My school made me start this blog...
Hello Internet, I’m a socially awkward guy who was coerced into starting this blog by my school’s fancy new CDS programme thingamajig despite not having a clue about how blogging works. So try not to cringe too hard. Here goes.
Let’s see, about myself. I’m Ryan, otherwise known as Viking. I’m an extraverted guy with a lame and cynical sense of humor. (Don’t judge.) I know this is ironic considering that I mentioned that I am socially awkward at the start of this post but that’s just how I roll.
Now on to today’s series of events. Being an IIT student in my school, I have to take a Cross Disciplinary Subject (CDS) during my School Discovery Programme (SDP). This CDS that is compulsory for us to take is none other than Effective Internet Research (EIT).
I was hastily thrown into a group of strangers, all of us had to grow accustomed on the fly to the new faces and new places. Being the socially awkward person that I am, being thrown out of my comfort zone and into a flock of strangers made me feel like dying. Thoughts like “Will they get my obscure references and lame jokes?” and “Will they see my cynicism as offensive?” raced through my mind. I had no idea how to communicate with them. Do I speak in a crass manner or with much more tact? Thankfully, the three other individuals I was paired up with, Natalie, Das and Yvonne seemed pretty cool and we warmed up to each other quickly.
The day passed by in a blur. My group and I had to do a presentation on how we would get a new pet within a $1000 budget. It involved copious amounts of research online to identify 5 key points that we needed to address in obtaining a new pet and maintaining it. The presentation went by without a hitch. We broke for lunch and soon we were back for another group assignment.
The next assignment required us to do research on future technologies. My group chose Smart Transportation. The four of us then divided the work and started doing research on four different aspects of Smart Transportation. We then wrote our points down on sticky notes and attached them to a sheet of paper, representing our collective efforts toward the subject we chose. Our teacher, Ms. Chua, then appraised the work before telling us to come up with synonyms for our respective research topics. For example, the aspect I researched on was a trip adviser for daily commute. I had to find key words such as ‘Trip Adviser’ and ‘Commuter’ and then find synonyms for them so that we could create a search query.
After the daunting task, the teacher walked us through the steps of creating a tumblr. account and told us to write a blog reflection. (Which I am currently doing. Shocker.). Then to our surprise, she released us about an hour early. My classmates were overjoyed and made their way home in high spirits.
I, however, was shaken up by the experience. I had no idea how these new classmates of mine worked. I had no idea how they ticked. I have a love hate relationship when it comes to socializing. I love company and making friends that I can rely on. However, I worry over matters like how I should act around them or how can I keep them as friends. On the long ride home, these thoughts floated around in my head for hours, making me ponder about human thought processes and emotions. When I arrived at my doorstep, I quickly pushed these morbid thoughts out of my head and set to work. The day was long over and there was no use worrying over things that is way out of my control. I had a blog to start after all. :)
From here on out, this blog will mainly be used for research. I decided to share more about myself so that you, the reader, can see things from my perspective. Maybe you’d be able to understand why I interpret certain things in my research in a certain way. With that, this blog post comes to a close. I’ll get in touch with you again soon, Internet.
This is Viking, signing off.
