musings

Woah. Hold the press. What an inspiring and original title.

Mmmph. Let’s just say I have a new found appreciation for people who do clerical work. It. Is. Boring.

I also have a new found appreciation for a working mouse. Have you tried making a flow chart with a mouse that clicks on everything that doesn’t move? I have. It takes awhile. 

All of me is still trying to figure out just what exactly gets accomplished at meetings. They last for a couple o’hours and discussions end up nowhere and things get… done? I assume they do. The conclusions were probably lost to me in a sea of acronyms. ABC soup. But considering there’s 26 letters in the English alphabet and assuming each acronym is on average 3 letters long there’s 26×26x26 acronyms… which means by the end of these 7 weeks I would have replaced everything I have ever learned about statistical analysis with acronyms. I haven’t decided if that’s a good or a bad thing. Will get back to you on that.

While at the end of the day I don’t much mind work (I find ways to amuse myself) I do want to crawl back into my childhood cause I realize what real life looks like and it involves that ‘r’ word… Responsibility. GASP! WAaaaaaaaaaaaaHHHHH.

Ostrich time.

I’ll be the first person to complain about the unequal distribution of grades but I really don’t think of grade inflation being as bad as everyone makes it out to be.

Yes, us young uns nowadays have supposedly ‘inflated’ expectations of what we deserve in class. The old uns (read: professors) have what they consider ‘normal’ expectations of what a student deserves in class. The two sides do not agree. War. 

But the thing with inflation is that just as prices readjust to an influx of paper money, so does the value of grades in the eyes of the beholders (read: employers, admission officers, and donkeys.) People say 50 is the new 40, well, B is the new C. ‘B’ and ‘C’ are just symbols, mere alphabets, endowed with their meaning by society. And since society was the one that defined their initial value, society then too will redefine their value as needed. 

B and Cs are not stagnant in time. Meaning, B will not forever mean ‘almost made it not quite.’ It is flexible as time progresses in its meaning and that’s what the old stooges seem to forget.

If more people get A’s and B’s, employers will readjust their valuation of A’s and B’s accordingly. Not to mention the interview counts more anyway.

However, there is a set of eyes of the beholders that do not readjust as quickly as employers might. Information in this market is not as quick flowing as in the employment world. Oh those stodgy ole admissions officers. Most graduate schools not only look at grades but also take certain soft qualities into consideration, like the ability to make a bake sale sound like a solution to world peace. So we’ll ignore those grad schools for a bit.

Now, med school. Yes, has a GPA cut off. So grade inflation is unfair to its applicants right? I don’t think so. If you can’t get decent grades with grade inflation, which as the word inflate might imply is usually an increase upwards, then you probably wouldn’t get good grades without grade inflation. If there are too many people with good grades, I’m sure the med schools have a way of choosing the ones they like best. We don’t really have to worry about varying inflation rates across the humanities and sciences since most pre-med students have majors in the sciences and have to take the same basic core classes anyway. No worries about varying rates across major universities since studies have shown (people actually spend money on these studies? Grah) that grade inflation in most universities is about the same. Of course there are grade giving discrepancies amongst professors, but meh, life isn’t always fair. 

Law school. Mmm… law schools care about LSATs and GPA and the end. Law school applicants come from a variety of majors since law school doesn’t really impose any restrictions on required undergraduate courses, therefore one could argue that varying inflation rates between the humanities and sciences could be a problem. But I still don’t see that as an issue. First, one assumes that lawyers are ambitious and manipulative, cause honestly if you can’t manipulate words to suite your goals then why bother being a lawyer. Secondly, since they are ambitious and manipulative, one would think that someone considering a law career early on in his/her undergraduate experience would put some thought into they types of courses and activities that would best benefit them in terms of getting into a good law school. If you choose to focus on a “harder” major and then find yourself having a lower GPA than someone in an “easier” major, then clearly you have played your cards wrong. Grade inflation is not a new thing. It’s basically institutionalized and part of the system. Manipulate the system why don’t cha. It’s only unfair if you entered the undergraduate system with no inclination of the existence of grade inflation. 

Finally, grades are alphabets we’ll probably forget in about 10 years. Good gosh. I didn’t realize tests and quizzes amounted to the end all and be all of evaluation a person’s worth in life. 

I mean, I dislike the fact that a humanities major probably has a higher GPA than I do, and that someone taking the same class with an easier professor would walk out with a higher grade than I would, but those are consequences of the choices I’ve made. I can control how much effort I am willing to put into work in return for a certain level of grade. I can admit that I’m not the brightest and that sometimes, people get higher grades because they are just smarter than I am. The end.

