|
| After a month of torturous amounts of work (remember that list at the beginning of the previous entry?), everything has been dealt with and finally it's the moment we've all been waiting for, Christmas and the winter break! I've never been more relief and happy that it's the winter break. And it makes Christmas so much more meaningful. After all, apart from the specific purpose of Christmas to celebrate Christ's birth, the spirit of Christmas is to share, rejoice, love, spread peace, and be happy, right? So yeah, I'm just happy that it's Christmas and that it's the break and that I won't have to be in school until Jan 4. But on the down side, I couldn't mail all my Christmas cards and stuff on time since I had been so caught up with work that it was only until the moment the break started that I actually started writing my cards (all the cards have been mailed out today...which is late, but meh). Another thing that's worth celebrating and be happy about is my laptop. At about two weeks ago, my laptop broke down. I was using it to finish up my essays and assignments and suddenly I got the infamous blue screen and it crashed. Yep, it was during "hell week", and it couldn't have happened at a better time. Thank goodness I still had my old laptop and that I've never sold it, cause I used that to finished up with everything that I had to do. Anyways, after two more times of that later on that night, the whole thing crashed altogether and my screen was smudged up. I came to the conclusion that it must have been the video/graphics card. Anyways, I found a small computer store that fixed it for me for $200 and I finally got my laptop back yesterday, just in time for Christmas.  What a great Christmas present eh? Recovering something you already had. Moral of the story: treasure what you have! Oh, and another joyful thing to talk about (yep, I'm trying to stay as positive as I can with this entry), though it happened half a month ago. Remember how I mentioned about the birth certificate replacement ordeal in the previous entry? Well right after I typed that entry on December 1 late night/December 2 early morning, on the exact day of my birthday, I got my birth certificate replacement in the mail! What a great birthday present eh? I was so happy. Now I can finally apply for that name change I've always wanted. The only problem I have with the whole thing is that after waiting for so long into the school year, this is the period of time when university applications are submitted, so I would have to talk to the university application agency-or-whatever to see if I could still change my name during this period of time. Ugh, so much complications eh? It's like I keep on bumping into obstacles after another. But I don't care, I'm gonna do it and I'm gonna make it happen. After the reflection I had after the entry I posted to openly discuss the name change issue, I think I've come to the conclusion that my future name would probably be Ivan Martin Mordalfus Matthias (changed the order of the names). I guess I'll bring this entry to an end here. It's Christmas Eve evening and I have to get going, so this is a good area to end this entry. Well before I go, let me just say:
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
God bless you all, ye merry gentlemen! And for those who are non-Christians, nonetheless, God bless you too and may you still have a great time in this most wonderful time of the year. Take care. Before I go, I just wanted to post some pictures. Some of them are Christmas-related, some are samples of my graduation photos, some are just my camwhoring pics, and some are of the Olympic torch relay that passed through the Greater Toronto Area. 
the little "Charlie Brown" (what one of my friend calls it) Christmas tree at my place
me and my grandma with the crystal Christmas tree behind us, at Toronto Eaton Centre (largest mall in the GTA)
some of my camwhoring pics, lol (mind you, it's not very often that I camwhore, so yeah)
the Olympic torch relay, on Yonge Street, near my school
the Olympic torch relay at one of the busiest intersection in Toronto, Yonge and Bloor. notice how in the last pic, the flame was being exchanged between torches, cool eh?
