I Got A Job! ...In 2.5 months! As A Fresh Grad! Tips On Getting That First Job

Just as the title indicates -- I got a job!

In complete honesty, it took me 2.5 months total to find one, beginning from the very first week I begun applying for jobs... till now. I finished uni in November, went on vacations until mid-December, and so only started applying mid-December. I spam applied job applications like crazy from December to January, only stopping because I had quite a number of interviews in February to go for (some were several rounds for the same company).

I didn't keep a tally of the number of applications I sent out, but I mostly sent them through job postings on LinkedIn, and got myself 1 interview in December, 3 psychometric assessments and 1 interview to be done in January, and 1 phone call screening and 4 interviews in February. In total, I had about 5 serious companies that gave me face-to-face interviews... and I was beginning to lose hope and was growing jaded up till the very last company, which coincidentally turned out to be the best one that I liked, as well as the one that liked me the most!

I know all these details seem pretty mundane to talk about, but since my blog is like my little diary that I can read and look back on after a while, I think it'd be helpful to remember what my job-hunting process was like.

I won't name the company that I got a job at out of privacy and fear of doxxing (lol), but I will say that it is an MNC and was the only company that offered me a role that was Corporate Communications-related -- which was the exact job scope that I was actively looking out for. I had like 3 Marketing interviews and 1 Strategic Communication interview, and not going to lie I was completely disinterested in the Marketing ones, and only liked the Strategic Comms one because it would have been a government job. Nevertheless, my preference was working in Corporate Comms, and I'm so happy that I got my preferred job scope.

For this job, my hiring timeline was as follows...

(0 week) 21 Jan: Job Application

(+2 Weeks) 3 Feb: HR Phone Screening (a very long one, lol, ALL generic interview questions were asked)
(+10 Days) 11 Feb: Email from HR for Interview

(+12 Days) 13 Feb: First interview with Direct Boss, contacted on evening itself by HR for 2nd round

(+6 Days) 19 Feb: Second interview with Chief Marketing Officer, Third Interview with rest of team

(+5 Days) 24 Feb: Call from HR that I was preferred candidate, but had to wait for interviews to finish

(+4 Days) 28 Feb: Offered expected pay via call from HR
(+3 Days) 2 Mar: Offer letter given, and signed. Background check in progress

(+2 Weeks) 16 Mar: Start of Job

I won't say I'm very experienced in hiring timelines since I'm a fresh graduate, but this was certainly pretty fast! I'll be starting work in 2 weeks too, and I think they liked that I was pretty much available immediately :) I'm really happy about securing this job offer, I got really good vibes from all of the interviews I attended for this company (it was pretty much 3-4 rounds, but since I was so distracted by other interviews on the side it didn't feel like much!) and the team that I'll be working with seems so lovely and aah everything truly excites me! I was very surprised to hear that my fellow teammates (expats) had been working in the company as fresh grads till now (~9 years)... It really instilled in me confidence that there is growth and progression opportunities in the organisation. Here's crossing fingers I have the same positive experience in the company as well!

Pretty proud of myself for getting employed relatively fast in this economy and climate... Especially with the coronavirus going on, and what with the government announcing a likely oncoming recession. I also got the job at a very reasonable (and to some fresh grads, perhaps even above-average) pay which is even more motivational when it comes to wanting to do well in this job, haha. Plus, I was already quickly losing stamina when it came to preparing for and going to job interviews, even though I may have only went to 5... So I was very lucky this job offer came at an opportune time!

Here's hoping for the best :)

Anyway, I just wanted to write out a couple of tips that I believe can aid fellow job-seekers as well... or fresh grads looking for jobs in general!

Things I Learned as a Fresh Graduate Job-Hunter

#1: Apply for Government Jobs Waaay Ahead!
Everyone says this, but I paid no heed lol. I couldn't, anyway, since writing my honours thesis during the months of Aug-Oct was so hectic and drained me completely. Either way, since I managed to go for at least 1 government interview, I can at least say I did try for it but it was not meant to be at this time. The main point here is that the civil service can take ages to respond to your application, and by the time they schedule an interview with you, you may have already gotten offered by an MNC. I actually have two government job interviews coming up, but I'll be cancelling them since I prefer the MNC offer more. I believe these stat boards only contacted me once their applications closed (which they leave up the job posting for at least a month for those interested to apply), so... yep, definitely a really long waiting time to even be shortlisted in the first place. Side-note, all government jobs require written tests, and boy they are draining...

#2: Be Clear and Consistent in Your Internship Experiences
I have a little inkling that I didn't manage to clinch the marketing roles I interviewed for, despite delivering a good interview (as relayed to me by my interviewers, lol), was because I lacked in marketing experience. My internships varied across advertising, design and corporate comms, but I didn't have much marketing experiences. Fortunately my corporate comms role saw need for a combination of all my various experiences, and that was why they hired me. But I believe for marketing roles it's more concentrated, and they really want to have someone with actual marketing experience. Anyway, I was still consistent in performing in comms-related roles. For myself, I did not realise I was interested in corporate comms until my very last internship stint where I was exposed to such work, so it worked in my favour still, I guess. So it's still wise to decide on a certain industry/expertise from the start and stick to it all throughout your uni life as you do internships. In other words, try to have a goal!

#3: If Negotiating For Higher Pay, Make Sure You Have Internships to Back It Up
Luckily for me, I did not have to negotiate for my pay, since they agreed to it on the spot. But I have a feeling that if I did not have my three internships to back me up, they would not have agreed to it as readily. During one's university education, often students make the mistake of paying too much attention to their academics and not embellishing their CV with actual internship experiences. All my summer vacations in NUS were spent doing something of note: FASS summer school, or internships. I never wasted any particular vacation doing nothing, haha. I think this foresight really helped me when clinching my first job :) So current undergraduates, please re-think doing nothing during uni vacations and go get an internship instead!

#4: Take Advantage of University Resources/Career Counselling/Resume Reviews
Since I was rather free in the month of December, my boyfriend actually pushed me to pay a visit to NUS' career services to get my resume checked out so I could improve it to get shortlisted for interviews. At first I was kind of disgruntled and reluctant to do it (out of pure laziness lol), but since I was rotting at home anyways, I scheduled an appointment with a FASS career advisor (they have designated ones for different majors) and sent her my resume in advance so she could make the necessary/edits and comments. To my surprise, the session was actually very productive! She gave very good advice and criticism, and I heeded all of her feedback and changed my resume accordingly. Not sure if it's related (or more timing-related), but I actually got a lot more interviews afterwards. Instead of copying and pasting job descriptions of the jobs that I had done into my resume, I manually wrote down all my achievements and described them in numerical terms. My resume definitely looked way more attractive afterwards, and several interviews actually commented on how strong my resume was!

I Graduated!: Mini Reviews of All The Modules I Have Ever Taken

Just as written in the title: I graduated! From NUS!

To top it all off, I did it with First Class Honours. I'm still unbelievably excited and overwhelmed by this feat. I'd never imagined I would be able to do so -- in fact, I never even set a target to graduate with FCH in any capacity throughout my entire university life. I never wanted that pressure, and so I told myself Second Upper would be enough. But then I ended up maintaining my FCH from the very first semester through the last semester... and while I did not like that added stress of "oh, but I technically *could* maintain it...", being able to successfully graduate with it is just so incredibly satisfying. It's really funny how the most amazing things happen to me by chance, though I'd like to think maybe, just maybe, some little hard work went into it as well. I worked so hard for my Honours Thesis, and I'm so glad to see it paid off.

If any stranger is reading this off the Internet, and wondering why I'm graduating in December/January, here's a short recap: I came from a polytechnic, so I get credit exemptions that are worth 1 semester. Hence I only needed to do 3.5 years to get my honours :)

Since I never finished doing reviews for my modules (I only bothered doing reviews for the first year, lol) I thought this might be helpful for those who are still debating/will debate in the future what modules to take in NUS. :)

These will only be mini-reviews though, I don't have the time or energy to go into detail too much!

