Search the Community
Showing results for tags 'Real Life'.
-
Man, I love the Kaiser Chiefs' album Employment. But what I love more is the fact that I've got my own employment now, too. That's right. I'll be working for a translating bureau starting August 28. And why is that so great? First of all, employment is hard to come by in Belgium. It's not uncommon to spend six months to two years (or even more) searching for a job. Yet here I am, three days after my graduation and a contract to look forward to. Not only that, but I also get a bonus from the government for graduating as well as finding a job in this sector. Another benefit is that I've still got some two months of vacation time to look forward to. I would've started next week if they'd asked me to, but this suits me just fine - now I can still attend Scouting camp, so I won't have to let my co-leaders down. Unpaid vacation, of course. Lucky, Lucky You're so lucky Okay, so that's Franz Ferdinand and not Kaiser Chiefs, but hey, it's appropriate under these circumstances. And in case you were wondering, yes, I'll probably keep on moderating. I usually won't have to take any translations home to finish them after hours, and although some extra hours will have to be put in during busy periods, I think I'll actually have more spare time then during my studies. No tasks, no projects, no studying other than the subjects and languages I'm interested in... Oh yeah. B) Oh, and I bought a new cap. My previous one was a black one too, with a yellow Biohazard symbol, but it was turning grey, the symbol ocher. Right. I've got a degree, I've got a job, I've got some extra vacation. I can start looking forward to the next steps: save up for my own apartment, a second-hand car... Life's looking good. *knocks on wood* Maybe I'll even manage to meet a significant other, but that'll probably require divine intervention. Oh, and in case you haven't checked it out yet, there's a music video linked to in this BioLog entry that certainly fits this entry as well.
-
Well, there we go, I knew it wouldn't last. Anyway, tomorrow begins finals, so this is going to be a short entry. Well, actually, finals have already begun, since one of them is a take-home exam I received on Tuesday; but that's ok, it just gets it done faster. The take home and the exam tomorrow should be pretty easy, it's the one next week that's going to take a lot of studying. It makes me glad I have a week to prepare. Looking back, the summer semester went by really fast. It feels like I've barely missed any summer, and I still have two months left before the fall semester begins, so that works out pretty nicely. To anyone ever considering taking summer classes, here's what I have to say: They go by quickly, they're generally easier, but there's a lot of work, since you have to compress what's normally two weeks worth of work into one. It's a compromise and one that pays off in the end, as far as I'm concerned. In a few days time, I'll be 9 credits or so ahead of most of my peers, and a little closer to that coveted degree. Now, back to studying, wish me luck!
-
Looks like I love to end my BioLog entry titles with exclamation marks. But if any of them deserve one, it's this one. I just got back from Antwerp, to know whether I had managed to graduate or not, and as you can guess by now, the answer was yes. I've finally managed to get a degree! And on the same day I've gotten stars for my BioLog! Of course, there is extra cause for celebration, as explained in one of my early entries. I've now got my Bachelor degree, though I'm not sure which specific Bachelor title it's going to be, either Bachelor Office Management or Bachelor Business Translation. Of course, BOM would be a nice title. I haven't gotten any other information so far, that's for the Formal Proclamation this evening - I'll let you guys know more later on. Cpt. SK, B.OM EDITH: I was first of my class with honorary mention. 73%, baby!
-
Well, today I went to the graduation party of one of my cousins. I don't really know him that much but oh well. It was kinda boring and uninteresting so I'm not going to bother with the details. This weekend I also have my neice and nephew over. They are fun to have around but can be a handful. They always want to play with my Bionicle sets... It must be because I have so many. Well, I'm kinda tired so I took a nap earlier. I'll stay up though cause Inuyasha is on tonight. And I've run out of things to say for now so... um yeah. Kohaku
-
Now, I went to a last-year college BBQ yesterday evening. The food was good, but I missed a bit of atmosphere. Anyhow, that's just the setting. Afterwards, we went for a few drinks in Antwerp, spent a few hours in one pub with a few of the more fun people in my year. As it happened, one of my friends told us there was a new pub opening near the market square, with a small party to celebrate the event. He knew one of the DJs, so he wanted to drop by there. Me and two of the girls joined him. Upon entrance, I was denied access because I was wearing... white sports shoes... Now, I realize this is general practice in clubs and discotheques, as in the 90s, those who dealt in party drugs wore white sports shoes as an outer distinction to contact their 'clients'. Not only is that no longer so, but this was just a regular pub. Just because one of the DJs was a regular at a club, there was security and guidelines. So there I was, at 2 AM, dressed in Summer clothes and enduring a 7 degrees Celcius temperature. My friend brought me a drink from inside, but it was still a pretty bumming note to end a good evening out on the town. Does it bother me? Of course. "Gee, we don't like your shoes, stay out." That's one serious "what the heck?" right there. Bouncers are such nice people, aren't they?