the mounted unit of the Toronto Police, standing by to shield protesters
Toronto City Hall, the final destination of the Olympic flame on that day
a live TV news broadcast, interviewing one of the torchbearers, with Toronto City Hall at the back
my graduation photos, the first one being the one that's going to be appear in the yearbook
| | |
| Well it's been a while since I've blogged and I have a reasonable explanation for that. Now that I'm in Grade 12, the last year of high school, things have been extremely busy. I don't think I've ever mentioned what my courses are for this semester. Anyways, I have: Writer's Craft, Philosophy, and English. I originally had Biology for first period but I chose to drop it because I couldn't catch up with that subject when there's so much going on and I don't even understand half the stuff that was going on anyways. Before I dropped, my mark in that class was 41%, so go figure. I basically used my last spare to drop it, which means that for next semester, if something doesn't work out for me, I can't drop any of my courses any more since I've already used up all of my spares. For those of you who don't know, you need 30 credits to graduate high school in Ontario. Since we have 8 courses per year (4 per semester), that leaves us with 2 spare periods which we could use anytime during high school and I just used up all of them (I used the other last year). Right now, I already have a bunch of assignments that are on hold and waiting to be done since the holidays are coming soon and everything needs to be hand in. I have two major essays that are going to be worth a significant portion of our final marks in English (1000 word essay...not too bad) and Philosophy (around 8 pages...still not sure how to connect my arguments with the philosophies), a short story to write for Writer's Craft that's also worth a significant portion of our final marks (about 8-10 pages), and other little smaller assignments in between. I also got my mid-term report card lately. I'll just show it to you, rather than telling you what I got: 
See, my overall average was 0.3% away from 75%. In Ontario, most universities' cut-off range is 75%. I'm just that close. Good thing the mid-term reports don't count anything at all, so as long as I get at least that 75% by the end of the semester then it's fine, since that's when we have our transcripts submitted. Another thing that ticks me off is that I got a "N" (need improvement) for Initiative in English. Even though that doesn't worth shit, it still pisses me off because it's so BS. If my English teacher thinks I need more initiative, then she should take a look at herself in the mirror first. Seriously, she doesn't do shit. You can ask everyone in my class and they would all tell you that they don't like her. Talking to her is like talking to a stone wall. She's unapproachable, always out of the classroom, doesn't have a lot of reactions to anything. Ugh, you know, if your science/math teacher is dead, you would still have your textbooks. If your English teacher is dead, then you're dead. And considering how 12U English is the most important class in high school (at least for the students heading to universities), it doesn't look too optimistic. But as long as I'm 70% or above, then I'm safe since that's what's required for university. Btw, Writer's Craft is probably the busiest class I've ever taken. There's always something to do...no, it's not just something, it's a number of things to do at the same time. (notice how I censored the teacher's name for English and Writer's Craft? lol) Moving on, in other news, today...is my 19th birthday. Notice how I didn't put this as my first story/paragraph of the blog entry? Yeah, I don't really care much about it. I'm not being like what I was during my 18th, 17th, or 16th birthday, where I was making a big fuss out of it, mourning for how it was coming and trying to avoid it. After having the 18th birthday that marked my adulthood, I don't really care with avoiding any more birthdays since I only did it to mourn about my childhood and teenage in the first place. See, the thing is, for every birthday in the last few years, I've always felt...well, bad for myself as I look back on the way things have been. I guess I have had this sense of envy, knowing that I have grown older and that I haven't gotten to do all the many things that other teenagers, or rather the majority of teenagers, seem to have done. This might sound silly, but you know, all those things you see and hear about with teenagers, whether through what they have said, what others have said, or even what's on the media. Yeah, that... I felt like I've never really lived "my life", and I guess that's why I've always mopped around when it comes to my birthday. For instance, right now, I'm turning 19. Looking back, it was suppose to be the "great 18", and what have I done during this year compared to all those 18-year-olds who have been celebrating their freedom the whole year (doing various shit that's considered legal for them now; I don't think it's necessary for me to list it all)? I feel so little and abnormal when I compare myself to them. But then again, I know I shouldn't compare because everything I've been through is different. Heck, I do have my independence already, I'm living by myself, for crying out loud. But you see, that's the thing; because of that, I AM different. As much as I like to promote and believe in individuality, I can't deny that sub-consciously, I - like many teenagers - would like to "fit in" and all that stupid immature shit, lol. Nevermind, I'm rambling off now, lol. Bottom line is, it's my birthday, I'm another year older. Happy Birthday to me ! And if I wasn't so busy with school, I would celebrate this day like the way I did last year by exercising my new set of rights. In Ontario, you're not allowed to buy cigarettes, alcohol or gamble in a casino until you're 19. Although there's basically everything I am against and that I won't do any of it, except... I think I would like to experience a bit of tipsiness again, lol. But nah, lol. Hmm...what else to talk about? I guess that's basically it until I can come up with whatever I have left out. I know, sad isn't it that the only significant things that seem to pop up in my head when I think about the last couple of months is schoolwork eh, lol? Oh btw, there is something else that's worth mentioning. I still haven't gotten my name change after all this time. I could have gotten it done this day last year, but I waited till I personally met up with my mother to have a real face-to-face conversation and not just on the phone. Over the summer I spoke to her about it and at first she didn't like the sound of it, but eventually accepted and respected my decision after digesting my reasons. But her one condition was that I must reapply for extra copies of my original birth certificate for her to keep before I change my name. Right now, I'm still waiting for those replacement birth certificates, lol. Funny how it has taken so long eh? Speaking of which, regarding the name change blog entry, a few people have wondered why I post such personal things and how they though it was stupid. Well the thing is, I've always done that. Little do some people know, I've always been pretty open about my personal life, for the most part. After all, I don't have much I need to hide from nor be afraid of. I'm always willing to talk about me and my life, and I do it all the time. It's just a matter of whether or not you would listen. And if you listen carefully, everything can be revealed. Before I go, a few autumn pictures that I told that I would like to share with everyone, : 
| | |
| I know I'm not perfect,
I know I have my own problems,
but I do try to be the best person I can be
except sometimes it's just not good enough...
