Sat (28/8/04)

Sitting at Incheon. Man, been here so many times it's become sickeningly familiar. I'd be doing something productive, but I just don't have that drive today. Not looking forward to the apocalypse that is my room back in Cal. Realised on the flight that I don't know where my classes are, so unless I can find a net connection over the next 2 days, I won't know where on earth to go (and what time, but I can always assume that class start at 8, engineer that I am...) on Monday morning. HW's my only contact when I get back – no one else has really bothered to reply to my mails (though I have to admit they were kinda last minute ones...) Not reallly in a panic, though. Resigned to just deal with stuff when it comes when I arrive. Sometimes I wish I had this sort of inner calm all the time, but it doesn't always happen. Could've sworn I just screwed my life over on my attachment, but then people always tell me I overreact. Well, what's there to be done? Life sucks sometimes. Deal with it.

Haven't gotten used to this keyboard. Can you believe that? Had this laptop for a year and I don't know wher all the keys are on the keyboard. Don't know how to turn on the numlock either, haven't a clue how to use it even if I did. Largely because I'm so dependent on my spare keyboard, so used to having more space and room. Is that my life, then? Fighting to stay in my own comfort zone? Always arguing that I should always stick to what I know because things work better that way? And what do I do about it? I like being an iconoclast, damnit. Worst of both worlds, being an extrovert with no social skills; being proud but not confident. Boy am I messed up.

Flight keeps getting delayed. That's the 2^nd time they've pushed the boarding time back. Then again, this is SIA, so I'm not so bothered. Incheon is also a lot nicer than Narita(BTW, everyone still speaks english with an American accent). I haven't had to try eating here yet, but the terminal is newer and much less claustrauphopic. Gonna type a little bit before going in search of a 'net terminal. Need to check out my class times. Just because I'm stuck here doesn't mean I shouldn't do something about something...

Speaking of classes, Econs 100A vs. 101A. 101 actually has slots left, but it's waitlist for me... Not too good an idea, to be at the back of the queue. I should ask the prof if he/she's willing to expand the class. Think I'd be bored to tears with non-math econs. Similarly, probably should look at some finance classes while I'm at it. Then again, finance seems to revolve around DCF methods anway... Want to do a coding class on logic structures and apply it to automate the finance calculations... Requiring human input on rather routine operations, like finance tends to do seems such a waste. So much room for some sort of expert system. I guess the only problem is that people don't trust machines to do their thinking for them. Frankly, I'd rather free my brain up for dreaming.

Watched Stepford Wives on the plane. Also saw most of Ladykillers. Stepford is probably not too good a movie, but then Nicole Kidman is drop dead gorgeous (seriously). I guess I'm enough of a romantic sap to like the relationship between Walter and Joanna. Ladykillers isn't all that nice. The humour is kooky, but it lacks the same sort of fun and wit as Ocean's Eleven. Some funny bits, but (and I'm beginning to sound like Nessa here) the characters really annoy me. Chances are that I won't bother with the rest of the movie. Same the time and go to sleep. I'll need my rest for when I arrive. 5 hours of sleep a night for 2-3 nights and then a 2.5 hour night and then a 5 hour one again. I'm surprised I haven't had an asthma attack yet. Always do when I'm sleep deprived. Guess my body realises I need to keep moving for the time being. Shall pay for it at a later date, but for the time being, I feel pretty functional.

Okay. Could carry on for a bit, but I think I'll go look for that Net terminal now....

Sun (29/08/04)

If you can believe it, I almost missed the plane. 1-hr to wait minus 1 hour because Korea is 1 hour ahead of Singapore = no waiting time. Whew. Didn't get to review classes, but would probably have been disappointed anyway since the system only runs Mondays to Fridays 7am to 12am.

Have, however, looked at all of this stuff now that I'm back in Berkeley. A lot of the time table has moved around. The upshot is that the Econs class I was taking now keeps clashing with other stuff. Option one is to move econs to nicer timeslots, but that may been hanging in school for inordinate periods of time. Good news is option two: econs was a substitute for biz admin anyway, and the biz admin class was so full they opened a new one. Which means I can slot in now. Biz admin does clash over with political economy of industrialised societies, though. Then again, PEIS was somethine I took because I couldn't figure what else to take. So on the morrow, I shall hop down to the library and convince the computer to give me bis admind and drop PEIS and econs. This leaves space for one more class. I have a list of 6 engineering/math classes I wouldn't mind doing, so here's hoping at least one of them won't clash with anything else. I don't really mind spending a long time in school – my place is so far I'd probably be glad to save the walking.

HW helped me put my room together yesterday (and we once again got a “too much noise” complaint. Feel pretty guilty about it.) HW realises that I'm no fun to guilt trip because I guilt too easily and then she feels bad too. (hint, hint) I shall put before and after shots of my room up later. It's nice, neat and clean now. Now that everything is in place, I can say that it looks a lot bigger. Had to swap my intended chair and desk positions because I forgot to consider the %*%^*&()@ power socket. The phone also has a too-short reach. Once I actually get a phone line here, I shall get an extension for the phone as well.

