Chinese New Year... what?

A Chinese New Year away from home, a Chinese New Year away from Singapore. How interesting a concept. Unsurprisingly, the whole mood here in Pittsburgh is nothing short of mundane; no one seems to be really interested in this whole festive season thing. It could just be that everyone's so overworked from all the stuff that they are lobbing at us in college that no one really cares that much anymore.

Or could it be because most people here identify themselves first as Americans, and then next as of being Chinese descent? Guess this question will be unanswered for quite a fair bit.

So the Singapore Students' Association (SSA) organised this Chinese New Year Reunion Dinner. It was a wonderful night. The whole event was organised simply, but it evoked the sense of belonging that appears to be the whole point of the reunion dinner. Food was much different from what we usually have, and since it was steam boat, everyone had a ball of a time trying to boil all the food stuff without causing too much problems (heheheh).

Earlier in the day, I had a teleconferencing with my family back in Singapore over a cross of MSN and Skype. It was quite dumb... MSN couldn't send sound across, while Skype couldn't send video, so we had to hybrid the two. Unfortunately, the house machine is underpowered to be able to perform and so in the end it was mainly a skype-based teleconversation. Not that it was bad, but at least it's good to be able to hear the voices of my family again. And, haha, my mum was surprised at my long-ish hair (it's gonna be so much longer by the time I return, that's for sure).

I gave RX a call too, via Skype, and managed to channel the songs "White and Nerdy" and "I bought on EBay" via the VoIP to him. He literally rofl'ed his way. I feel kinda bad that I couldn't play Diablo II with him over the Internet (had to do homework and stuff like that), and hope that I will be able to do so soon.

I gave Nicole and Yongji a call each to wish them happy new year, and they were kinda pleased too. =)

And so, another Chinese New Year, and another year added to my bludgeoning age. What the heck man... by the time I reach March, I feel as though I've aged by at least 2 years, with my birthday and Chinese New Year and all (yes, if you actually look up my lunar calendar age, I'm a whopping year older than the other 1985 babies).

Gak,

So, what's in for the year of the pig? Well, 3.8 is always hovering about (and will probably do so for the next few years heheheh). There's also other stuff to look into, like setting the ViCOMP question set (yes, I've ideas on the problem set, just need to sit down and type the damn thing out together with all the sample solutions in all the three languages), moving on with some personal life stuff, and going back to general hacking (boy do I miss writing programs).

That's about it, I guess.

新年快乐 to all who read this or the other blog.