Warning: the content of this post will mostly be unpleasant.
if you're still reading, thank you for bearing with me, and please don't complain that i dampened your spirits. so. i'd like to start out by talking about judo. previously, i'd said that someone in NUS emailed the national team manager to tell him i'd been removed from the team. after talking to the NUS president, i found out it was worse. they emailed the SJF management direct. and their reason for not contacting me? "we couldn't find your email or get a hold of you on facebook". to which, i'd like to say that that's a rubbish excuse. i've emailed them before, i'm facebook friends with the captain and president, the president has my number. if they had said that they forgot, or given some other more reasonable excuse, i might have taken it better. but that was utterly unacceptable.
what made it worse (yes, it's somehow possible) was the way the president reacted. slight digression. in my interactions with people, i've identified several common responses when someone is in the wrong, or has done something not entirely correct. (1) they try to justify their actions, eg "well yes, but you made me do it by *whatever reason*" depending on what the reason may be, this may be acceptable. (2) "yes, but do you remember the time when you did *something bad*?" i find this to be weak, especially if the previous thing had already been resolved. only rarely have i seen someone say "i'm sorry, how can i make it better?" can you guess what the NUS president did? hint: it's an even number. so he brought up something from several months ago, when in my haste to confirm membership with NUS, i sent a rather poorly-worded email to the national team manager. he had previously told me that there were no hard feelings about it, and that the issue was considered resolved. so my question is, why bring it up now? to make me look bad so he looks less bad? i don't know. but to be fair though, he did apologize. and on the bright side, this means i don't have to go for NUS training any more. of course, this probably also means that i won't be welcome at NUS training from now on, but from the way i see it, no big loss to me or to them.
also on judo, i'm mildly worried. grading is in a month and 2 days...and until now, i don't know the format. as if that wasn't bad enough, my partner messaged me a few days ago saying that we'd have to switch partners around. there's a master's competition in australia one day before the grading, and the minimum age to register is 30. of the 2 people in singapore's best pair, one is underage. and guess what? my partner satisfies the age requirement, so we're switching partners for the next month or so. to be honest, i definitely wasn't thrilled to receive the news. getting used to a new partner isn't easy, even less so when there's a time constraint. we actually just had our first training session together earlier tonight. it was...not good. rather, i was not good. it's a combination of being mentally tired from TA, worrying about the upcoming QE, and having to overcome the physical inertia of not training for a while. hopefully i'm able to remember all the tiny little details for our next training session. i feel so bad, though! my new temporary partner is helping me out with no gain on his part. in fact, i feel like i'm awfully inconveniencing him...not to mention i accidentally injured him (mildly...i hope) while we were training. i think regardless of pass or fail, i definitely owe him a dinner.
friction is bound to exist between people. it's just a matter of how much. i have generally good relations with most people in my lab, and if there's any reason for anyone to be unhappy, it's usually my fault. but there's this guy who's been getting on my nerves recently. he is actually nice, but the way he does certain things is just so irksome. *disclaimer: i'm not perfect either, but i do think through my options before acting*. example, my habit is to string the collected empty waste solvent bottles together with, well, string (sorry it's so obvious). since i had TA today, i left the string of bottles tied to the solvent trolley after collection, and went back to the year 1 lab. when i came back, the string was cut, and that made me quite angry. i use that string on a pretty regular basis, and to have it cut is annoying. sure, it can be replaced, but WHY didn't he think of trying to undo the knot first? i don't believe someone pursuing a phd degree isn't smart enough to figure out how untie a knot. it's not even that hard! just pull one end and the whole thing comes loose. my guess that he's used to doing what's convenient for him, even at the expense of others. and after cutting the string, he just left it there. at least have the decency to clear the mess you made! granted that i'm not the best person to be lecturing someone (well, anyone, really) else about cleanliness...but at least my mess is confined to my personal space, and not common areas. i don't want to play the country card here, because there are others from the same country with whom i get along with very well. maybe it's the culture shock of coming to singapore not too long ago. how 7 months = "not too long ago" i don't know, but maybe. i shouldn't be dealing with this! i'm swamped as it is. well, if this goes on, i'll just act in a similar way. newton's third law.
group meeting tomorrow, and i have to study for QE after that. hope things go smoothly for the next month (and 2 days) or so.