Year 2 Modules

SC2212 Sociology of Deviance: [Grade: A] I did this during FASS summer school (June/July), and I would highly recommend doing so if you have the chance. As far as I know, this module is *always* offered for summer school. You'll get to hang out with mostly foreign exchange students who come here for summer school, make international friends, and also take advantage of the bell curve because students on exchange don't really care about getting As :P The module itself was very interesting, Prof Gana is always lovely and super engaging as always, and there was even a field trip to a halfway house. I deeply enjoyed it. The workload was considerably light considering it was only an 8 week program. There was a test and group project assignment. I'm sure there is more but I forgot the exact details lol.

GEH1014 Samurai, Geisha, Yakuza As Self Or Other: [Grade: A-] I enjoyed this module because of the very interesting subject matter, and it was relatively easy to do well in. You could bring one sheet of notes into the exam hall. Also, make sure you get good group mates for the group project!

GEQ1000 Asking Questions: [Grade: CS] Not much comments for this one. Very easy and chill module. Compulsory and only CS or CU grade. Can't go very wrong here.

LAJ2201 Japanese 2: [Grade: B+, but I S/Ued] Took this in preparation for my student exchange in Tokyo. The senseis are all so lovely but I cannot stand the environment of learning Japanese in NUS. I experienced being talked down on by a classmate who thought he was much better than me. Turned me off so much I didn't want to enter such an environment again. Also, the workload was incredibly heavy. All language mods will have this kind of workload so I didn't want to have to juggle this with higher-level mods as I grew into Y3 and Y4. In my experience, language mods are very hard to score in unless you are extra vocal and put in a lot of work into the module.

SC2210 Sociology of Popular Culture: [Grade: A+] I very much enjoyed this mod. Very manageable workload. Theories are very straightforward and easy to understand. I was taught by Prof Josh(ua Kurz), and it was his first time teaching this mod. I almost chose him as my HT supervisor in Y4 because I wrote my HT on popular culture, but I ended up choosing Prof Ivan (Kwek) instead.

SC3101 Social Thought & Social Theory: [Grade: B-] My grade for this module absolutely devastated me lol. I don't think I did that badly for the exam, but I believe everyone scored more or less the same marks (going by our assignment grades) and so 1-2 marks difference would cause a huge change in grade. The prof provided an opportunity to get some extra credit for attending a book talk, but I personally couldn't make it because I was having another lecture at the time. I feel like that put me at a major disadvantage :( Just be diligent for this, guys. Not my favourite module, but it was compulsory for Soci majors.

Rest of the modules: Done at my overseas student exchange at TUFS. I cleared three 3000-level Soci modules, one 2000-level Soci module, and two 2000-level Japanese Studies modules. Very pleased with being able to overload during my exchange!

Year 3 Modules

JS2225 Marketing and Consumer Culture in Japan: [Grade: B+, but I S/Ued] Very do-able module, thought I would get an A coz I got consistent As in my individual assignments but I guess my group project or exam must have pulled me down :/ I really like Prof Hendrik as a JS professor though. He's this cute jovial German dude that makes me want to put in effort into the module because he's so passionate about what he teaches. I liked him so much I ended up choosing to take another class by him next semester (a level 3000 module).

SC2214 Media and Culture: [Grade: A-] I thought I would get a B+ for this considering how much I didn't like the module lol. Nothing personal. I genuinely like the professor (Prof Kiven) he's very friendly and recognises me when I'm in school and always says hi, but I just do not enjoy the way he teaches this module... It's very abstract, very theoretical, too "out there" for me. To me the content he teaches for this module can be taught as a level 3000, not 2000 lol. I came from a mass comm background in NP so maybe I'm critical/too used to learning other types of media-centric schools of thought. Just was not my thing at all. Module was easy to score in though, I guess... I really did my best in doing all the readings and making my own notes and trying to understand them through their "abstract"-ness lol.

SC4221 Comparative Analysis of Human Rights: [Grade: B] Did not enjoy this module because of the professor for this sem (to my understanding, he is no longer teaching it... for now?). He's very biased towards the more vocal ones in class. He also marked my test down because I provided my own understanding of a [political] news piece in Singapore (where I supported a government initiative) and he wrote comments on my paper indirectly insinuating I could not critically think about politics because of my support... He was very vocal about being pro-opposition in class, so... He also did not make an effort to provide clear instructions on how to write the final term paper, which pissed a lot of students off. I don't find the way he marks fair at all, because of his incredible bias-ness.

SC4227 Gender, Sex and Power: [Grade: A] I LOVED this module. I love Professor Eric as well. Highly recommend for those interested in Gender studies. And no, you don't have to take the level 2000 Gender Studies mod before doing this module. In fact, a friend of mine took the level 2000 mod AFTER she took this level 4000 one. The level 2000 one is taught by Prof Adelyn and my friend does not have positive comments about her as a lecturer...

JS3222 Japanese Business Management: [Grade: B+] OK, I did expect this B+. I didn't really put too much of an effort into this module for god knows what reason, but I still enjoyed it because of Prof Hendrik. He really loves what he teaches! That inspires me.

SC3213 Visual Ethnography: [Grade: B+] A lot of hands-on work every week, and group discussions. But this is just Prof Ivan's teaching style. He rather have students group together to formulate discussions and then present at the end of every lecture/tutorial. I don't think he gives out bad grades but I have a feeling because everyone gets good grades that's why the bell curve might be quite tight and I didn't get my expected A lol.

SC4205 Sociology of Language & Communication: [Grade: A+] I chalk my A+ up to a ton of hard work for this mod, ok. This module is HEAVY on the theoretical parts. Good if you have a background in Linguistics, but most people don't. Even my friend who minored in Linguistics had a bit of trouble digesting all of it. I was also quite shameless ah and frequently emailed Prof Elliott with all of my questions, to which he always answered promptly and lengthily. I really did my best for this module and so I went from understanding nothing to understanding... most of it?

SC4226 Cultural Production: [Grade: A-] Highly recommended and hands-on. Very fun because I had the best group mates. We performed a skit as part of a group project, and then later got to write feminist poetry to submit as part of a group assignment. I also got to write about the fandom of my favourite Japanese-rock band, The GazettE, for a term paper. Prof Ivan marked it, wrote comments on it that would forever change my life, and then returned it to me. Basically he changed the way I (sociologically) thought about the fandom, opened up greater perspectives, and from that moment on I knew he was going to be my HT supervisor. Lol. Poor Prof Ivan... Hahaha

Year 4 Modules

SC4101 Practising Anthropology and Sociology: [Grade: A-] This module is mandatory. The advice for this mod is always to: GET GOOD GROUP MATES. It's a very chill module, honestly. Choose a topic that is EASY and do not be overly ambitious. Choose an easy topic and do it well. My group did Healthy Eating Initiatives in NUS. LOL.

SC4401 Honours Thesis: [Grade: A-] I slogged my guts out for my HT so I think if I did badly for it I would cry. Very thankful I got an A-. I cooped myself up in the NUS library from 9am-8pm daily and met Prof Ivan once a week to talk about my thesis. It was hell, and a nightmare, but it was the greatest ordeal and academic rigour I'd ever gone through in my measly twenty-three years of living and it was glorious.

I hope all of these mini reviews were semi-helpful to anyone on the Internet, in some way or another.

And so...

Ta-daa! I graduated. In 3.5 years. Majoring in Sociology and minoring in Japanese Studies. Went on 1 overseas student exchange to Tokyo, tried out FASS summer school, did 2 internships throughout the years, even accomplished writing out a 12,000 word Honours Thesis at the end of it all.

I did it!