Though I have to say, I’m still pissed at myself for blowing off a class and walking away with a grade that is far below what I wanted. But I deserved that one, my GPA will mourn for now. But lesson learned, tomorrow is another day.

As I listen to my brother’s tuition teacher guiding them in Chinese about how to write an essay in Malay, I wonder is this really the way to educate the young? It’s so formulaic, so redundant, so… banal. In my opinion, this is no way to show the young uns how to think creatively. How to think at all. 

There’s so many things I don’t understand about this tuition lesson. First off, why is it taught in Chinese? No wonder we can’t carry a basic conversation in Malay. (Heck I can’t, but I place the blame on not really needing to for the past 7 years.) But that’s a minor detail, I’m sure my brother would shut his brain down if this lesson was conducted completely in a language he struggles with. I guess it’s a nice compromise.

Secondly, I don’t see how mastering the format of writing a daily journal is essential to scoring an A. Is formatting really that important that it delineates the As from the Bs? Google was invented for a reason. In today’s Google universe, you can easily find the ‘right format’ online. Nothing a little creative problem solving won’t well… solve. If a formal letter was a cake, the proper format is the cake pan. Just go out and buy one. Oh sorry, can’t bake that cake now, the cake pan is 1 inch too long. 

Thirdly, there is no beauty in the writing. It’s a lesson on manual regurgitation. Place part A into part B, screw tight. Oil part C a bit. Actually, I realize now that I’m not really just talking about language. I can’t fault the system for trying to ease people into a foreign language. The end is sound, the means applied just seems a little off. In all subjects. There’s no experimenting, there’s no gray area. Everything is either right or wrong, and language is the very last thing on the planet that has right and wrong. Sure that’s grammar and spelling, but those are the lego blocks of language. Somehow all schools teach us to make say, a Lego cake, but you can do so much else with the blocks. So much.

It’s the same with Science, everything is words. Memorize this right way. Memorize that right way. I’m sure some smart person out there has said that there’s a bajillion ways to fail and only a handful of ways to succeed.

Learning through the memorization of successes… now that’s no way to learn and be interested and learn to think. We try to give the children as few ways as possible to fail, but failure is where we learn. “Oh your experiment exploded in your face? Now tell me where you went wrong.” Memorizing the way it won’t fail is okay, but it won’t stick. I will always remember the stories of how my experiments failed and why it did. I have completely forgotten everything I’ve memorized in Secondary school. 

It’s not like I have the solutions up my sleeve. Just observing.

I am sitting crossed legged in Nutter’s apartment and it is quiet. She’s gone to bed and they have left and I feel alone.

I feel alone.  

I’ll miss all of them. I’ll miss monday nights and tv shows, late night stats studying, watching movies with absolutely no fiber of goodness. I’ll miss Alex’s bubble breaker, bad you tube videos and late night nothingness. I’ll miss the camaraderie the laughter and the bad jokes. I’ll miss baking and watching The Office and sitting on the couch watching TLC. I’ll miss a lot of things. This semester Duke truly felt like home and I have them to thank. 

Sorry if I was a mess. I’m just a sappy sappy sap. 

Keep in touch kk? Done.

Took a shower after 3 days. It feels good. 

I want to go back to Wilson Creek. It was a nice place of denial…

Then I got back and got my grades. Blah.

Then I realized graduation is this Sunday. 

I miss you all already.

More when I’m less in a minor funk.

AHHHH!! Is it really… really almost finals week? And… grad… won’t say it. Ugly word that is. Still, the almost end of my spring has been filled with a little/a lot of fun.

In some form of chronological order by my cheese brained memory:

1. I was out jogging on Friday when towards the end of my run I saw his brown fox… then I realized it was a Lab off leash. I thought “geez, these owners are brave to let their dog off leash.” Then I saw a couple, and a another guy behind them and I thought, wonder if the dog belongs to the couple or that big burly dude behind them. Then I think, “Hmm… that guy reminds me of someone.” Then the guy stops next to a water fountain, whistles to the dog and turns to his, I assume, girlfriend and speaks in a British accent, “do you want some water?”

I think, “Gee, even his voice reminds me of that someone.” Then it hits me… IT’S ORLANDO BLOOM. Yes, read that sentence again. Orlando Bloom. My first and probably last celebrity sighting. Clearly I did what ever sane person would do and stopped mid jog to stretch so I could catch more of a glimpse. (Him and Colin Firth are filming about 10 mins from my school. In case you’re thinking, geez Cass, isn’t Orlando Bloom a little out of his element in Durham.)

