Biodata

My name is Tng Wee Guan and I was born and bred in Singapore. I attended school at Nan Chiau High School (Primary), Anglo-Chinese School (Independent), then Anglo-Chinese Junior College, and am currently in the National University of Singapore (NUS). Intrigued by laws of mathematics and physics, I have a strong interest in my current field of study, Mechanical Engineering. I like to be thorough in my work and have a keen eye for analyzing. During my course of study in NUS, I have also discovered in myself an enthusiasm for working with others in a team.

In NUS, I started out by attending the Engineering Freshmen Orientation Camp. The following year, I returned to join the Engineering Freshmen Orientation Camp as an Orientation Group Leader. I was also drawn into the Sociology Society, an affiliate of the Faculty of Arts and Social Science in NUS, by my friends. A member of the Organizing Cell of the Society, I assisted in the organizing of activities such as the annual bazaar and the career fair. In my second year in the Society, I headed the Publicity Cell, which was responsible for the design of t-shirts and posters, and liaised closely with the Marketing Cell for sponsorships and funding. I have learnt a lot from my experience in the Society.

I have also interned at CPG Corporation Pte Ltd, where I gained exposure to the field under a Mechanical Engineer. There, I assisted in the design of Air Handling Units for an upcoming government building. I have also acquired good working relations with the staff and other engineers.

After graduation, I hope to excel in the field of Engineering in the private construction sector. I will also be grateful for learning opportunities in the financial sector.

Edited: Added internship details; Used full name [3 Apr 09]; Deleted paragraph 2 [13 Aug 13]

Five

Smallville is an American television series developed by writers/producers Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, based on the DC Comics character Superman, created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. The plot follows the adventures of a young Clark Kent's (Tom Welling) life in the fictional town of Smallville, Kansas, during the years before he becomes Superman (Wikipedia, 2009).

An avid fan of Smallville, I’ve gotten a breathtaking view into Clark’s life, his many loves, his undying morals and stubbornness, even his fantasies or nightmares. What I’m going to write about this morning is non-verbal communication.

Clark was very much in love with a girl called Lana. She was the girl next door, and they’ve braved through many storms/episodes to end up how they are now. Have you heard of Lex Luthor? Lex Luthor was Clark’s arch rival, be it in love or in, well, matters of the world. They were enemies, though they had a rather strong friendship in the earlier seasons of Smallville.

Lex had just found out one of the biggest secrets in the world. He knows who Clark really is, where he came from, all of his abilities and most importantly, all of his weaknesses. Lex was, however, unable to harm the world in any way, because there is nothing left of him but his brain. Furthermore, there was nobody who could trust him enough to work for him (anymore).

Lana went away for a while, training under the toughest she could get her hands on. She wanted to be strong as she saw herself as a liability for Clark. She left Smallville earlier because of an incident where Clark almost lost the world because of her. She uncovered what she thought was Lex Luthor’s plan to become superhuman. She hijacked the plan and paid off the many people to make it hers. She underwent the operation and became somewhat of a –gasp- superhero. Little did she know that she was also a walking Kryptonite sucking superhero. Kryptonite is a kind of rock that came from the planet Krypton (before it was destroyed). It makes Clark vulnerable and weak.

In the beginning, it was near perfect. Having super powers took away Lana’s fears and they could be together, no worries involved. They even fought crime together. It all began when Kryptonite was being used by some of the villains. Clark was weak to Kryptonite, so Lana would take care of it. She began absorbing the kryptonite’s ability to make Clark go weak. It was a matter of time when her kryptonite buildup would kill him. This was a very very sad episode for me. They were like the Sun and the Moon - they could never exist at the same time. There was no chance they could ever be together again.

The non-verbal communication here? Lex’s hatred for Clark.

Lex Luthor had a plan to transform a person into a superhuman, but it was not for himself. He was in a state where it was not physically feasible for him to undergo the operation without killing himself. He was also married to Lana (for a period of time) so he understood her and her longing to be with Clark. The latter was what enabled Lex to come up with such a vicious plan. It made Lana predictable – she would seek strength to void the liability in her, as mentioned – and easy to plan for. So Lana was the intended person for the operation. Lex hated Clark so much that he wanted to take away the love of his life and make it impossible for them to ever be together. Lex also loved Lana, so it was obvious to him what he had to do to deprive them of each other.

Lex Luthor is such a bitter villain!

It also shows us how strong a message can be brought across through non-verbal communication. In fact, in my opinion, it is the strongest message that anyone can bring across. Imagine the suicides and the messages that come with it. Imagine the killings and the messages that they are conveying. Imagine the things people do in the name of love and hatred. Don't you think that non-verbal communications sometimes convey much stronger messages than words can?

Sorry for the long post!

Ref: Search Smallville on Wikipedia.org

Four

Nan Chiau Primary School was my school for 6 years. It was small, very simple, and everyone knew each other. It was a comfortable place to grow up in. After graduating from primary school, everybody went their separate ways. In the leaving cohort there were only around a hundred students, so people were lucky if they went to the same secondary school.

I wasn’t so lucky. I was the only person from Nan Chiau Primary to be posted to Boys’ School X. I haven’t heard of it before and I didn’t even know it was an all boys’ school (till days before the first day of school). It turned out to be a huge school with over 400 students per cohort. It was also a mission school (religious education was part of the curriculum in school).

All along, my parents have been rather open with my choice of religion so I’ve never had any form of religious education before. At the same time, both of them are Buddhists, so you can roughly guess which side I’m skewed towards. So imagine how it was like for me to attend a service and be told that it was compulsory, and to bring a hymnal along to sing songs of praise every Tuesday, and stand through long “sharing” sessions by the teachers every single morning during assembly.

The worst part of it was: I was alone. Only some weeks later, I made some friends and things weren’t as bad as before. There was this boy, Eugene, who was going through the same patch as I. We took it up to the Head of Level (Secondary One) and asked her why the Indian boys were excused and us, not. She gave us the mission school reason and we were simply defeated. After that, I gave in. I sat in services with an open mind and enjoyed all the morals of the stories.

All till Mrs Icantsayhername, my Literature teacher, got off the wrong side of bed one morning and came into class with a mission of her own. She wasn’t into teaching that morning; she simply came and preached to us in an awfully misleading manner. She was trying to put across a simple message: Non-believers convert or you will be going to hell. That hour of lecture was etched deeply in my memories.

Nicholas asked me later during recess, “Roy, how? Are you converting?”

“No, are you?” I asked.

“Yea, don’t convert will go to hell eh,” he replied.

She managed to intimidate a few of my classmates into converting. Nicholas was one of them.

Later in life, I’ve had friends bringing me to services at different churches; I even went to some on my own accord. I’ve come to know the meaning of service and preaching, of hymns and of prayers. I believe Mrs Icantsayhername meant well, but she let her emotions get the better of her and chose to spread the word in a not-so-subtle way.

Is there something else in her behavior that I’m not seeing?

All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.