I read the email wrongly and thought it was "AYG Appreciation Dinner".

So dinner was not provided. Sheesh. Luckily there are some tidbits in the goodie bags we get and I brought snacks of my own..there was even the mascot soft toy wearing a shirt that says "I made it happen!" as a souvenir, and not forgetting the certificate of participation. :)

Labels: AYG, concerts

Well..in short it didnt completely lived up to my expectations but I think I made the best out of it.

As mentioned earlier I am an "Embarkation IC"..under Transportation along with the Vehicle Access Control people. In the end our roles were sort of combined together so it doesnt matter. 10 (or was it 11) of us in the group and during the functional training day we were assigned different positions. I was unlucky enough to be assigned to Beach Station, which was far far away from the competition venue and whatever welfare the workforce there received. Sad sad. And moved to afternoon shift some more coz I was the only one who can make it in the afternoon for that particular position.

Anyway..my job is to look out for VIPs dropping off at the beach station. There are two drop off points, one is near the venue itself for the athletes and media etc. The other is at my position, exclusive for VIPs. I have to watch out for them along with a protocol person, call the shuttle bus (using handphone!!!! No walkie-talkies for me!!) when i see them approaching to drive them to the venue.
So the job actually depends on whether VIPs are coming to watch beach volleyball, or even whether they actually drop off at the beach station because, due to miscommunication, drivers sometimes drop the VIPs off at the athletes drop off point.

The first day was always more interesting because, well, its the first day. VIPs come to find out what is happening. And more countries are in action = more chef-de-missions or any other officials come to support. I had a relatively busier afternoon, and an interesting person to talk to - the protocol person with me is a SIA pilot. Day 2 was bad with only 2 groups of VIPs. Day 3 was even worst with none.

Therefore..my part-part-time job (part of my part time job as a volunteer) became a Sentosa Information Officer. :S For some strange reason tourists sometimes dont go to the very obvious Information counter 10 metres from me and they come to me instead. So I became half an expert in directing people to wherever they want to go. Which is quite simple if they are leaving from Beach Station. Haha. A few even asked me to recommend them which places to go. o_______O.

Protocol decided that they dont need to station somebody at beach station so the transport team sent down somebody else to work with me..and sigh, i shall not comment much about her. Day 3 and 4 I had very few VIPs to attend to, and she ran off to watch some matches. Well...we are kind of over-staffed anyway. Came early at Day 5 to watch matches..went with the morning shift people..and watched two bronze medal playoffs. Missed the finals because I was on shift, which Thailand won both the boys and girls category.

Food was provided (though the quality decreases exponentially :S) such that by the time we found out workforce (and volunteers) are actually allowed to go to the Games Village a.k.a Swissotel for meals we were almost acting like hungry ghosts (ok, exaggeration). But I went with the protocol and transport people for dinner after our last day of volunteering..food was quite nice :)

One thing I couldnt do while volunteering..perhaps its trading and collecting the pins and badges which most countries have..but I do have one very cool keychain from an Oman guy..it features a 50-year calendar on the back. Whee!! Didnt get to take much pictures also...guess you know why.

Going for an appreciation dinner tonight! There is an "international recording artiste" performing a mini-concert and my head told me who this person is..Yay yay yay :) I shall reveal the person in my next post if i get a picture of (clue:) her.

Labels: AYG

Will be away for a few days :)

Labels: AYG

Haha...just in case there are ppl who are expecting more posts..sorry to say that I might not have the time to blog much..maybe once a week or less than that...haha.

Float progress was supposedly slow wor so we made ourselves work overtime..was planning to write out this post at 4am last nite just to proof this point haha..but couldnt bring myself to do it..Last nite (this morning) ended up sleeping at almost 6am. :x But the work is not that bad lah. At least not for "mundane" people like me. Others may have more difficulties sitting down and doing the same thing for even an hour or two. Lol.

H1N1 is kind of getting out of hand in Singapore..a few cases in NUS, and cases in E.Hall...scary scary. Even Brunei has around 20 cases liao..although all imported cases. And cases among AYG athletes. Eeks. Speaking of which, I am going for functional area training at Sentosa tmr. Eesh..praying that I will come thru all this healthy :)

Hope to write again soon! (I sound like i am writing a letter)

Labels: AYG, float, holidays, Raffles Hall

Ok, its a boring title.

Anyway..the only two things I am involved in now..float is still quite slack eh..coz we junior cladders arent really involved in the design yet (thankfully, coz I am horribly uncreative), so we did a little bit of mass production these few days..not to mention long lunch breaks, late late dinners and lots of watching show while doing work. Heh heh.

Havent been going out very often but have been spending quite a bit of money...most of it went into accomodation fees. Spent quite a bit during last weekend's PS outing wif ex-classmates. Going to spend more when AYG comes....just came back from beach volleyball volunteers briefing and since I am doing morning shift, I am supposed to report to Sentosa by 6.30am. Shuttle bus at Clementi MRT at 5.45am = no public bus at that hour = must take cab or else walk but its a bit far = spend more. Luckily food is provided. But I think my role shud be quite ok..I am an Embarkation I/C who directs the athletes/media/officials etc etc to the correct bus.