Nothing is ever good enough. | | |
| There is an important matter at stake right now, and I need advice from whomever's reading this. For those of you who don't know, ever since I was 13, I've been determined to have my name changed to something else other than Ivan Ngai Sum Sze. And now the opportunity to do so is finally available now I am "home", of legal age, and having been in the country for the past 12 months (it's part of the requirements to change your name, so I had to wait even after the immediate moment I turned 18). So now's the moment. Before I go on, some of you might not know the reasons why nor the story behind this whole thing, and some of you might have already known it but have simply forgotten it. If you are one of those, the following two paragraphs would be what you need to know about what's going on. I have always hated my father and his side of the family. My father was a coward, worthless and pathetic man who hardly contributed anything to keep the family working. Things with my parents and the in-laws usually won't work out, and in the end, our families separated. My father did nothing afterwards to sustain me and my mother, but instead he ran away. My paternal grandmother has always been part of the problem with the arguments that goes on within the family, and after our families split up, she helped him covered his tracks so that he would not have to take care of us. All of this happened when I was around 3-4. That's the reason why I've never liked my last name/surname/family name/whatever you like to call it, and that's the reason why I would almost never use my full name unless for documentation or formal purposes, and that's the reason why I wanted to drop my family name.
I would not follow my mom's family name because her father was not a good man either and she was never all that proud of her family's history either. She even once said it herself, "all the men in the Cho family are worthless, only the women are those who are strong enough to struggle on their own and do well". To sum it up, let me just say that almost all the men in my family tree are either worthless cowards who are unable to do much to succeed or just simply jerks/a**holes/douchebags/etc. Most of my family tree is shattered, and I'd like to start all over. In this sort of situation, some people would rather not change their names and would rather retribute for the family name and make something good out of it. For my case, I am not too fond of that idea and I would rather start over. Therefore, I would like to change my surname to a completely new name. I would not be changing my name to some random last name and follow some random stranger's last name. I would like to start over, start my own family line, a new family name, and that's what I'm going to do. Now the point of this entry isn't for me to ask whether anyone out there agrees with this idea of mine with changing my name, but it is to ask for advice, opinions, comments and suggestions for what I'm about to do next with the name change idea. Ever since I was 13, I thought of using the name "Mordalfus". A completely fictional name that I got from a book called "Mattimeo" in the "Redwall" book series. There is no special reason why I chose to pick that name; I just like the name for the way it sounds and its uniqueness. However, despite how much I have mentioned this plan of mine to my friends over the past few years, it is until recently when I actually got the application form (I've been holding onto the form for the whole summer now because I need to first inform my mother of this decision of mine since I respect her and I was in HK for a month and a half with her during the summer) that I received a few negative feedback from people, telling me that it's a stupid idea (the name itself) and so on and so forth. It frustrates me at first that nobody said anything about it for all these years until now. And since I am a bit insecured and unconfident sometimes, I'm asking for as much advice as I can, as to whether I should stick with my plan of changing my surname to "Mordalfus", or whether I should pick an alternative name? If I should pick an alternative name, it would most probably be "Matthias" (love that name for a lot of reasons, even wanted it as a middle name, as well as naming a future son that name if I were to stick with Mordalfus) or something else (and that would require lots of planning and thinking all over again if that's the case). So in a nutshell, my final question is what would you think if someone had a family name/surname/last name, Mordalfus? Would you think it's weird or unique? Cool or terrible? Good or bad? This is very important to me since I'm talking about something that would be for the rest of my life, and I only have a short time to do this as I want to get this done before I graduate high school (in my last year of high school this year, remember?). I'd really appreciate it if you have read this all, respond to this entry and take the less-than-a-minute survey (if you really can't be bothered to reply directly, then at least take the survey). Please be honest and respectful. Thank you. Survey URL: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=Qwq32K8MX3pJTZHIW3f5Pw_3d_3d | | |
