my fellow deaf Lasdunians. Food was the usual. I shall not even bother to elaborate more. It was good company tho, as usual. I love these people. WHY DO THEY HAVE TO LEAVE. 

On another note, I caught a certain someone's eye and I'm pretty sure he smiled at me. Or maybe it was just my imagination. Hm.

Went to Nadya's house after dinner to get my penguin hat (because Neil and I are gonna be penguin buddies tmrw!) and my lotion. My skin is dry D:

Met up with Neil at JoFo bus stop, and we headed off to uni again. We watched Lynn and The Muses perform, and they were amazing. Just amazing. Lynn was really good, and what more, she sang for me and Neil. I was just .. mesmerised. She has such a beautiful voice but she's so modest about it >_____> 

I think I'm going to join The Muses in Jan. Finally! :D

Waiting for the bus back to Oadby.

We were hanging out, waiting for the bus, when we saw Anlia, Sam, Darren, Alvin and Sue May. They came over and well, introductions were made yada yada yada.

Came back from uni and went straight to ASDA with Lucy. 

And now I'm back, writing this post. Twas a good day! :) Goodnight! :)

Did I?

I woke up at around 2-3am, to people screaming downstairs. I remembered thinking that I wanted to scream at them to 'SHUT UPPPPPP!' I don't know what happened next, but I woke up at 4 and I now I'm worried. I have no idea if I really screamed at them or it was just in my mind ahhhhhhhhh >______>

Hi!

Sooooooo. Hi guys!

And no. This is not another emo post.

After seeing people blogging on Dayre (a mini blogging platform), I tried it out last night. Aaaaand to be honest, I found it annoying. It was so hard to keep within the character limit, because well, you know how I like details. 500 characters? Boo. Some people might say that I can just start another entry, but I don't really want to keep breaking down my day into multiple entries. So here I am, because Dayre's made me miss blogging and I JUST CAN'T use it. (Also because I'm trying to prevent T from reading my previous posts, but that's another issue altogether heh.)

I'd love to update y'all about how I'm doing and how I'm coping with the course and how UK is and whatnot, but I've had such a great day that I'm just going to post about that. Here goes!

It didn't start off to great, though.  I woke up at 5, and I couldn't go back to sleep. I spent that whole hour debating with myself whether or not I would go for class. I do the same thing every Thursday, and I always come to the same conclusion. This week was no different. I decided that I just couldn't skip. No reason why, but I just couldn't.

I kept questioning that decision, though. All the way through prep and breakfast, I was still debating with myself whether or not I would go. I even got on the bus later than usual because I was insistent that I WILL enjoy my breakfast today. Surprisingly, even though I got the bus late, I still reached uni with about 25 minutes to spare. GREAAAAAAAAAT.

Went to my usual waiting spot, and waited. It was so empty, and I was thinking that everyone else must have skipped. After a while, Saara showed up and I told her how tempted I was to just skip class and head off to the library and study. SKIP CLASS AND HEAD OFF TO THE LIBRARY TO STUDY = LIFE OF A MEDICAL STUDENT. And then Neil showed up and ruined my plans. How could I leave now that he'd seen me? T_____T Hahaha but he wanted to skip too so we could have skipped together anyways :P We ended up going to class because well, we're good kids heh. Not before Neil decided to pull my shoelaces and bully me though >____> And when Lynn came up behind me and pulled my hair, I straightaway blamed Neil hehehe :P And he wonders why I don't like him.

Thankfully we didn't skip, though. Group work was really good, even though Peter and Sarah were mia! We continued where we left off last week, creating questions for the other groups to answer. That went well, I suppose. I still remember the first time we worked together, I wondered if we would ever be able to work well together. Heh. It was awkward back then. And now we really are doing well! I love group work with these guys, they're just amazing. (I may be prone to lying because T just found my blog fyi.) Anywaaaays, group work was fun. Not because of the work itself, but because we kept talking about random stuff! Bits and pieces of conversation would just pop up while we were working, which was distracting but well. Thursdays are for getting to know each other better ;)

During break, I ingeniously decided to mention blogging. Which led to T trying to find my blog. She typed in 'Jaslyn Ling blog' and she found Amirah's post about me. And then she somehow found my Blogger profile. Which then caused me to try and snatch her iPad away. She passed it to Neil, which then led to me trying to chase Neil down in our group study room. So not childish. So medical student-ish. So professional. I know. Eventually I just gave up and Neil read out the user description on the profile to the whole world. Something about the scent of old books and the sound of rushing rivers. Which he later on played on his iPad for me. Neil, Neil -____- They couldn't find my blog, though. I eventually just showed it to them anyways. It'll be better for me to show and forewarn them, rather than if they just stumble upon it one day.