One more thing to report..I can officially start looking into SEP programmes already...and plan out vacation internship etc etc..guess why. No prizes for the correct answer though...

Until next time...

Labels: AYG, float, holidays, JDP, Raffles Hall

Woke up at 6.30am..I think I am the earliest bird in Block 5 today. Lol. coz all the room lights are still off.

Training was supposed to be at Temasek Polytechnic which is at Tampines. Damn far....Planned to do some reading for my Chinese Heritage paper during the one-hour MRT ride..but then couldnt find a seat until like, halfway through at City Hall..so did managed to read a bit. Reached Tampines, then couldnt find the bus stop that has the bus that can take me to Temasek Poly (I learn the route from streetdirectory.com)...and registration was supposed to start at 8.30am and I am still stranded at Tampines bus interchange. Ended up cabbing there o_O. Taxi driver uncle was kind enough to waive 20cents off my fare since I din have coins. Heh heh.

As usual whenever I go to some function alone..I can't help but noticing...there really ARE all kinds of people in the world. First part of the training was an introduction to AYG..supposed to serve as a test for the upcoming Youth Olympic Games (I do know the difference between the two btw, not that ignorant..or was there anything in my previous post that was misleading?)...and personally I think they are really rushing it, they didnt really choose the volunteers either, anybody can be one if you can commit to the schedule..i guess they are desperate for volunteers. Only 9 sports are contested and the athletes will stay at Downtown East, "because the place has many things youth will enjoy". Err..ok..we were also told of what kind of jobs will be available for us to take up. Kind of interesting. I never knew there were volunteers in-charge of "brand protection"..i.e warn people who are carrying huge Nike banners if addidas is a sponsor of AYG. Hahahaha.

Then there was a very young lady who came to encourage us to sign up as volunteers for YOG also..I wanted to..but then not sure if I am around or not lar. Then had to attend a "module" on service excellence. We were randomly splitted into groups according to where we were sitting. This is where the "all kinds of ppl in the world" statement come in..We were all from very different backgrounds, there was a teacher, three boys from some youth group in a CC, an office lady, an ITE(?) student who laughed maniacally loudly everytime a joke was told, a MI student..and a NUS year 1 econs girl. Hah hah.

Anyway we came up with some presentations..and there was a role play session when my group was in charge of dealing with a situation in which we have to interact with angry individuals. Lolz. That was frankly speaking the most interesting part of the session. Others are quite dry..can just read one. Very little hands-on practice, theory most of the time. I guess they have to make do with whatever time they have.

Am looking forward to the six days of commitment in June. Provided they don't kick me out if I cannot attend a training/briefing by the venue which I will be assigned to.

Got cheated by the bus guide at the bus stop on my way back..supposedly all bus will stop once/ terminate at Tampines bus interchange. So I board the first bus I see (which is supposed to terminate at Tampines bus interchange...didnt check with the bus driver even though I see the sign in front of the bus saying something abt Bedok Interchange. And..yea, u guessed it. And I was thinking of exploring the new mall next to Tampines MRT, heard a lot abt it on radio this week...and it is such a rare occasion for me to travel to this part of the island you see.

Guess somebody from up there wanted me to go back to my rm quick and study eh?

P.S. I completed 7 days of blogging in a row! :)

Labels: AYG, holidays, updates

Today is the unofficial last day of term. Whoa. Last day of freshman year!! Gosh.

I don't know, everything happened too fast already and I am not sure if i have digested everything. 8 months and almost 10 miserable first year engineering modules. Oh wait, 9, plus the infamous Chinese heritage module.

Speaking of which, today is the last day of working on that dumb project and I have finally submitted it!! Was quite excited about it that I don't care much about the content and I sort of forgived my team mates (all except one) because the contents they came up with, even though it was last minute and they were sort of irresponsible for assuming that I will be the one doing the final compiling and editing (I did it in the end), was quite detailed and I personally know that it needed quite a bit of reading. Like I said, all except one member. Anyway, its over and we shall not talk about it anymore :)

Feeling so good that I finally accepted the fact that even if I don't get to stay back in RH it wasn't a big deal. Lots of volunteer work to look forward to in the hols so it won't be wasted too :). Going for Asian Youth Games volunteer training tomorrow! Even though have to travel all the wayyyyyyyyy to Tampines. In case you don't know, its almost from one end of Singapore to another. But its something I always wanted to do, volunteer at a sports meet, and assuming I don't get to go Melbourne, I am definitely gonna volunteer for the first Youth Olympics in Singapore!! Its a once in a lifetime opportunity! And probably gonna volunteer for some international student service also.

I can sense an eventful vacation coming up :) But first have to get past exams first and score something good :S

Probably the bright and sunny weather influenced m mood :)

P.S I have been blogging everyday since Sunday. Let the trend continue! :D

Labels: AYG, NUS, updates