Went shopping for essentials today too. Got stuff like detergent, a filter and a phone. Also got all my textbooks and some notebooks. Damn. Nearly killed myself bringing them home. Now I may have to return the PEIS stuff because I want to drop the course. What a drag. PEIS stuff is quite expensive. Humans people assign bunches of history books/classics and stuff. Individually they're cheap, but the costs pile up when you have 8 books for one subject. And, unlike most engineering texts, they're not available back home.

Good news! Neal Stephenson is arriving in Cal near the end of the month. They're releasing The System of the World. Sadly, there's a policy of only signing one book (in addition to a copy of System purchased on signing night. Then again, I already have The Confusion signed, so if I get him to sign Quicksilver, I'll have a complete signed set. Neat, huh? Better not miss the date...

With a 128MB memory card, I think I ought to try taking actual photos of the school. Give me a couple of days and I shall see to making some sort of walking tour or something.

Roommates, roommates... (Actually housemates, but then some people don't make a distinction) There's, what, 5-6 of us here. N (Indian girl) with boyfriend P (who may not be staying for more than 2 weeks, is what he said); J (we share the name...) Chem Eng grad student, new to town, but has a car; V (my fiance's name. This is getting creepy, huh?) and N (girl. Works at the optometrist on Shattuck, I think). Looks like a cool bunch. Have to say N and P like to watch movies late into the night, though.

Tues (2/9/04)

Okay, didn't type anything up for a whole day despite many happenings. Life is settling down. For Monday:

I got the phone taken care of, using JW's hp. Should have a dialtone by weds. Then again, N down the hall got hers on the same day. Guess I have to wait because my line's bizzarre or something. Nothing to be done, just wait and hope the phone comes up.

Also visited M's place. Nice to see my former roommates and stuff. They've got a pretty nice place – really roomy living room and kitchen. Unfortunately, they have only two rooms for the four of them, so they're kinda squeezed in. I guess that's what the living room is for. They also have a great view over Berkeley and the Bay. On a clear day, you have an unobstructed view of the Bay, bridge and all from their window. That comes at its own price, of course: they live on the top of a hill on the 3^rd floor... So it's even more of a climb to their place than to our old dorm. It's a silly idea if you ask me, but then they're sorta fit. Also, have to say I don't like the way their rooms are different sizes: one of the bedrooms is really cramped while the other's quite big.

Managed to get my classes sorted out on H's computer (and net connection). I'm now fully enrolled in all my classes, no waitlisting. Dropped both Econs and PEIS in favour of bis admin and a lot more engineering. Worry now is that I'll have to drop the electrical eng class because of an exam clash. The civ eng prof says he's trying his darnest of moving his exam to avoid the clash and I hope he succeeds. Then again, it may be a relief to drop one class or another because my workload is pretty heavy as is. Hate the gaps in my day – 2 and 3 hour breaks every day. I shall have to bring work to school....

Weds (3/9/04)
Well... The bag mom bought back from Bangkok has broken after a day of hard use. Went on a massive shopping expedition today and bought a bunch of stuff. I suspect that it was the ream of paper which finally caused the bag to give in. Or maybe it was the textbooks... Anyway, the damn queues are so long in the first week of school, especially the book return line. That said, I now have cereal and milk, speakers and a working printer. Also checked out wireless networking stuff so I can set up the network here in the house.

I really like this neighbourhood. It's so quiet its an amazing break from the school. Walked down to Elmwood for dinner and to have a quick look-see. It's a nice slice of suburbia, sorta like Nessa's place. Lots of restraunts (prices on the so-so side. Too expensive for a starving college student, but not too high for family meals, etc) Cool shops, videos, souvenirs, clothes, etc... Bought a bottle of herbal bark infusion – it's supposed to go down really well with honey and I do have a pretty large bottle of Jarrah honey with me. Add the grocer and I may not have to wander down to Telegraph all that often after all. Thinking that I have to watch my spending from now on. Sure, I've mostly bought household essentials, but I have to be thrifty too.

Saturday (4/9/04)

omfg. I hate the phone company. My phone line is still not up. Was to be up by Weds, then there was a screwup and then it was supposed to be up by Fri. It was apparently activated on Thurs, but there's some mess up with the wiring. I have basically memorised the voice messages for both customer service and repair... And yesterday they were playing “please call xxx instead” with me, so customer service told me to call repair and repair said to call the landlord and after I talked to my landlady she said to go ahead and have repair come down, and then repair tells me that the phone number I supplied, the one which repair was OK with the previous two times I'd called, the number customer service had assured me was working 3 times already, was not valid. The only reason I managed to get repair to acknowledge a working line was by getting customer service to call them for me... You know, maybe that idiot in repair just didn't want to do anything because I'd called just around midnight..... Anyway, repair is (hopefully) going to come by today and give me a phone line. Don't know if I can start on my DSL at this time either, but when I call the DSL department, I'm going to say its their (the phone company's) fault that this is all taking so long and that they'd better expedite the DSL.

In other news, I've sorta explored the neighbourhood. It's beautiful, especially on these late Summer evenings when the sun is still up reasonably late, and there's a cool breeze going. The shops are cool, though a bit pricey. Then again, this is a resonably yuppie neighbourhood, so what am I complaining about? Wish you lot were here, really. Without any contact with the outside world it's kind of lonely.