After the break, Sarah cameeee! We swapped our questions around and our group was doing pretty well! Until the fire alarm went off. This time, T and Neil, having learnt their lesson from the previous fire alarm, packed all their stuff before they left. We had to gather at the meeting area, but it was freezing and the wind was blowing like craycray and based on our previous experience, we thought that we'd have to wait for about half an hour-so a few of us headed to Subway! :D THE WIND TODAY OHMAIGOSH IT WAS SO STRONG I BELIEVE I REALLY COULD HAVE FLOWN. We were in Subway for about 10 minutes when everyone was allowed back into MSB. Walking out from Subway was crazy.  The wind was blowing so hard, it was just pushing me forward. I couldn't even stop myself from moving >______> Oh and guess what Neil said about that? 'That's nothing, wait till February. It gets worse.' GREAT.

Back in our group work rooms, we attempted a few more questions before realising that Kee (our Clin Dem) wasn't coming back. Sooooooo, we left early hehehe :P We walked to the city for lunch. On the way, T, Lynn and  I were acting quite insane. We talked about following leaves, we jumped into piles of leaves, we tried to match each others' footsteps, and we talked in song :'D We looked absolutely ridiculous. At one point, the wind was blowing so strong, I jumped to see if I would fly. And I SWEAR, I did. I floated to the right. Hehehehe :3

Walking down New Walk 

Neil charging towards us & trying (unsuccessfully) to photobomb :P

We had lunch at Subway, where the 6 of us just squeezed into one tiny booth heh.

After lunch, Sarah and Farihah went back home, while Neil, T and Lynn accompanied me to get some stuff :) Then we had a leisurely walk to LRI. In the rain. In the cold. In the storm. SO FUN yawwww.

Got to LRI just in the nick of time. We were so happy when we reached, like 'WE SURVIVEDDDDD!' :P It was funny to see our tutor there before us though, cuz we were sort of joking about how he fell off his bike as he was cycling to our last session. What more with the wind, right? :P So yeah. Consultation Skills was great though. I was just really happy that I improved! :) The last time, I felt so bad after but this time, I felt I did better. Except that I was smiling inappropriately throughout the whole interview >_____> But I smile/giggle when I'm nervous! D: Other than that, everyone did really well and I learnt loads! :) Also, Sarah is so cute whenever she's nervous :3

Walked back to uni after that. Lynn and I were teasing T because one of her eyes had started to go red. And since we were just in Consultation Skills class, .. :P Lynn was planning to cycle home, but eventually decided to get the bus back after Neil, T and I nagged her. Because of that, she made us miss the bus. So we had to wait an extra 10 minutes. On the bus, we had cookies! And good music :)

T shy shy, ngeheheh. ;)

And that's the end of our little group 15 adventure.

Had dinner with our little group of Deaf People of  Lasdun (whom I will introduce you guys to soon. Actually I've yet to introduce you guys to anyone heh. Soon,soon.) It's Christine's birthday, so we decided that we were gonna surprise her after dinner. MJ pretended that he left something in her room, and then we barged in. The look on her face was priceless HAHAHAHA omgosh she was so scared :'D

She loved her gift! :)

I sort of took a whole series of reaction pictures (no idea why I didn't just take a video), but they weren't that clear sooooo.

We took more group pictures, but they're all in her lappy so, oh well.

Then we spent the rest of the night just playing truth or dare (just truths) and just talking. 'Twas really really good, I feel I know everyone so much better now! :)

I'm exhausted now, but I still have to do some revision. I just hope I don't fall asleep. More updates soon. Love y'all, and good night! :)