2. I am the President of Chapel Choir. I’m so happy. I’m not too sure what the conductor thinks cause somewhere deep down, I’m pretty sure our relationship is love-hate. But yeah.

3. So Saturday was glorious weather. Glorious. I wandered around campus without doing much productive work. Went to an outdoor party with this water slide thingie and OH THAT WAS FUUUN! Then later that night I got dressed up, went to Chilli’s (classy, I know), went to DUI’s Big Show (amazing improv. Thank you Dean Sue. Thank you Coach K… and Mojo the Monkey… no!) Then then then then, I went to my Semi Formal. Considering I planned it… I was glad it was good. Apparently I do have the ability to make social things fun. I went with my friend and we had a blast. I’ll claim he had a blast too. Someday, I’ll thank him for putting up with my neuroticism about how the semi was going to explode in my face. Oh beans.

Tap tap tap.

Honestly, I can’t begin to imagine how it feels like to be 22 even though I am. If that makes sense.

I have good friends who are turning 26, friends working, friends engaged and friends married. All these are friends who I have grown up with. It’s a little scary.

I don’t think I’ve changed that much. Am I more mature than when I was 13? Looking back I’d say, yeah, the way I approach life has changed a little… a lot. But 13 year old Cass is still very much a part of me, so is 5 year old Cass who likes cartoons and 10 year old Cass who is insecure and unsure.

Do I have all the emotional strength and mental tools to deal with the future? Am I ready to make this world my own? I don’t know. Maybe I never will. Maybe the point is to accept that I’ll always be learning, always changing, and there’s no such thing as 100% mature and learned and done. The finish line is relative.

All in all I feel like I wasted my 21st year and I don’t like that feeling. I feel like there was so much I could have achieved and I didn’t. On the other hand, I needed that year of inertia, of confusion and misdirection to grow a little. I can look back now, a year later and pinpoint all the mistakes I made… and maybe my 22nd won’t go down the same way.

21 year old Cass was confoosed and lost and angst-y.

Who will 22 year old Cass be?

not ready not ready not ready.

Not ready.

Someone get me a greencard. Thanks.

**
I want to tell you this, but I’m too emotionally chicken. I truly value our friendship. Meeting you has been one of the greater moments in my life. In you, I’ve found a kindred spirit. Sometimes, a lot of times recently, I think about how much fun I’ve had with you and how in a matter of months you’ll graduate and what if I never get to hang out with you again? It scares me. And the fear has been making me ornery recently. So I apologize if I seem neurotic about wanting to keep doing things with you, it’s just that I can feel the grains of time slipping through my fingers. Rargh. I know you’re excited about what’s to come, and I’m excited for you. I know you’re a little tentative about meeting new people and starting life over, and I’ll always be there for you. It’s your great adventure and I don’t want to constantly complain about how my life will be so much less interesting without you here at Duke… but I’ll miss you. A lot.

All I can hope is that you’ll read this and realize its you and forgive me for my increasing insanity as the days inch closer to your graduation.

Things I should be doing: Studying for Statistics. Fail.

Can’t explain it…

I’ve been walking about with this feeling about me and I can’t put a finger on it.

Homesickness?

I miss my brother. For awhile I thought he was going to be able to come visit me, but now I hear my dad doesn’t want to bring him over cause the boy is easily bored. And bored boy + business meetings with banks = bad bad bad. So no brother.

Donna asked me the other day how I could possibly consider working in the US if I miss my family so much all the time. I don’t know. But I miss my friends a lot too when I’m home. There’s just no easy solution. I’ve dug myself a deep hole with no ladder in sight.

I have to leave home eventually, and I’d much rather find my own roots in a place where I have the support of my friends.

But oh, I miss my brother and his annoying habits. I miss his sense of humor that seems to be so unlike mine and yet so much the same. I miss our talks. I miss how he is protective of me even thought he’s about half my height and weight. I miss being there for him. His entering the stage of his life, preteenhood, that’s just fraught with drama and angst and puppy love and high highs and low lows. I just miss him.

讨厌。笨蛋。什么蛋。

Last night was LNY performance put up by the Asian Student Association. I went for the first time of my Duke career. (Cheers for me!) My friend pointed out, “you’re from Malaysia? Shouldn’t you be really fobby? But you’re not!” First, I have never fully comprehended what it entails to be fobby… Second… there is no secondly.

The performances were awesome… but the only with the piano and violin duet playing traditional chinese music just made me miss home. I wanted to turn to my left and pat my dad to say, “hey remember when…” But it wasn’t my dad sitting next to me. There was a lion dance and I knew my brother would enjoy it… oh boys.