| On a random note, take a look at the date today, 09/09/09, special eh? Today is also special by the fact that it's the first day back to school for me, and I'm in Grade 12 now. It was not too bad and not that great, was just okay. It felt a bit weird to be back in school actually, especially with the issues I've mentioned in the blog entry that I posted right after school ended. But like I said, after all this time, I'm not gonna let all of my problems get the best of me this year since it's my second year in this school as well as my last, and last in high school overall. I'm trying to keep having faith that this year's gonna be a good year. Anyways, for the first semester I have, Math - Data Management (i might drop out or switch out of it since me and math don't go well, especially if it's first period...), Writer's Craft (a special english class that focuses on writing skills, something that I want so to sharpen my writing skills; the teacher seem really stern though and i don't like that), Philosophy, and Biology. Let's hope everything goes well with school. An undate on my 5-week journey to Hong Kong from July 17 to August 24, visiting friends and family, and I have quite a lot to show and talk about now that I'm back. If I were to describe my feelings for everything about my stay in HK, it would be the word, "change". Because while I was there, I saw that a lot of things have changed and I knew it the moment I saw my siblings again. Oh, how they've grown! They're taller, bigger, and just simply...different. For example, their hands have grown larger than the last time I held them. Ever since I've moved out and my family has moved to a new, better and safer apartment, they've grown a lot more independent and they know how to take care of themselves now. Heh, children are always the easiest way to measure the changes in life. Speaking of the new apartment my family has moved to, my family seems to be doing a lot better over the past year. Family has been gaining some extra money from stocks my stepdad had invested. They've moved to a much better apartment (bear in mind that about 90% of residence in HK are apartments, space cost a lot there). My stepdad's company provide a car for him since they promised a raise a long time ago and now they're giving him a car instead of a raise to make up for it, and it's even a Mercedez-Benz E-class. So everything's been going very well with my family and I'm very happy about that. It's amazing how so much change can happen in one year. It was nice to see my family and how well they're doing, as well as the friends that I've made there and have loved all along (they have different backgrounds, some were raised in HK, some weren't, but most of them weren't raised in the local Chinese culture because of their foreign backgrounds; so if only they were here instead of over there), and had a great time with them. You know, about two years ago, I once said and considered that if the happy things would stay the way they are, then I would give up my dream of "coming home" and stay there with the happiness I've found (in terms of friendship; the only problem I had with my life at that point besides the fact that I was away from "home" was my stepdad, but that's another long story for another day). But I never gave up on my dream of "coming home" because I thought that all of us were leave some day anyways, knowing that we're only there for indefinite periods of time (like i said, most of my friends were from other countries, who were just staying in HK for a indefinite period of time). So my stay there made me wonder about that thought I had two years ago now that I saw that things haven't changed and most probably won't change much any more now that the period of uncertainty while we were "graduating" is over... But in the end, I knew HK would never be my home because there are too many differences there for me to bear compared to what I perceive as my home. I wouldn't mind living over there for a period of time, but certainly not staying there. I'd say that I'm happy with the way things are right now in my life, to live my life at "home" in Canada and visit HK every so often (more like every year) to see my friends and family, so I won't be missing them TOO much. And that's the way it is, and I guess that's what's best, considering and knowing that one cannot have things both ways and in all the ways they want it to be. Now before I go, a few of the best pics I took while I was in HK. You know where to find the rest of my album ("Revisiting HK 2009") for this trip: either on my facebook or my default blog, http://spaces.msn.com/megastorm88. 
The Jumbo Floating Boat Restaurant
And while we were inside, having dinner, there was this throne thing and we took a bunch of pics there (actually, mom made us take a lot more since she liked the background, you should see the full album and you'll know what i mean). Here's one of them, a family photo:
Stanley district and the "Murray House" (a historical building) there
 >
 me and my friends up on Victoria Hill, aka The Peak
and the view up there:
 Victoria Harbour at night:
 | | |
|