-
After I got yesterday's mail I saw that I got my subscription to Electronic Gaming Monthly. The bad news is that it was in a thin clear bag which said that, "We sincerely regret the damage to your mail during handling by the Postal Service." Now this has happened to me before but the reason I'm more upset than normal is it has happened more than once in the past two months. In order they are my Nintendo Power magazine, my Lego BrickMaster magazine, and now my EGM magazine. This is disappointing, at least my last Bionicle comic was in good condition. Oh well, if it happens again then I'll have to go down to the post office and get things cleared up. Mainly because it says this is a rare occurance. Kohaku
-
It's 4:15 AM (Central Time) my dad was searching for our snake. Our snake is a ball Python. So my dad checked all around the house and couldn''t find him. He found him in time, in the bathroom on the floor. He found him at about 4:30 AM. At about 4:45 AM I awakened to hear my parents talking about it. My dad says there was a small hole in the roof of his cage, a hole that he managed to squeeze through. Since then I was unable to fall asleep again. Now when my dad found him and put him back into his cage he kept going right to the spot he escaped from. Snakes are smart, he knew where to go to get out again. However, my dad rigged the top so our snake couldn't get out. I'm home because I couldn't fall back sleep and to help my dad in fixing the top. Why is this bad, because a few weeks ago our snake got out. He was gone for 6 days. We found him and fed him then. The good news is he wasn't gone for a week this time. There is only one emoticon that can discribe how I look: :wakeup2: Kohaku
-
Well, I haven't updated in awhile and though I should today. First, I'll be posting more on my old Lego set tomorrow. The reason why? My digital camera stopped working for awhile. Now it's fixed and all is good in the universe. (Well not counting the fact that Samus Aran is hunting me.) Second, I've got the first of my Mario mocs built. Once I get a few more of them finished I'll post a topic and an entry. Of, course I still need to take the pictures. Third, I have been going to baseball games a lot. Some are Little League games. It is fun to go and see my nephew's play the great sport. I've also been going to see the Milwaukee Brewers play. Of course the are the best team, in my opinion of course. I've got two games coming up one on sunday and one on tuesday. And last week was my last week of school for this year. Which means next year I will be a Senior in High School. And the only difficult exam I had was for Physics. I am glad I never have to take that again! The easiest exam was for AP US History (APUSH for short) one of the questions on it was a multiple choice(there were more multiple choice questions than this one.) It was as follows: The only answer to this question. A.) A That was actually a question. Well, I've also been searching for a computer related job as well. The fact that I'm Master Certified in Microsoft Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and Outlook. That puts me ahead of other people. Well, I'll update this more often from now on. Kohaku
-
It's been a while since I posted here, so I figured I should say something. There's not much to add, however. Between school, work, and BZPower, I'm kept pretty busy, barely even time to play Halo and such. I'm in the middle of midterms for the summer semester, so halfway there; though I wish I could say it's all going to be downhill, hehe. I'm working at a small company that designs and manufacturers control equipment for die-cast machines; it's a good job and I'm enjoying it. It's definitely better than working retail, which I've done before and loathed. It's good to think that we're only a third of the way through June, and although the past few weeks have gone by fast, there's still over two months of summer to look forward to. Recent signs suggest that I'll be attending Brickfest, so if any of you will be there too be sure to say 'Hi!' I know a few other BZP staff members will be attending as well. Well, that's all for now... ...See you space cowboy.
-
No, not the musical genre. You know how hard it is to study when there's a lot of noise? Well, the neighbours one side are having a family bbq, as are the ones on the other side. The latter ones also have a huge swimming pool and lots of children, so you can imagine the noise. How the heck am I supposed to concentrate on the darn German conjunctives, their use and forms? Gah! >_< And that's my BioLog for today. Now leave me alone, and don't make any noise.