SEP experience at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (TUFS) 東京外国語大学

Hi there!

I'm currently an NUS student on an exchange programme at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (TUFS). I decided I want to document any helpful information on this blog regarding my student exchange programme (SEP), as well as for me to remember the (administrative) details of my SEP as well :) I think information like costs etc are very helpful in general, so hopefully this helps anyone who comes across it as well!

Some info about me:

Major: Sociology
Minor: Japanese Studies
Semester that I'm on SEP: Y2S2
***however I was a poly student, so I get 1 semester exempted! Technically I'm in my Y3S1 right now, but for convenience purposes, let's go with Y2S2

While applying for my SEP at NUS
I applied in my Y1S2 (the first semester you can apply for SEP). NUS students are given 5 options each, so I chose: TUFS, Ritsumeikan, Rikkyo, Kwansei Gakuin and Uni of Cali. We can't rank our choices but I placed TUFS as the first one anyway, because I knew a senior who went there and since she seemed like she had a great experience I felt more familiar in a sense with that uni. Not sure if my "ranking" helped at all though.

Ritsumeikan and Rikkyo are also in Tokyo, while Kwansei Gakuin is in Osaka. I was leaning towards getting a uni in Tokyo because I prefer the city, and there's a million and one things you can do in Tokyo, whether it's shopping, eating, Disneyland, or day trips to surrounding prefectures. NUS is partner with many other universities in places like Kyoto etc too but those areas felt too country for me.

Anyway, I submitted my application on 28th February and got an email on 12th May, saying to check my allocation on the student portal. No interviews whatsoever, which I think is the norm in FASS.

And I got allocated TUFS! :)

Preparing for SEP
I only received an email on 15th September after that to start preparing my SEP documents to send over to TUFS, and to submit them in November. So I had plenty of time to find a professor to write my letter of recommendation for me, do my health tests, fill up all the necessary forms for my visa etc. Pretty straight forward.

After submitting my forms in November, I basically waited until next year when I received my acceptance email from TUFS in late January, then I had to wait again until late February for TUFS to courier the official acceptance letters to NUS. I only managed to apply for my visa in the first week of March I think, but the Japan embassy in SG is quite fast and got me my visa within like 5 working days or so.

It was a pretty tight and stressful moment, because I was flying off to Japan on 18th March to tour Japan for 2 weeks first with my boyfriend, before moving into my uni dorm on 1st April. So I was glad the visa process was quite fast.

It was around this time that my Japanese student buddy (Akane) in TUFS emailed me as well, and we managed to exchange Facebook & LINE information so I could ask her plenty of questions.

About Module Mapping
I know NUS recommends us to do module mapping for our classes at our partner uni waaay in advance, but I only managed to do so once Akane linked me to all the right places to look at the available classes for the upcoming semester. Can you imagine all these while (from last year May till I got to know Akane) I was just left wondering if I could even transfer any valid classes back to NUS for my SEP semester LOL. It was a rather terrifying long wait!

Anyway, I just submitted any potential classes I thought would fit and by the end of it all, I had submitted about 19 options :') The max module mapping requests you can send is 20 btw, but I kept changing my mind and some of the classes I sent for got rejected for the level I wanted, etcetc.

To keep it short, classes in Japan work differently from classes in NUS (or Singapore in general). You actually get to shop for/try out the classes for the first 2 weeks, and only register for the classes you want after that. Classes in TUFS are 1.5hours each, once a week, and are worth 2 credits. Applying for classes is very easy, you don't have to fight for slots or anything, you will usually get the classes you choose.

16 credits in TUFS = 20 MCs in NUS (one semester's worth).

I ended up taking 10 classes in TUFS (all taught in English). So it's about 20 TUFS credits = 24 NUS MCs.

This is my TUFS timetable:

Here's a brief breakdown for my NUS module mapping.

TUFS
12 credits SC (8 credits L3000, 4 credits L2000)
8 credits JS
20 credits total

=

NUS 16 MC SC (L3000 12 MC, L2000 4 MC)
8 MC JS
24 MC total

It's kind of complicated how it's calculated, but I had many email threads with the SEP coordinator about it so hope this helps if anyone needs it!

About my TUFS dorm

You can't choose which TUFS dorm building you get allocated to, they have 3. All dorms are single rooms. I got allocated to Dorm 1, which was the first building that got built, aka the oldest. Don't be phased by that though, the facilities are all pretty clean and well-kept.

The differences between the 3 dorms is this: Dorm 1 and 3 have a private bathroom (toilet + bathtub/shower) in each of our rooms. Dorm 2 only has a toilet, no bathtub/shower, you have to shower in communal toilets instead.

Monthly rent for dorm 1 is 22,000 yen, dorm 2 is 21,000 yen, while dorm 3 is 46,000 yen (+ a one-time 30,000 yen fee for card key money).

They're pretty lax about visitors for dorm 1 and 2, and friends/family come visit or sleep over all the time. For dorm 3, they're super strict. There are residence managers and I've heard that visitors have to sign in each time they enter. I've also heard that it's because it's so new, so they want to maintain it well and make sure no one ruins the building.

Here are some photos of my room.

When you first enter:

 

There's a mini-kitchen (stove, sink) and a nicely-sized fridge.

Opposite my mini-kitchen (where the bagpack is hanging) is my toilet.

My study table.

Left: My bed. Only fits 1 person lol.

Right: My closet. It's actually right by the door when you first enter my room.

My balcony.

& the view in Spring! You can see cherry blossoms. Taken on 1st April when I first moved in.

Administrative Stuff

As for things like registering for national health insurance, making your bank account, getting your residence card, registering at the city hall etc, all of these things will be done on your orientation day. TUFS actually will get a bus to charter the exchange students to the city hall to settle all the administrative stuff.

As for phone, it's up to you. Usually Japan only has SIM cards for 1 year or 2 year contracts, and they don't have anything less than that. I personally didn't see the need for making phone calls in Japan, so I decided to get a data SIM. Tourist data SIMs in Japan, the ones being sold at places like Yodabashi Camera or Bic Camera, are really expensive and not worth it.

After doing some online research, I decided to get mine from Sakura Mobile. It's a 7GB data monthly plan, and costs about 3980yen monthly. There was a 4420yen registration fee though. You can choose from 2 payment methods: credit/debit card online, or convenience store payment (they'll send you a smart card for you to do so).

Water + Electricity Bills

Here's the fun part. I'm also still keeping tabs on my spending, so jotting it down is great.

Water bill for 1st Apr - 9th May: 1,978 yen
Electricity bill for 1st Apr - 16 Apr: 2,026yen
Electricity bill for 17 Apr - 17 May: 4,058 yen

Food in the TUFS cafeteria

Relatively cheap. My favourites are the Butamiso Yakiniku Don, or Spaghetti Meat Sauce. Usually only 300+ yen each. I also love the chocolate & strawberry cakes, just 108 yen!

Grocery Shopping
Most people do their grocery shopping at Ito-Yokado, a supermarket at the Musashi-Sakai station. Musashi-Sakai station is 2 train stops away from Tama. It's also the station where you'll have to take to if you wish to switch trains to head to Shinjuku.

My grocery shopping cost fluctuates, but I usually spend 1,000 - 2,000 yen each time.

Monthly Budget

Personally, I've set aside 2k SGD for every month, so I expect my exchange (Apr - July) to cost 8k in total. I believe it'll fluctuate from month to month, since some months I do more heavier travelling than others. I did an impromptu day trip to Nikko during Golden Week and the transport was crazy -- I believe the Shinkansen from Nikko to Shinjuku cost 4,000 yen.

In general, transport is very costly. Going to the city area (e.g. Shibuya) costs 540 yen ($7) one-way. I believe transport takes up a lot of my budget lol.

