Head to the Grind Stone

April 20, 2008

Originally Written on the 13th April 2008

Another calamity week of organized chaos. I’d better start with my exchange updates as this has been the root of my stressfulness.

Firstly I cannot under take the teaching spoken english project, well I can but I just wouldn’t get the credit for it. On further investigation I discovered that for me to receive credit I would need to complete several excess courses which simply isn’t worth it. So scrap that.

This leaves me with either the fully paid scholarship or doing an exchange with an exchange partner with my home University in ShangHai. I have been applying for both with the hope that one of them will ensure an exchange. For the fully paid scholarship I just need to get all of my forms back to the Chinese embassy before the end of the month, this includes a complete physical report with X-rays, bloodtest etc. With such a limited time frame I may not be able to apply in time.

Last Monday I finally found out the outcome of the ShangHai exchange which is that they will still accept my late application (which I think is completely reasonable). I was incredibly surprised to discover that my home University has offered me a $5000 scholarship and a further $1000 travel grant. This as well as some more positive impressions from a little more extensive research has me leaning in favour of this option.

There is still a massive catch. Firstly I find out the result of the fully paid scholarship by the time I have committed myself to study in ShangHai. This is obviously highly problematic. Even though I get full fees paid (including tution, so yes, a free semester an then travel costs) I would rather not pull out of this other deal to ShangHai, especially when I have been provided with another scholarship.

So the way I am slicing it now is that traveling to ShangHai is the main goal and the fully paid scholarship is Plan B. This way is a much more secure way of thinking as I have already been accepted at this ShangHai University, I just need to get enrolled and I will be content.

God this is a painful situation to try and explain to everyone. I still don’t want to keep my hopes up until everything is finalized. So hopefully by the next time I report in I will know my fate.

I’m not really in the mood to write about anything else really. Thats not to say that there isn’t much to talk about rather I can’t be fussed writing it down. Its currently holidays and I have spent most of the first weekend trying to recoup my energy and clear out some work first up so that the rest of my time can be spent on relaxing.

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Happiness; Coming and Going

March 10, 2008

Originally Written on 8th March 2008

The title is a line from Lucky Man – The Verve a truly inspiring song. Of late this line has moved me considerably.

I want to talk about something that has contained a considerable amount of happiness; this past week. As you may have noticed from my previous post this week has been the first week back at University. What can I say it has been an incredible week, I am so surprisingly delighted with how the week has unfolded.

People

I used the word surprisingly intentionally. This past week has not been enjoyable because I am back at Uni, moving around and seeing people again because frankly I did plenty of that over the holidays. It has been the surprises that are hooking me.

Firstly I should mention that I do a fair bit of traveling, this semester I have to go to 3 university campuses spread over 2 Unis. Usually this results in me catching 6 ‘pieces’ of public transport a day just to get to my most distant campus and back home again. Anyways, I have been simply amazed by the number of friends that I have met on my travels, this week about 5/6 times that I have required to use public transport I have seen and chatted with someone I know. Its not that which surprises me though, its that everyone I have met are different people whom I bump into around the place occasionally. It is like everwhere I go there is somewhere ready to talk to, it has almost reached ridiculous levels.

It isn’t just on the move though. Around Uni, in classes where I wouldn’t suspect to know anyone I am meeting more people and engaging in great conversation. I also heard from one of my Chinese buddies whom has returned to Australia. I met up with him Friday and we are both so stoked about it. He is one of my best buddies and it is great to have him back in Australia. ^_^

Classes

Something else which surprised me was how much so I am enjoying my classes. There are two, new classes in particular that I have been pleased with. One is a marketing course which a friend told me was simply God awful and the other is a course which deals with language and technology. I can already see how the marketing course is going to benefit me and I find it to be an interesting class. The other class is even more so right up my alley, we learn about language and technology, namely computer technology. Some of the topics we are covering are language learning thru technology, blogging, Google, Second Life as communicative tool, the methods and limitations between certain communication methods etc. I am so excited to be a part of only a class of 5 people studying this subject. It is all focused on learning through exploration and flexibility. The course allows us to gain education in something relevant to us. This means that my tutor has encouraged me to study more about blogging. Infact just being in these classes has encouraged me to want to go out and do more research and to an extent write papers on this kinda stuff. Its so complelling.

DP’s Gamer Blog

Thats right, my gamer blog. Theres been a lot of developments here as well. There has been an increase in posting frequency which I admit is unintentional but I just have had to share it. I have reached a state where I simply love writing in my blog and I really wanted to share some more articles.

The most significant surprise is with my traffic which is looking to 2.5x that of the traffic 2 months ago. My RSS readership has peaked as well. Also just yesterday I think I got a plug on the Brainy Gamer podcast. Micheal whom runs the site offered free plugs so I took him up on that offer and nearing the end of the podcast there is an advertisement by Matty Jay. Micheal also added his own kind words afterwards which I am very thankful for and I really wasn’t expecting.

Conclusion

Yeah so this week has been awesome. I am meeting up with even more people at and around Uni. I am throughly enjoying my classes and my blog is picking up steam. I am just so wrapped with how life is progressing.

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Goal Setting for Second Year Uni

March 4, 2008

Originally Written on Saturday 23rd Feburary

It looks like the long summer holidays are drawing to it’s inevitable close. Man it really has been a long break, I feel as though I have made so much progress and had so many great moments. I want to keep the momentum rolling right through the year though. Which means that it is time for me to set some more goals.

I’ve been thinking about all of this goal setting business in the past few days and have concluded that I should have a tight, relevant list of only a few select goals. I only have a handful in mind but they are all very important.

Now because of my lack of part time work this puts a greater emphasis on my Gamer Blog as well as these upcoming new projects. Last year even with University, weekend work and going out I still managed to fit in about 8hrs a week of additional Chinese practice with my Chinese friends. Looking over this years courses I feel as though this can be easily maintained as long as I am peak performance.

So here is my list:

Chinese

Write, Write, Write! Writing more Chinese essays and articles is the key to putting most of the important things into practice. I need to write more to accommodate the plentiful speaking opportunities that I now have. So I want to focus on writing and getting my friends to check up on it.

Relationships

There is a saying that has been on my mind lately and it goes something like this: surround yourself with great people and you too will feel great. Thankfully I feel as though I am currently surrounded by great, supportive and influential people. As a side note even though I have never really thought much of online friendships etc I have made a great selection of blogging friends via my Gamer Blog. Which I am also very pleased about.

I guess this year I’d like to further advance friendships and network out with more unique people.

Websites

This goal just requires only one thing from me and that is to continue the strong work flow of previous years. What I have discovered recently from my Gamer blog is that I DO have the skills to write some really great articles, my site looks great and is functionable so I don’t need to worry about that anymore I just need to write. So with this, Chinese and Uni I will probably be doing a lot of writing this year. ^_^

There is actually a second part to this which is my new projects. I’ll need to get those out this year. Really this is a time issue. Once the CMS is finished, the design coded and the domain name bought, all I need is to add content. Which isn’t really that difficult, rather it will take a lot of time.

Gaming

Pretty simple this one, I only have two objectives. Buy and finish Metal Gear Solid 4 and attempt to clear up some more games on the huge pile of games to finish.

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Nexfinity

For your consideration, a blog about video games as written by myself: