Post lecture period

Yesterday was my last lecture for the semester. Relieved to have done my duty to the students, but worried at the same time of leaving them to study by themselves for the final exam at the end of the month. Well I just hope they are doing their best with whatever I have given them.

A quick follow-up to the previous post on the civil servant induction exam. I heard everyone passes, though the official result did not state that explicitly. If that is the only result, then it just said I have successfully completed the induction programme (that's all after all the 'hard work'?). Anyway, time to move on :D

Early last month (yes that's May), I had the chance to attend my graduation ceremony in London. The timing was not so convenient though, as it was in the middle of the semester. Meaning I had to cancel lectures. Not something that I like to do. But my mum had been looking forward to this since I was still studying, plus it was going to be her only trip to the UK, I made the effort to re-schedule lectures for that whole one week. As always, the flying part was not the most enjoyable one. Fortunately, as I requested wheelchair assistance for my mum, it became the smoothest and the best trip I have ever had to the UK, and back. This is in terms of boarding the flight and going through the immigration (everyone knows how it is at Heathrow!). Not to mention the ultra-super-duper-helpful Malaysia Airlines crew members, and the KLIA ground crew. They deserve a biggg appreciation from me! In the end, the graduation ceremony went well, took my mum sightseeing here and there, I hope she was happy. I considered that as my Mother's Day treat for her :)

Watching movies on the in-flight entertainment system is nothing like in the cinema, not even close, even far from watching DVDs on the Mac. But without a doubt MAS has quite a selection of good and latest movies. Over the long journey, I managed to watch, err maybe more than five movies. From what I can remember: The Grey, Albert Nobbs, Chronicle, Just for Laughs episodes... But what has made the most impact on me is the movie Extremely Loud & Incredibly Noisy, starring Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock among others. Watching it kept taking me back to the book by Mark Haddon - The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightime! The style of the story being unfold is very similar, especially both main characters in the movie and the book are kids. 

Watching drama-type movie on the plane is not easy, given the loud humming sound of the plane's engines. And the headphone supplied is not the 'noise-cancelling' type (which I reckon is gonna be very expensive!). So I had to push the phones harder closer to my ears in order to listen to the conversations. Probably about time MAS to include English subtitles as well (pleasee....). But surprisingly I was able to follow the movie and understand the story. This time I am not going to write much about the movie itself. Enough said that I really love it, and this is among the few drama-type movies that I like. Usually I need a push to make me watch this genre, as most of the times I prefer loads of CGIs and special effects. I guess boredom is the factor this time ;)