Train passes aren't practical because 1) as exchange students, we are not entitled to student passes. 2) no train pass makes sense for the lines that we take from uni into town, since we have to keep switching to different lines.

If you plan to do many day trips out of Tokyo, especially on days where you have no classes, be prepared to allocate more budget for it. I'm also into going to concerts, and concert tickets ain't cheap! Really depends on what you like to do in general.

Left: Day trip to Chichibu (Shibazakura festival)

Right: Day trip to Nikko (Toshogu Shrine)

Shopping

My favourite places to shop are at the Forever21 in Shibuya and Shinjuku lol. yes I'm basic af. But I also feel that the Forever21s in Japan have fashion specially catered to the kawaii Japanese women demographic, and the items they sell are significantly sweeter or more harajuku edgy. I love it! Plus, I always buy from the sales section, and get crazy good steals all the time :) I've gotten tops for 540 yen, 299 yen, 1-for-1 promotions, cute hair ties for free, etc.

Just some stuff I've bought (yes, I love pink):

Also, I managed to set up my Yahoo Auctions account to purchase stuff from there :) It's relatively easy to link it to your Japanese bank account to pay for stuff. I've bought Shellie May/Duffy stuff and Dua Lipa concert tickets through it. Absolutely hassle-free!

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I'll add more to this post in time to come :) Feel free to ask any questions!

NUS FASS (AY2016/2017 Semester 1 & Semester 2) Modules Review

Hello!

I'll be beginning my journey as a Year 2 student in FASS once school re-opens in a few weeks. Since it's going to be bidding season soon, thought I should finally get round to giving reviews of the modules I've taken so far! Since I took them some time back, I'm not going to be giving super detailed reviews, but hopefully they're adequate enough for you to help you make your decisions as to which modules to take :)

AY2016/2017 Year 1 Semester 1

FMA1204C (Saving Face: Freshmen Seminar) 

Super enjoyed this module. Protip, freshmen seminars can be taken to replace FAS1101 as a module, and I've heard dreary/very sian reviews about FAS1101. I think freshmen seminars are so much more worth it-- no tutorials because all you have are 3 hour long seminars every week. TBH, I much rather have seminars than do the usual lecture-tutorial style, because seminars feel much more intimate and relaxed. My seminar only had 10 students (including me) in it, so meeting every week made us get to know each other pretty well over the semester. My tutor was Ms Judy, who is suuuper cute and bubbly and lively and sooo fun to have discussions with. One of our seminar sessions even had her taking us out on a lunch date to The Royals Bistro in UTown where we exchanged our essay drafts with our peers over lunch and gave comments while we ate our lunch. And yes, the lunch was free!!! HAHAHA.

Anyway, the concepts were easy to understand, and very interesting. I was initially skeptical of how interesting the content could be because "saving face" as an idea sounded so abstract and out-there to me, but then I realised that it actually was very applicable in everyday life. Plus, we study how people of different cultures/backgrounds interact with different "face-saving" techniques, and it really helped me understand why sometimes misunderstandings occurred due to miscommunication.

Oh yeah, and this module has no exam, just small tasks e.g. forum postings to be completed every other week. Despite the almost weekly tasks though, I never felt they were a chore at all. So the whole module to me was very chill and enjoyable. I quickly recommended my friends to take Freshmen Seminars, after this experience -- I think you'd enjoy taking a seminar over FAS1101 any day. Plus, it's only available to freshmen for a reason! The tutors all know we are freshmen so they take care to ease us into uni life :)

Final Grade: A-
I believe I did well in all my components except for the final essay we had to submit, in which I believe I got something like... 69? Due to the way I structured it. I was rather disappointed with my final essay result, but I got to learn and improve from it anyway.
Workload: Very manageable.
Verdict: Would take again if I needed it to clear another requirement, highly recommend.

GES1028 (Singapore Society) 

I still have no idea why I chose to take this GES over the other GESes (which, now looking at them, they seem so much more interesting) but I guess I saw that this Singapore Society mod was offered by the Sociology department so I thought it'd be more relevant to my major. TBH, lectures were pretty dry, and the prof (Adelyn Lim) just read off the slides, so you could have survived not attending any lecture at all. I still went for every one though, because I study easier when I've sat through a lecture on it. Also, I happened to be taking SC1101E this semester, and the topics they taught in these 2 mods every week were largely the same. E.g. if this week they were talking about Race in Singapore Society, they were also teaching about Race in SC1101E lecture that week. Idk why they were so similar but that really helped re-enforce concepts for me, haha. Also made studying a whole lot easier. But because this was a GES mod, they didn't make the content too sociological. So it was all quite factual to me, like studying from a social studies textbook or something (we learned about programmes the government put in place to help with e.g. encouraging birth rate and such)

The mod was quite chill to me, just one mid-term (closed book, timed) essay, one pair/group presentation, and final closed book examinations (they give you a few essay qns, you have to choose 2 to write on type). I did relatively well for my mid-terms and pair presentation (I think I got A+ for both of these components) but I mis-read one of the essay questions for my final closed book examinations and I believe that jeopardised my eventual A+.

My tutor was Shane Pereira and I really enjoyed his tutorials! Basically we just sat around and discussed the tutorial qns and... that was it. Just really fruitful tutorial discussions, no whiteboard, no nothing. Except for the fact that I got an 8am tutorial slot because I had no other choices, so... yeah, that sucked. Still, I made it for every tutorial except for one time where I woke up late and came in at 8.30.

Final Grade: B+
Workload: Manageable.
Verdict: Take if you're interested in studying Singapore society from a sociological perspective. Quite dry TBH, but I guess very do-able, and I guess my 8am tutorials didn't help. I think there are better/far more interesting GES mods out there, plus there are ones out there with no examinations at all. But I think it was relatively easy to score in this mod if you're good with essays and pure memory work. I'm still quite sad over ruining my finals :(

SC1101E (Making Sense of Society)

I wanted to major in Sociology, so of course I had to take this module hahaha. Everyone around me (including friends who wanted to/are majoring in Sociology) mutually agreed that the intro mod for Sociology sucks. Like, it turns you right off from Sociology... or to even consider it as a major. No offence to the profs. Saroja and Lou were the two lecturers for this sem, they were both pretty interesting individually (Saroja liked to give personal recounts, Lou liked to crack lame jokes that had the entire lecture hall go deadpan and cricket lol). Still, I think the intro mod serves to give you a basic idea of what Sociology is about, so if you find yourself not interested in the lectures, you probably shouldn't major in Sociology, haha.

My tutor was Ms Ritz (short for Ritsuko), a Japanese masters student who was sooo cute. I really enjoyed her tutorials, she gave Japanese perspectives of every topic we discussed about. We were expected to do readings beforehand and discuss tutorial questions in class, so we would get into groups and share our opinions etc. Ms Ritz was really helpful and answered whatever questions we had after class too.

Mid-term was fairly easy, just short answer questions. Other than that, we had to submit a response piece on a piece of literature we read, and then we had final closed book examinations. Sociology exams are always just verbal diarrhoea to be honest. As long as you can form concrete arguments with all the memorising you did, you'll do fine.

Final Grade: A+
Workload: Manageable.
Verdict: Possible to score well if you put effort in studying. Helps if you have an actual interest in Sociology, otherwise I've seen friends who did poorly in the mod just because it bored them and they were still trying to decide on their majors. Take if you want to know what majoring in Sociology might be like.

SC2101 (Methods of Social Research)

A required mod to take if you want to major in Soci. Despite that, it's one of my fav mods to take this sem even though I'm not a mathematical person. At all. But Dr Feng is possibly one of my most fav profs ever. He taught this mod with Dr Tan, who is interesting in his own right, but Dr Feng really takes the cake lol. He's sooo funny and always tells us over and over again, "Many students tell me, 'Dr Feng, I don't understand why it's calculated like this'. But it's fine if you don't understand this calculation. You don't have to force yourself to. Just blindly memorise and do it like this". Hahaha. I love his cute China accent when he speaks in English too, so endearing!

I took a research method mod back in poly in Mass Comm and I hated it, but this mod was infinitely better and was sooo much easier. We had to use the SPSS program in the computer labs (again, I learned it back in Mass Comm too) but Dr Feng guided us every step of the way and so even though I felt lost a few times, he always answered our questions promptly and helped us through it :)

Final Grade: A-
Workload: Super manageable. The first assignment was critiquing a literature review, followed by a qualitative interview on someone you find interesting (I did it on my own dad haha), and then a quantitative assignment on two areas you found interesting (I think I did on Gender & Politics?).
Verdict: If you're not a math person, make sure to ask many questions! I somehow managed to attain an A- even though I think I did the least studying for this mod (I uh, failed to plan my studying schedule properly and left the least time for this mod, oops. Probably because it was half math?). I'd like to believe that Dr Feng inspired me to try my best for finals even though I didn't particularly enjoy statistics haha. Having a good prof really works miracles. He did make sure to emphasise that he didn't want to turn any of us off from statistics this early on in our academic life lol.

GER1000 (Quantitative Reasoning)

A required stats mod for all NUS students. I had no choice in this. ;( This was totally different from the Soci stats mod above, and I didn't enjoy GER1000 very much because... to put it plainly... I am not a math person. I got lost quite a bit, it always takes me a while to understand mathematical concepts. I believe I tried my best but for mid-terms I just passed with a 7/14 LOL. I didn't even understand where I went wrong because I thought my calculations were right! So I was freaking out about my finals, but I heard that the group project REALLY helps to pull up your grade. I was even googling about the possibility of having to re-take GER1000 coz I was THAT scared, lmao!!!

My group project was relatively smooth, thanks to good groupmates. I took my GER1000 at an Engineering block (all because my friend said that it'd be good to take it with Engineering people wtf) sooo it helped that 3 of my groupmates were Engineering students? The other 1 was majoring in Architecture, haha. Anyway, just coz I wasn't good at stats doesn't mean I didn't contribute, ok. I did help contribute 1/3 of the questions we submitted + I stepped up to design the poster, lololol. (desperately wants to feel useful for this stats mod)

Final Grade: B- (but I S/Ued it)
Workload: Manageable in the sense that if you understand the concepts then the tutorials shouldn't be hard for you, I guess. LOL. I was pretty much lost a lot of the times so the tutorials were really difficult for me?
Verdict: We have no choice in this matter but to take it, sooo... suck it up and try to understand as much as possible. Do well for your group project, usually tutors will help us with our group project score to give us a higher grade overall :)


AY2016/2017 Year 1 Semester 2

EN1101E (Intro to Literary Studies)

I really liked this module, though I only took it to clear my FASS basket. I've always had a keen interest in Literature in secondary school despite never taking it as an O level subject (I chose Pure History instead). I enjoyed analysing the poems they chose for us to read in this mod, as well as The Great Gatsby text that we had to read. TGG is really simple and full of symbolism to analyse, sooo. I didn't particularly enjoy the other two books (Waiting for Godot and An Artist of the Floating World), but I get that they wanted to expose us to different types of texts/authors.

I also really enjoyed my tutorials, my tutor was Mr Tan (Teck Heng) and he really tried to make the most out of our 45 tutorials every week :) It was usually just tutorial group discussions based on the questions he prepared for us. I enjoyed his enthusiasm and helpfulness!

Final Grade: A+
I actually ran out of time in my finals and missed out on answering a 4m short answered question, wtf. Finals was MCQ + short answer + 1 essay qn. Still, I think my A+ for my timed mid-term essay + my paper done on TGG (I wrote about the emancipation of women in the 1920s) helped salvage that.
Workload: Manageable. I actually read the books pretty late and I never actually finished reading Waiting for Godot, but as long as you have a good idea of what it's about I guess you're good to go? I read a lot of sparks notes equivalent type of websites haha.
Verdict: You'll do well if you have an interest in literature.

GET1035 (Critical Perspectives in Advertising)

Easiest mod ever. Maybe it's because I came from a media background and interned at an advertising agency before, so I was pretty much used to all the media concepts and terms. Plus, since this was a GET, they didn't even use that much technical terms, and made things very easy to understand in layman terms. Ms Dazzelyn (she was my tutor also) was really cute, she's so animated and always tries to get the class participating in discussions. There were 2 industrial talks where she invited industry professionals to speak on their experiences, and I thought those were really helpful.

Tutorials were just watching a lot of advertisements (since everyone took turns to share their favourite advertisements), so that was fun. Try to participate in class because I think Ms Dazzelyn appreciates that - my class was damn quiet so I ended up speaking up a lot every other week haha. I think she noticed coz all of us had participation cards where we had to grade our participation for every class, and when I gave myself three stars she would often add two more stars and be like, "thanks for participating!!!" Hahaha so cute.

Final Grade: A
Mid-term was electronic MCQ + short ans quiz, I think I was the first one to finish the quiz lol. I was even wondering why no one was leaving the lecture theatre yet because we had an hour+ to do it but I think I took like half an hour? Anyway, I think I scored pretty well for it in the end.
There was also individual presentation (present on your favourite advertisement and why) + group project/presentation (you guys have to choose another favourite advertisement related to the topic you chose... mine was Globalisation and New Media). My groupmates were really chill, they knew everyone had their own commitments and I think we finished our project in less than a week, hahaha. Granted, we're only given about 1-2 weeks to prepare for our group project from the moment it is announced.
The final exam was electronic MCQ + short ans + 1 essay qn. Very do-able as long as you study/memorise the relevant concepts and apply them accordingly to the advertisements given to you.
Workload: Super manageable. I never had to prepare anything for class! I didn't even do my readings, haha.
Verdict: Take this if you want a chill GET. Plus you get to sit in an air-conditioned room and watch advertisements for 45 minutes each week lol.

JS1101E (Introduction to Japanese Studies)

Took this to clear my basket, but ended up enjoying it so much I actually chose to minor in Japanese Studies after this! I heard that the Sem 1 lecturer was better, but I got Dr. Hislop in Sem 2 and I was pretty happy with his lectures anyway. I enjoyed every lecture I went to, because he always is so animated in his teachings and he's sooo enthusiastic -- you can tell this man really is passionate about what he teaches. He gives lecture slides but ONLY on the Saturday of the week of the lecture, so that means you get no notes beforehand. His lecture slides are also very sparse and empty, which means you often have to take down notes/whatever he's saying. Many times I felt like I was just transcribing whatever he said every lecture lol. But yeah, that's why every lecture is important, because he doesn't give very detailed lecture slides. If you missed a lecture, you might be confused as to what is going on re: the topic.

This mod heavily relies on self-study, I think. I often had to piece together information and come up with my own notes (through the readings + what he talked about in lecture and tutorial) and I studied from my own notes. Very different from pure memory work. You have to understand what is going on.

BTW, this intro mod covers heavily on the history of Japan (all the way from the beginning of human civilisation) and the wars, etc. Many times I felt like I was studying history. I didn't mind though, it was really interesting. He did touch upon topics like feminism in Japan, but those were just 1-2 topics on their own and quite short.

Tutorials were alright, just group discussions based on the 3 tutorial qns he would upload each week. What I found quite infuriating about tutorials was that he never really gave a resolution to our discussions, and often left us hanging in the air. I get that academia never has a concrete answer, but I guess I got so used to having definite answers in general that his discussions always left me... wanting for more? Or just wanting some sort of resolution/idea lol. We would often have group discussions for 30 mins (out of our 45 minutes tutorial), discuss with the class/him for about 5-10 minutes, and then that was it. Sometimes the things he talked about didn't have relevance to our tutorial questions either, which frustrated me even more, lol.

