Going to Camp !

Tomorrow, I will be going for a Secondary One camp on St. John's Island organised by my school, Hwa Chong Institution. So I won't be able to surf the net, or even make phone calls! But still, I'm feeling strangely worried .

Why do I feel worried? Because of this. Remember how the lost city of Atlantis was drowned in a single stormy night? I'm just thinking : What will happen if that happens to St. John's Island? It probably won't, since God must really love St. John, and therefore never destroys his property. But think of all the things that happen at sea. Giant icebergs, Krakens, pirates, waterspouts, hurricanes, violent storms, typhoons and the lot. Any of these could appear around the island, except the icebergs, maybe.

Also, the island is quite big compared to humans, so if the island is actually a secret base or a giant turtle or something like that, we could just get killed. Also, my previous theory of cryptids appearing from portals might also be true. Who knows, we might just be walking into a death trap.

But the whole point of organising camps isn't to kill kids, or they would happen much more often. These camps get organised so that students can forge friendships outside of the classroom, and interact together. But when you hardly know any of the other students, how do you bond? I'm sure all that's going to happen is that bands of kids will group together and go off to do their own thing. It would have been easier if we knew some of the students from other classes and consortiums, and made friends with them.

Anyway, I hope I can remember all that happens to me during the camp , so I can tell you guys about it. Wish me luck!

BALLS!

Today, I'm going to put in a topic completely unrelated to anything in this blog: What is it like to be a ball?

First, we must consider the many types of balls. One of these types are sport balls , such as footballs , basketballs , volleyballs , rugby balls , tennis balls , table tennis balls , golf balls and more . If one of these balls was interviewed, what would they say? It would probably be something like: “I get beaten / kicked / smacked around every day of my life.” This is probably a complete summary of a sport ball's life, until it gets lost / cracked / popped.

On the other hand, there are meat balls, such as fish balls, beef balls, pork balls, and any-other-type-of-meat balls. These balls do not live very long, but a life summary of a meat ball would be something like: “I get moulded from meat, cooked and eaten.” In other words, they live for a few days at most, if kept refrigerated. But what if part of a meatballs imaginary brain was retained after digestion? It would say: “I survived the fall down the oesophagus, the acid pools in the stomach, travelled the long and winding large intestine, and escaped the ravages of the anus.”

Then there are the toy balls, such as rubber balls, marbles, juggling balls, a ball of string etc. These balls are mainly used for playing with, rather than being smacked by bats, feet, paddles and other instruments. These balls appeal most to puppies, kittens, young children, older children and jugglers. These balls undergo the same process every day: “I get pushed / thrown / flicked / tossed in the air / rolled around day after day.” The near-extinction of balls of string are largely due to less old ladies wanting to knit, or the invention of the evil “spool of thread “. Other types of toy balls simply tend to get lost after a while; either misplaced or, more commonly, escaped the owner to find other colonies of balls. Planets are also balls, albeit on a much larger scale. The planets in our solar system include Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Pluto used to be a planet, until it was demoted to the rank of sub-planet, much to Plutonians' dismay. Other balls in the reaches of space include moons (natural satellites), comets, stars, atoms, electrons, neutrons and protons. (Asteroids and meteors do not count, as most of them are irregularly shaped.)

Most balls tend to be round, but some strange balls, such as rugby balls, are shaped oddly to suit their original purpose better. Balls come in all colours and sizes, but the most common visible ball known to man is the eyeball. (The word visible is included; meaning can be seen by the naked eye, because otherwise, the atom family would be taking over. They're still seething now, so remember to read this part quietly. ) Eyeballs are the most common visible ball as there are two of them to nearly all humans and animals (even if they aren't used), and these are the most widespread visible living things on the entire planet. There may in fact be more eyeballs on other planets too, but no one knows.

