Watson Bay, Vaucluse House, Double Bay ice cream

We had another one of those almost obligatory holiday family outing last Friday (6th July), and it's not the Fish Markets this time! Mum was really prepared this time, she had this old tourist book that the government prints, you know the ones that you get at the airport? She looked through one of those and she had been talking about all these locations for ages before this.


First stop: Watson Bay. Mum wanted to see The Gap, which is these two stone cliffs that you can go on and look out at sea. According to her convicts used to go and stand on those, and looking out at the ocean, it would really hit them that it's next to impossible to escape, so (you guessed it) they would commit suicide by jumping into the ocean. Apparently it still is a prime spot for people looking to commit suicide, because there's a couple of signs telling you there's hope and there's help, and there's a telephone booth with two buttons: one for emergency services, one for Lifeline.

It really is a beautiful place and my descriptions does it no justice at all.

I'm very influenced by my family's opinion

I'm very influenced by my family's opinion, which I suppose is as it should be. I told them my Maths results (2 unit and Extension 1), they were pretty happy with it because my 3 unit mark had a noticeable improvement on my last one. Same for Physics, and I only lost 3 marks. So I'm sort of living in a little bubble of happiness/contentment right now. I didn't even feel this way when I first got the results!

Note: getting a good tutor is important, they can really help you get better marks.

Nan Tien Temple

This being the first day after Chinese New Year, Mum said we're going to Nan Tien Temple to pray for health, prosperity and help in my studies. I think a lot of Chinese people in Oz has been there before, I think (but am not absolutely sure) that it's the largest of its kind in the Southern hemisphere.

I watched the Chinese New Years gala last night live from start to finish (which means I slept at 3:30 in the morning). Naturally I slept in, and we actually got there at around 1:00 in the afternoon. It was a road trip of a little more than an hour (according to google maps) and there was a stretch of highway 33 km long. The trip itself was actually quite relaxing, and I listened to my iPod all the way.

I like going to temples, especially temples in Australia, it's always quite peaceful. If you went in China or Hong Kong, it'll be packed and there'll be whole crowds of people squeezing around every body around and holding lit incense over their heads and it'll be so so noisy. But it's quieter in Australia.

Everything was outrageously expensive, a pack of 15 sticks of incense is $10, having a year-long incense lit for you is $60 for one person and $100 for the whole family. My Grandma already lit them for me in China already, so I didn't need to do it here.

When we came back we went to Bankstown RSL for the all you can eat buffet. All the food was nice and I definitely over-ate. I'm still not feeling very comfortable.

So, photos! (photography not allowed inside the temple halls themselves)

 This statue was in the car park

100th Post!

This is the 100th post on this blog - my first blog in my whole entire life.

It's been a little more than a year since I first started blogging at the request (and plodding) of Helena and Cinda (to whom I am eternally grateful to for introducing me to this wonderful medium). It's quite a coincidence that when I began this blog I also began my life away from Hurlstone. I didn't even realise that until I went back and looked at some of my earliest posts. Reading through my old posts throughout this year I feel like I've changed, but also like I haven't really grown up at all.

There's a passage in the Bible that goes something like this:

When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.

I'm not ready to put away my childish things, I'm not ready to grow up and come away from my family's protective wings, I'm not ready to make my own way in the world. But if I never try I'll never be ready, and one day, there will be no one to shelter me from the big bad world out there. But it's not time yet, and I still have a little while to be childish and safe and not have to worry about anything more serious than my school results, and so, let's celebrate my 100th post on this blog!

Dance! Dance! Dance!

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          /__/-/   \/
         /     |
        /     /\
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            \ )/ /
            / | /
            |/|/
            S S
           /x|x\
           |, \.     b'ger

I'm also trying out blogger's scheduling function, fingers crossed it'll work.

Vivid Live Light Show In City

I love my new camera. I went to the Vivid Live light show in the city on Sunday night, and if I was still using my old camera, none of the photos would have came out ok. Hope you guys went and saw it, it's a nice night out and the lights are pretty. I could stand and stare at the mesmerising lights on the Opera House forever. There's some fun interactive stuff there too, so it was all really fun.

So here they are people, an epic(ly long) photo post of the Vivid Live light show.

'Talk' About Getting a Part-time Job

Mum and grandma had a Talk (with a capital T) with me after dinner. They want me to get a part-time job, not for the money, but for the work experience. They especially want me to go work for McDonald's. I don’t really mind doing part-time jobs, but how do I go about getting a job?

This work experience thing is something that’s come up time and time again. They really want me to have work experience because employers don’t want workers that don’t have any prior work experience. I know that I’m really not in a very good position, I don’t have any good points other than a good academic result. I don’t have work experience, I don’t do sport, I don’t have any volunteering experience, I basically don’t do anything extra-curricular. And that’s very very bad. Even universities give priority to students with good ‘leadership qualities’ and stuff. SO, now I’m looking at myself and sort of despairing a little bit.

Aside from not knowing how to get a job, I’m pretty shy, I think. I used to be scared of talking to strangers at all, but now I’ve improved and am only scared of asking strangers for anything I don’t think I can rightly expect from them. Like, for example, asking them for a job.

Do any of you work part-time jobs? What do you suggest?