Final Grade: A
I was actually quite surprised about this, I even entertained the thought of S/Uing this mod just incase LOL.
Workload: Quite time-consuming. You're expected to do weekly forum postings (uh, I didn't... I think I posted twice at the start of the semester and then I did 4 more in the last week of the semester). You can't just chapalang write nonsense also, must have substantial content to write about and you're expected to use sources in your forum postings. Dr. Hislop always said that those who didn't put in effort in forum postings would suffer grades-wise, so I was damn scared lol. Readings were also quite heavy tbh, I often procrastinated on them and skimmed through the non-important ones :S The group project is important too, 1000 words per member so if you're in a 4 member group you have to churn out 4000 words. It's quite heavy so every member has to play their part. My group wasn't so bad, but I wouldn't say we were very coordinated either. We ran into a couple of mishaps and so I didn't hold much hope on doing well for the group project (we eventually got graded 20/30 for it. Quite surprising because I think the average mark was 21/30 for most people).
The final exam is closed book MCQ, but as long as you've been attending every lecture and doing up your own notes, you should be fine. I was quite clear on what was the correct answer and what was not because I was so familiar with my own notes. The MCQ was not that easy though, and I was still unsure for a few questions. Dr. Hislop made sure to emphasise that no one has ever scored full marks for MCQ before, the most was 45 or 46? And even then, he said not to waste our time trying to score full marks, and instead use that effort to do forum postings or tutorial participation. I think I participated quite a bit in tutorials too and always had nice chats with Dr. Hislop before class, so I guess my participation helped me clinch an A?
Verdict: Don't take this IF you simply want to clear your basket. Honestly it has way too heavy of a workload, don't bother if you have no interest in Japanese studies (or even just slight interest). For your exams, you really have to study a shit load of content it's no joke lol. But, if you're interested in Japanese culture, then you'll probably really enjoy this module. Helps that the prof is so passionate and it's always fun to watch passionate profs conduct their lectures. Be prepared to be diligent in your readings/forum postings/tutorial participation though.

SC2217 (Sociology of Tourism)

Pretty dry. Content was interesting, but I'd say I'm rather disappointed with module overall. I don't particular enjoy the prof's style of teaching (Dr. Maribeth) because her slides are basically just literature reviews and she discusses them during the lecture. I felt that much of the information was also outdated with regards to tourism, since we are now living in an era of technology and Airbnb etc. I didn't particularly enjoy my tutor's classes either, because I felt the tutorials were not properly structured and were quite messy. Also, instructions for assignments were definitely not clear. I felt some of the grades/feedback I received on assignments were unjustified because they never specified in instructions they were looking for so-and-so, and had stated something else instead. I also gave a ton of feedback at the end of the module, hoping they'd inject more interesting elements into the tourism module e.g. field trips to touristic places in SG. For our first assignment, we had to do a response piece/reflection on two tourism-related films we watched during lecture, and me and my friends agreed that though they were interesting, perhaps a field trip out in SG would have been much more relevant/less dated/interesting?

Final Grade: B+ (I S/Ued this)
Workload: Pretty manageable. Just a reflection, a pair/group essay + presentation, and final closed book exams.
Exams were quite easy to study for. IIRC you can spot topics because she will tell you largely what topics will be coming out. Since you're only required to do 2 essay qns out of the 6, you can easily just study 2 or 3 (to be safe) topics in-depth to write your essays.
Verdict: I was quite disappointed with the mod, thankfully I was taking it with friends so at least they made lectures/tutorials more interesting and something to look forward to. I wouldn't say this mod is easy to score in, though. Think my friends got B+s as well.

FAS1102 (Public Writing and Communication)

It's a compulsory mod, so not much for me to talk about. Really. There is nothing for me to talk about lol. It's OK, pretty interesting that we got to work on our interests in our final project (My group did on marital rape which was my idea so I was pretty interested in it).

Final Grade: A-

Hope these reviews help somehow, and do let me know if you have any questions :)

Getting my Class 3 Driving Licence at CDC Ubi

Hi there!

So, very recently, on 22nd August, I finally passed my TP test to get my Class 3 licence. :) OK, I use the word "finally" because I failed my very first test (18pts with immediate failures), but thankfully I managed to pass my TP test on my 2nd try! I thought I'd write a little on my experience on getting my Class 3 licence, because it always is interesting to read about these sort of stuff (to aspiring driver-to-bes), right? I know I liked reading a lot about people's experiences on getting their driving licence, haha! So I just thought I'd share mine.

Class 3 licence VS. Class 3A licence

First off, I chose to take up a Class 3 licence, which enables me to drive both Manual and Auto cars, namely because:

1. My father kept telling me Class 3 was better, in the sense that "if you're going to spend so much $ on getting a licence, might as well go all the way and get a Class 3 because it's more useful" 

2. Plus, we can convert it to an international licence anytime we want. I know that Class 3A licences (enabling you to drive Auto transmission cars only) can also be converted into international licences, but I read that it depends on the country and the state that you're going to. It's easier in the SEA region, not so sure for US/UK/Europe. Class 3, on the other hand, is much more versatile and you probably won't face restrictions when it comes to any conversion of licences. :) But of course, if you think that you'll only ever drive in Singapore and/or the SEA region, by all means go for Class 3A if you want to get your licence easier and faster! 

3. Eh, people always like to say that girls can't drive manual cars! Prove people wrong! 

4. Another lame reason is that my 16 y/o brother (not legal to start learning driving yet) says he's going to get a manual licence, and me as the older sister can't lose to him!!!  

Joining a driving school VS. Getting a private instructor

Secondly, I decided to enrol in a school to learn my driving. There are 3 driving schools in Singapore: BBDC (at Bukit Batok West Avenue 5); CDC (at Ubi Ave 4); SSDC (at 2 Woodlands Industrial Park E4).

Why did I enrol in a school? 'Cause my dad said so. HAHAHA, he just said that "if you're very confident you'll be a good driver, then you can get a private instructor. Otherwise, go for school." I think he just has his opinions about it la (seeing as we go by the training book in school and we manually tick off learning checklists with every new lesson), but actually in the end I really find that learning driving in a school is much more beneficial (for me) than learning under a private instructor. I understand that private instructors can go at your own pace and know your driving habits very well to the point they can pinpoint your little nitty gritty mistakes and get you to correct them etc, plus private driving lessons are MUCH cheaper (it's half the price - usually only $30+ for a driving lesson, while school charges $68-77 depending if it's peak period or not), but let me just elaborate on why I think school is better!

I went to CDC at Ubi, so here's just my experience from there:

If you sign up with a driving school right from the start (which is about $100+ registration fee), even before you study and book your Basic Theory Test (BTT), the school will give you:

1. Free classes that you can attend at the school for your BTT and FTT 

2. If you don't want to go for physical classes, the school also offers E-learning on their website (just login to your account) 

3. You can book free (about up to 6 sessions i think) sessions at the school where you can do trial quizzes in their computer labs... and you can do unlimited trial quizzes in the time frame they give you. This is VERY IMPORTANT. Just utilise it since it's free. I found that the questions that came out in the trial quizzes were the exact SAME questions that came out in the actual BTT & FTT. Which means the school just re-uses the questions! You confirm have a chance of getting full marks if you do most, if not all, of the trial quizzes they offer you. :) (I didn't do all of the quizzes, by the way. I did maybe 3/4!) 

4. School learners get priority when it comes to booking their TP tests. And we get the dates much faster and easier. Private learners have to get their instructors to book it for them, which may take a longer period of waiting time. 