Now we come to invisible balls. These refer to the balls visible individually only through microscopes. These balls are the building balls of everything, and we could never do without them (because we wouldn't exist). You can find invisible balls everywhere, from the reaches of outer space to the loving auntie's/grandma's house to the inside of your own nostrils. These balls are fundamental to fundamentals. For planet and moon balls, life is pretty much the same all the time: “I rotate and revolve round and round my star/planet every day.” As for eyeballs, all they do is: “Detect light and send impulses to the brain so the Big Cheese can tell what's going on.” In fact, some of them don't even do this! Invisible balls simply exist, sometimes revolving around something or bonding with another.

After this post, you have hopefully been enlightened on what it means to be a BALL. Please post your thoughts by commenting or writing in the Cbox!

Two Needed Posts For Any LA blog (Part 2)

This is the other of the posts which I should have done earlier , but procrastinated and left undone until now .

The two stories which I am comparing this time are Lamb to the Slaughter , featured in the last post , and The Way Up To Heaven .

The Way Up To Heaven is about Mrs. Foster , who is obsessed in being on time , and Mr. Foster , who loves to torture her by making her as late as possible . It starts when Mrs. Foster wants to go for an eight-week trip to London to visit her daughter . Mr. Foster is still getting ready when Mrs. Foster is already in the car . He is in the car when he realises that he has forgotten to bring a gift he wants to give to his daughter . He hurries back into the house , but Mrs. Foster finds the gift pushed into a crack between the seats . She prepares to call Mr. Foster , but she hears a strange sound and stops to listen . She stands for a while then realises that she must not be late and hurries the driver , who is too obedient to disobey . Eight weeks later , Mrs Foster returns to find the house absolutely the same as she has left it , except for a strange pungent odour in it . She finds the elevator jammed , pointing to between the second and third floors , and calls a mechanic to fix it . But whatever happened to Mr. Foster ?

I feel that Mrs. Foster was far more torturous in killing Mr. Foster than Mary Maloney was in killing Patrick . This is because Mary killed Patrick in the space of a few seconds at most , whereas Mrs. Foster left her husband trapped in the elevator shaft for weeks , slowly dying of thirst and starvation . But Mr. Foster probably deserves this treatment , as he tortured his wife for years , whereas Patrick was a loving husband to the perfect wife until the very end . In short , THEY BOTH GOT WHAT THEY DESERVED!

Two Needed Posts For Any LA blog (Part 1)

This is one of the posts which I should have done earlier , but my procrastinating attitude made me leave it till now .

Lamb to the Slaughter is a story by Roald Dahl . It is about a man who is killed by his pregnant wife after he tells her some bad news . The story starts with the wife , Mary , waiting for her husband Patrick , a police officer , to come home from work . When he returns , he is acting strangely , and finally tells her some bad news which he should have told her a long time ago . Filled with anger , she kills him with a leg of lemb from the freezer in a burst of passion . After that , she puts the leg in the oven and goes out to buy some groceries . When Mary returns , she finds the corpse , and after some weeping beside her husband's dead body , calls the police . After some questioning , she remembers the leg of lamb and asks the police officers to eat it , thus conveniently disposing of the murder weapon .

Love is about a man and woman who have failed to find the perfect match . When they meet each other , they feel that they are perfect matches . After some time together , they realise that they are not compatible . Only at this time , they realise that they have already found the perfect match , but did not realise it in the first place . So they marry their past lovers , and "live happily ever after" .

Male Child is about a man with 6 daughters , but wants a son . His wife is pregnant , but he feels that it will be another girl . When he finds another young woman , he decides to marry her but keep her a secret . Unfortunately , she does not want to be kept as a mistress but as a wife openly acknowledged by all . He tells his wife about it , and she says that he can leave her if the next child is a girl . At this point , instead of wanting his wife to give birth to a boy , he wants a daughter . This is the turning point of the story .

The story I like most out of the above is Lamb to the Slaughter . This is because the first time I read it , I did not realise the implications in the story , as it was only a bit of leisure reading . After the LA lessons , I realised that a lot of thinking is needed to analyse the story and find the true meaning of it . This is why I like Lamb to the Slaughter , as it is the story in which I realised all the differences , and changed .