if you're still reading, thank you for bearing with me, and please don't complain that i dampened your spirits. so. i'd like to start out by talking about judo. previously, i'd said that someone in NUS emailed the national team manager to tell him i'd been removed from the team. after talking to the NUS president, i found out it was worse. they emailed the SJF management direct. and their reason for not contacting me? "we couldn't find your email or get a hold of you on facebook". to which, i'd like to say that that's a rubbish excuse. i've emailed them before, i'm facebook friends with the captain and president, the president has my number. if they had said that they forgot, or given some other more reasonable excuse, i might have taken it better. but that was utterly unacceptable.
what made it worse (yes, it's somehow possible) was the way the president reacted. slight digression. in my interactions with people, i've identified several common responses when someone is in the wrong, or has done something not entirely correct. (1) they try to justify their actions, eg "well yes, but you made me do it by *whatever reason*" depending on what the reason may be, this may be acceptable. (2) "yes, but do you remember the time when you did *something bad*?" i find this to be weak, especially if the previous thing had already been resolved. only rarely have i seen someone say "i'm sorry, how can i make it better?" can you guess what the NUS president did? hint: it's an even number. so he brought up something from several months ago, when in my haste to confirm membership with NUS, i sent a rather poorly-worded email to the national team manager. he had previously told me that there were no hard feelings about it, and that the issue was considered resolved. so my question is, why bring it up now? to make me look bad so he looks less bad? i don't know. but to be fair though, he did apologize. and on the bright side, this means i don't have to go for NUS training any more. of course, this probably also means that i won't be welcome at NUS training from now on, but from the way i see it, no big loss to me or to them.
also on judo, i'm mildly worried. grading is in a month and 2 days...and until now, i don't know the format. as if that wasn't bad enough, my partner messaged me a few days ago saying that we'd have to switch partners around. there's a master's competition in australia one day before the grading, and the minimum age to register is 30. of the 2 people in singapore's best pair, one is underage. and guess what? my partner satisfies the age requirement, so we're switching partners for the next month or so. to be honest, i definitely wasn't thrilled to receive the news. getting used to a new partner isn't easy, even less so when there's a time constraint. we actually just had our first training session together earlier tonight. it was...not good. rather, i was not good. it's a combination of being mentally tired from TA, worrying about the upcoming QE, and having to overcome the physical inertia of not training for a while. hopefully i'm able to remember all the tiny little details for our next training session. i feel so bad, though! my new temporary partner is helping me out with no gain on his part. in fact, i feel like i'm awfully inconveniencing him...not to mention i accidentally injured him (mildly...i hope) while we were training. i think regardless of pass or fail, i definitely owe him a dinner.
friction is bound to exist between people. it's just a matter of how much. i have generally good relations with most people in my lab, and if there's any reason for anyone to be unhappy, it's usually my fault. but there's this guy who's been getting on my nerves recently. he is actually nice, but the way he does certain things is just so irksome. *disclaimer: i'm not perfect either, but i do think through my options before acting*. example, my habit is to string the collected empty waste solvent bottles together with, well, string (sorry it's so obvious). since i had TA today, i left the string of bottles tied to the solvent trolley after collection, and went back to the year 1 lab. when i came back, the string was cut, and that made me quite angry. i use that string on a pretty regular basis, and to have it cut is annoying. sure, it can be replaced, but WHY didn't he think of trying to undo the knot first? i don't believe someone pursuing a phd degree isn't smart enough to figure out how untie a knot. it's not even that hard! just pull one end and the whole thing comes loose. my guess that he's used to doing what's convenient for him, even at the expense of others. and after cutting the string, he just left it there. at least have the decency to clear the mess you made! granted that i'm not the best person to be lecturing someone (well, anyone, really) else about cleanliness...but at least my mess is confined to my personal space, and not common areas. i don't want to play the country card here, because there are others from the same country with whom i get along with very well. maybe it's the culture shock of coming to singapore not too long ago. how 7 months = "not too long ago" i don't know, but maybe. i shouldn't be dealing with this! i'm swamped as it is. well, if this goes on, i'll just act in a similar way. newton's third law.
group meeting tomorrow, and i have to study for QE after that. hope things go smoothly for the next month (and 2 days) or so.
-random thought of the day: Am I difficult to live/work with?-
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