5. School learners drive in the circuit from day one. School driving instructors have a habit of making you drive in the circuit for a bit to warm-up, before bringing you out onto the roads, so by the end of ALL of your lessons, you confirm will know very clearly how to navigate around the circuits, and all the neat little tips and tricks about particular lanes or curbs. Plus, school instructors will tell you all these tips, especially if you ask often. :) Private instructors have to BOOK for circuit lessons, and they have limited slots to share between all their students + other private instructors fighting for the same slots, so you won't be getting as much circuit exposure as compared to if you sign up with a school.

There a couple of downsides to CDC at Ubi, though, which I also must highlight:

1. Out of all the 3 driving schools, CDC at Ubi is said to have the worst traffic situations, as there are many lorries and trucks around the area (it's an industrial area). However, it's said that if you learn to adapt to such road situations, you'll be able to drive anywhere in Singapore with such experience :) So might as well learn to get used to it from day one! Of course, if you're afraid that their traffic situations might cost you your TP test, then by all means go to another driving school, haha. 

2. CDC at Ubi is really, really, REALLY, very hard to book practical lesson slots. You have to camp on your computer or phone daily to book practical lesson slots the very day and time new slots are released every month. It's just like grabbing concert tickets, but much worse lol. Otherwise, if you have a more flexible schedule due to school holidays or whatever, then frequently just refresh the website to see if anyone will drop their lesson slots. 

A lot of people cancel their lessons a few days beforehand, so there will ALWAYS be dropped lessons. Just hurry snatch them up if they fit within your schedule - don't think! Anyway, we have a... either 18 or 20 cancellation count (if I didn't recall wrongly), so we get to cancel up to THAT many amount of lessons ourselves.  

My friend who learned driving at BBDC was able to get practical lessons much easier than me and another friend who was learning at CDC. In fact, not only was it easy for her to book practical lessons at BBDC, she was also able to book TP tests for NEXT WEEK. Which means she only needs to wait a week to do her TP, wtf! Very efficient, right? If you're not the type to camp for slots, and you're way too busy to do these sort of "camping", I recommend you to join other driving schools or go for private instead. I'm not kidding when I say that it's very competitive for practical slots! It really stressed me out, haha.

The real reason I signed up with CDC at Ubi is most importantly because I live very near CDC, and I have a direct bus that only takes me a few stops to get there. If I'm going to be travelling there back and forth several days a week for driving lessons, I might as well go to a driving school close to my home.

One Team VS. Common Pool

When you sign up at CDC at Ubi, they will also ask you if you want to sign up with their One Team, or join the Common Pool. You pay a bit more for One Team.

One Team: This just means that they will allocate not more than 5 instructors to you, and you will drive the exact same car with every practical lesson. The upside is that these instructors will remember you and know your crucial mistakes better. Usually you'll only get not more than 2 instructors, even though they said "5". This can be a good or bad thing-- you may end up hating the instructors allocated to you, since you can't choose. Of course, you can always request to change instructors if you find their teaching styles really do not suit you, but that'd be much more of a hassle.

My friend got allocated One Team (she took a Class 3A licence at CDC's Kovan branch) and she only got 2 instructors for the entirety of her 24 lessons. She only really liked the first instructor, not the second one (much more fierce). She didn't request for any change of instructor, though.

Common Pool: You can't choose which instructor is allocated to you every lesson - they are allocated to you at RANDOM. also, you drive a different car every lesson. This was what I ended up choosing. Of course, sometimes I still get allocated same cars and same instructors more than 5 times (especially when you're going for 20-30 odd lessons), so it doesn't mean you really see a new face every time. I actually felt like a certain instructor DID teach me for basically half of my lessons, from the basics right up to me practicing for my driving test. It felt nice because I didn't even have to pay extra for the devoted attention, haha!

But anyways, it really is quite fun meeting and interacting with new instructors each time you get into their car. Some are quiet, some are talkative, some are encouraging, and some are downright fierce and make you feel like shit... lol. I'm glad the ones that I get allocated more to are very nice, patient, encouraging and understanding. :)

It's up to you to decide what kind of learning style suits you. Personally I enjoyed having different instructors more also, because different instructors notice different things, and have different tips to share with you. It's up to you to decide which style of driving to adopt that best suits you.

My time frame:

Right after graduating from poly, I took advantage of my break before university started to learn driving. (As did my 2-3 other friends!) Here's a rough gauge of my timeline so you know roughly how long it'll take to get your licence :)

Late Feb: Signed up with CDC Ubi, booked BTT date
Mid Mar: Took my BTT - Passed
Apr: Booked 12 lessons for May
May: Booked 12 lessons for June, as well as booked FTT date
June: Booked about 6 more lessons for July. Passed FTT
Late June: Booked my first TP test on 15 July
15 July: failed TP test, immediately booked second TP test for 22nd Aug (earliest date available)
Aug: Took about 3 more lessons on 15, 16, 17 in Aug before my 22nd Aug TP test
22nd Aug: Passed my TP!!!

I took about 30 odd lessons before taking my first TP test because I wasn't confident enough and wanted to be extra sure in my abilities before taking it. Alas, nerves got to me so I still failed it. I took another 3 more before my second TP test. By this point in time I was certain I knew how to drive around the circuit and outside on the roads already, it just depends on the traffic and my luck on that day!

Tip: Don't give up on manual driving if you're thinking of doing so!

One more thing, taking manual driving was definitely much more challenging than auto car driving. Even by the 10th lesson or so, I was still very shaky in terms of coordinating my gear-shifting and awareness on the roads, because you really have to be well-coordinated enough for manual cars. But don't be disheartened, even at this stage! All manual car learners will have thought about "changing to auto car driving" at least ONCE in their learning stage, because to be honest, why are we making our lives so hard, right? HAHAHA. Will we REALLY ever need to drive in Europe? Most likely not.

But because I had various reasons for not wanting to go back (making my dad happy, getting my licence before my bro, really makes sense to just chiong for a Class 3 licence if I'm spending so much $ anyway, plus you never know if you ever need to drive a manual car in an emergency situation) so I didn't want to change to auto car driving and be looked upon as a sore loser. As long as you believe in yourself, you can one! It'll take time, but just go at your own pace. You're not competing with anyone-- only to ensure you learn driving in the best way you can.

Anyway, the more lessons I took, the more gear-shifting and holding the clutch became second nature to me, and the only mistakes that I was making was not being "aggressive" enough in my driving. Which is also crucial to improve upon la, but I believe auto car drivers also make these same "not aggressive enough" mistakes... All (or most of us) new drivers will be ball-less in the first few stages of driving one, so...

There you go! My little pep talk on choosing Class 3 over Class 3A (if you're interested. I'm not forcing you la, if you really prefer driving auto cars then go ahead!). After getting my licence, I'm driving my dad's auto cars anyway.

My TP tests

First TP test: 15 July, Friday, 8.30am. My dad told me long ago not to book tests during peak hours, but 我就是不听 lol. I had no choice though, because it was the only available timing before I was going to fly off to Japan in 2 days' time for a 2 week vacation. I was very calm on this morning... I had lessons on Mon, Tue, Wed, Thur, before this, so I thought I was prepared enough.

Nope. I wasn't focused at all. The first thing I did was strike kerb at parallel parking, which SUCKED, because I never really do strike kerb at parallel parking, even during practice. Even my past instructors told me my parallel parking was perfect! But on TP test, ANYTHING can go wrong. It really depends on your luck. Positioning might be off when you first position it by the side etc.

I thought having the circuit empty of cars would be beneficial for me, but nooope. It gives the TP tester even more reason to test you emergency brake, which I hastily did (because I am most worried about emergency brake-- my reflexes always seem to work too slow :(). I did the E-brake in time, but because I was already so nervous and focused on my mistake of previously hitting the kerb, I forgot to signal right and check my blind spots before moving off after doing the E-brake. So I got those marks deducted. In my nervousness, I even went to the wrong lane to turn right......... Making mistakes really will throw you off and make you wreck the rest of your test T_T

Once I was on the road, I was in a filter lane trying to filter in right... And I thought I checked my blind spots enough to ensure there was no car coming/or it was quite a distance away, so I could hurry and rush in, but the moment I tried to, my instructor E-braked and told me there was a car coming and I couldn't. And I ended up getting honked... wtf. By this point in time I knew I failed the test already la, and I kept apologising to the TP tester :( He looked pretty disappointed, like "what went wrong? You were very steady in all your circuit courses etc."

