What's my status?
Still alive, still struggling.
In two days, we will have our second mock test, and just a little more than a month, we will hopefully be able to extricate ourselves from the burden.
Pending Christmas
There is really nothing Christmas-y about burying our heads in books.With our heads filled with maps and Chinese articles, formulae to solve equations and years when different wars took place, I say we still managed to put our hearts in classroom decorations.
In the storage unit of a school that is not normally accessible, we fished out a forgotten Christmas tree. Like kids who were just about to celebrate their first Christmas, we bounced through the corridors all the way back to our classroom, barely registering the fact that there were people watching us with judging eyes. For the third consecutive year, we hung the led lights in the classroom. This time, we were blatant. We hung it on the frame of our blackboard, and it was blinking and shining all day long, and no one complained! Angela wrapped some tinsels around the chalks, one of which pricked our math teacher on the thumb.
I brought a chocolate advent calendar given by my cousin, and every day, we would take turns open one little door on the calendar, counting down the days until Christmas comes to us.
This Christmas is bound to be the least festive in the three years of high school life, with the test pressure that has been interfering with our free time to an extent that we all became accustomed to the perturbance. But I dare say our classroom is the most festive in the whole school. This is the last year we will be doing this as a family of over a dozen people, and we do not want to miss out on it because we have a test to deal with.
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| Yeah, we also spent time decorating William. |
Christmas Presents
It is unrealistic to prepare presents for everyone in the class, but I have one prepared for Candy. One day, we were taking the MRT together, which was a rare occasion, with me living just forty minutes of walking from school. Several changes of topics later, and we somehow touched the conversation about books. She told me that she loved the story of Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott, and that she cherished the book with her heart, but after a small accident, her book was ripped apart. She didn't get a replacement of it afterward, so I figured this Christmas is a good time to do so. I got her an English copy of Little Women, even when the one she lost was translated into Chinese.Hope that she will like my gift.
Christmas Music
Being such a globally popular festival, the music industry would not lose grasp of the chance to produce some modern Christmas music.Music has been an endearing friend when I am studying. The block out the hustling of the world and replace it with rhythms that I am familiar with. These days, a lot of my chosen songs have been Christmas themed. No matter if it is some classics like Last Christmas or even Twelve Days of Christmas or some more modern ones like Meghan Trainor's I'll be Home or Owl City's Kiss Me Babe, It's Christmas Time, I welcome them all.
Just a week or two ago, I came across some more of them, like Michael Bublé's rendition of Santa Baby and Sia's Snowman along with a dozen others; I couldn't be happier than to expand my storage of Christmas songs.
Musing and End
Of course, I am running out of time again. One last thing.One day, I was on the bus heading home with Allison, and I said to her with a tone quite forlorn, "I really do wish to be in an old tavern or cafe that has nothing but decorations that scream Christmas." She was nonplussed.
"Save those sentiments for later. You'll have plenty of Christmas to be cheerful about when you're abroad. Enjoy the not-so-Christmas when you can."
Her tone was cool and neutral, and she did make sense. I don't think about it that often, but there is absolutely no doubt that I would be missing home like crazy when nostalgia hit.
This is all for this week.
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| Second blood donation! |
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| With Mom. |
Sincerely,
Hugo
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