We drove a short distance, then went back to CDC. I was pretty nervous/upset at this point so I ended up mishearing a lot of his instructions, and everything was a flurry. Aaaah. It was a wreck. Anyway, he sat me down later in the room upstairs and went through all my mistakes with me. He told me not to give up etc. Of course I won't give up la, I spent $2k+ on lessons already!!! TMD, if I don't get this licence, 我真的对不起自己。

My parents were very nice about me failing the test. My mum told me she failed the test like 5-7 times before she finally passed, lol. So I'm still not the "worst". HAHA. Thanks for trying to make me feel better lololol.

Second TP test: 22 Aug, Monday, 11.45am. This test was actually booked wrongly... I meant to book an 11am test but saw the timing wrongly... It was actually the warm-up timing. -_- So my booking ended up becoming 11.45am. I was kinda worried because this overlaps with the office timings' lunch period and that means more cars would be on the road for their lunch break... But I guess fate has a way of making things come together 'cause I passed in this time slot!

Other than having luck that everything will go smoothly during your test, you should also get a tester that is very nice and not so anal! I think I got lucky with both my timing and tester. :) I got an old Chinese tester, which I was kinda worried about. Old Chinese men tend to be kinda strict (or, on the opposite end of the spectrum, very nice), so I wasn't sure which one I would be getting. I don't wanna bring in race as a factor lah, but people tend to say that Malay testers are nicer. (Ironically, I got an old Malay tester my first TP test and he was really strict the whole time he was with me T_T but maybe it's also 'cause I struck kerb very early on in my test already... Which gave him a bad impression T_T) Anyway, my Chinese tester this time was nice! :) He's not overly nice la, he's the quiet and firm type. But I think also 'cause I didn't make much mistakes, so I didn't really get yelled at also!

So we started off the test in the circuit, right? I was most worried for my parallel parking because in my warm-up earlier, I struck kerb... again. T_T I was thinking to myself, wah if I strike kerb again for actual test... GG to my test today. 'Cause I know first-hand just how making a mistake so early on in the test can affect your mood to do well. I spent most of the time in my first test worrying about whether I was still going to pass or not, and I ended up failing. So this time, I was EXTRA careful not to strike kerb. I lowered the mirrors down till the max and made sure I moved very slowly out.

And I did not strike kerb. :)!!!!!!!

Once I knew I passed that hurdle, the rest of my courses went smoothly. Because the circuit was quite congested still, the tester didn't test me on E-brake, even when I went onto empty lanes in the circuit. Soon we were out of the circuit and onto the roads, and my first thought was, "WAH, I survived the circuit!!!! I DID IT!!!!!" I was almost bouncing in my seat, hahaha. I was certain I didn't accumulate any points in the circuit, and that gave me confidence. I've heard a lot of times from my instructors that as long as you do well in the circuit, the tester more or less pass you already! They just need to see you make a few turns here and there on the outside roads, and will quickly bring you back to the school to give you your final result.

And it's true! I just did a rather short road. Did a few lane changes, did a U-turn, more lane-changing, and soon we were back to the school. The traffic was fantastic as the roads he made me drive either didn't have traffic at all, or not so heavy traffic. There was once I almost didn't manage to lane-change in time to turn right because of the many cars, but I still made it in time, THANKFULLY. My weakness is lane-changing! If there was heavy traffic, I'll probs make even bigger mistakes. That's why my dad told me timing of your test is very important. If your weakness is heavy traffic, try to avoid peak timings!

I really like this tester because he was quite anxious in making me cut into lanes. Since I feel that I don't have good enough judgment, I tend to hold back and wait for the traffic to be COMPLETELY clear before I cut into lanes, especially when it comes to filter lanes (esp since I failed in this part during my first TP test), because I don't want to get into any unnecessary accidents. But during this TP test, he gave me clear instructions and hurried me to "go now!" each time I needed to cut into lanes... so I'm thankful for his anxious instructions.

I ended up only making a few mistakes here and there, and right before we entered the school I misheard his instruction to turn right as turn left, so I got 4 points for that (Veering off-course T_T)

I was legit shaking from excitement as he asked me to drive back to the front lobby of the school and park the car there, 'cause I was mentally totalling up the points in my head and I didn't think I would fail the test! I got so excited that when he got out of the car and quickly made his way off, I got out of the car myself and.... FORGOT TO TURN OFF THE CAR ENGINE!!! wtf!!!!! HAHAHA wah really, I think I'm damn heng, because he was walking so fast that he didn't even bother turning his head back to check whether I'm following him or not, so by the time I grabbed my bag from the back seat and REALISED that I did not turn off the car engine yet, I quickly rushed back into the front seat and turned it off.

I'm pretty certain if he turned his head back and caught me out of the car with the engine not even turned off... I'd get penalised! I don't know if it will be an immediate failure or more points deducted la, but. Granted, I also haven't walked away from the car yet la, I only got out to grab my bag from the back seat only. But wtf!!!! Really damn heng he didn't turn his head back, hahaha!

I think a driving instructor nearby saw me panicking as I turned the car engine off, and quickly rushed over to tell me "it's OK, we'll take over, you just follow the tester go up the stairs!" T_T Really very thankful for such a nice instructor. Must be sympathising with all people going through their tests. 'Cause I've learnt that testers can fail you for even the smallest things during your test. :(

So I rushed up to catch up with the tester on the stairs, and he didn't notice anything. He turned his head back once to see if I was following him (in which I was just one step behind him) and then that was it. He led me into the waiting room, then printed my results out. I was soooo nervous. I kneww there was a slight possibility I could still fail -- maybe there were some major mistakes that I overlooked.

But in the end, after what felt like FOREVER, he came over and handed me the slip of paper. I PASSED! And apparently got deducted 4 points in the circuit already. 2 points each for Vertical Parking and Parallel parking. Just because I "turn steering wheel while vehicle is stationary". My face was like............... .........OK, OK, I'm not going to say anything 'cause you passed me anyways. But really, other than being certain I didn't turn my wheel while my vehicle was stationary, but also I never understood why that was counted as a mistake......... OK OK, but I won't argue la, I passed already!!!

I got some other minor mistakes like "Lane-changing is abrupt", but I didn't get any points for ANY safety checks, which I was very happy about! I'm always told that my blind spot checking for the left side is bad (I don't know why also... T_T I do try my best to check my blind spots but maybe it's just my subconscious nature to miss out on it sometimes?), so I was really happy that I wayang-ed enough during the TP test that I didn't get any points for safety checks! :) :) :)

Really very happy I passed. I didn't wanna spend any more $$$ on tests ($200+ for one test is no joke!) and also, to be real la, I'd feel very paiseh if I took too long to get my driving licence! It really boils down to your tester and your luck!

Just got my driving licence in the mail today! Took about a week to reach me (applied on Mon, received next Tue.) Haaapppyyy!

Excuse my alien face... I always look horrible in official, serious-looking photos.

Can I make up for it by sharing a nice recent #OOTD of myself?

Anyways, I've been practising driving to NUS a lot in the past week... Still quite shaky but dad is convinced that if I drive regularly, I will be a pro in time soon to come. Hopefully! I wanna be more confident on the roads.

I've been having a fever the past few days though, which really sucks. Anyway, I don't wanna talk too much anymore -- this post has gotten quite long. Hope this post is beneficial to any driver-to-be that stumbles upon it, and ask me if you're curious about anything! :)