-
Just thought I'd put you guys up to date with how my Finals are and have been going. I'm just about halfway through. Well, actually, I'm well over halfway if I count the translating exams for Germand and English I had before the official Finals period. French business correspondence: went rather well, both the written and oral part. Although the latter was a phone conversation which had nothing to do with actual business terminology... I don't think people will ever be calling me at the office to ask for my favourite barber shop... French oral exam: we had to read a text and then give an oral overview. It was pretty hard to find the logical structure within the text (or rather, add it, for lack thereof), but I did okay. English: written exam dealt mostly with non-finites. Which was basically the course content for this year. Yay for non-finites, I guess. I did great on the oral exam, I only needed to give a summary of an article we'd read in class and answer a few questions on a book I had to read. (For those interested, I read Ian Rankin's Black and Blue, and will probably read Knots and Crosses so I can get to know the characters better.) ICT: practical MS Access exam. Still managed to make a few mistakes, but nothing to threaten my score. I'm sure I passed, although I'll have a lower score than on my MS Word and MS Excel exams of the previous years. (Well, duh.) Human Resources Management: this oral exam only counted for 50% of the total. The other 50% was permanent evaluation: during classes we had to present our HRM solution to the tasks set out in the course book, based on the theory and information we researched. Our group scored well, and I scored high on the oral exam as well. So far, so good, but the worst is still to come: German written exam on Monday, along with German business correspondence. Wednesday brings me PR & Marketing (not worried), Thursday's English business correspondence (I think I went to three of those classes this year...) and Friday's the German oral exam. Blargh. There's a session on our portfolios for Dutch, but I can't study for it, and neither do we need to. Bring the portfolio, talk some nonsense, leave. So basically: I hate German. Loathe it. Oh, and hay fever. >_<
-
So, I'm taking classes this summer at my college and therefore need a room to stay in. For reasons know only to the Office of Residence Life, I can't stay in my current room, but instead need to move to another dorm. Fine, okay, whatever. So I got assigned a room a few weeks ago, as well as a date to move in on. That date was yesterday. I'm still in my old room. Seems ResLife forgot about Memorial Day, and had been planning on cleaning up rooms then, but couldn't. Since my parents came by and took my fridge yesterday (the new room is an apartment and already has one) I was stuck today in the 80 degree weather with no way to keep my milk from curdling or to keep some water cold to drink. Heck, I'm sitting on my bed right now practically sweating it's still so hot. As most of you probably know from dealing with me on BZP, I'm not one to back down, and by the end of the day (read: 9PM at night) was able to move my perishables and some other things over to the new room. Fortunately I have no classes tomorrow, and should be able to move the rest of my stuff then. Others who weren't so persuasive have to wait until the weekend. A warning to you all, no matter how nice of a school you go to, there's always bureaucratic dren to deal with. And it's always a pain; I've yet to find a school, a job, anything, where that sort of stuff never gets in the way. If anyone does, let me know so I know there's still hope. And that was my rant for the evening. I'll let you get back to BZPower, so I can get back to my sweating, what fun...
-
What a title. But what the heck is this going to be about? Well, I just want to give you guys a bit of insight into my own personal real life situation. No, I'm not going to give you my address and a list of my RL friends. I'd like to talk about my current situation, and you'll see where that title came from. It's not as bad as it might sound, though, and if it comes off as if I'm still struggling with any of the below, rest assured that I don't. You see, I'm still living at home. A recognizable situation for most of you guys, but I'm running behind on schedule, so to speak. I'm well in my twenties by now, yet here I am, still at home and nowhere near moving out. This is mostly due to my studying career: during my last year of high school, I had no clue what to do afterwards. I had studied Latin-Sciences, so that diploma would do me no good on the job market. The school counselor offered little help, and neither did the teacher coaching our class, who incidentally happened to be my uncle and godfather as well. All they could tell me was what they though I wasn't capable of. Thanks a lot. So, we all know I like to draw. Most of my course books can testify, even if they're just covered in doodles. So I figured: "Why not attend an art college?" So after school, I went to take a number of practical tests to see whether I could get admission there. As it turned out, they thought me sub par. Looking back on my art back then, I'm not too surprised, but I was still disappointed. So there I was, the start of the season two months away, and no plans for the future. A hasty decision led me to enroll in the University of Ghent's IT course. They had told me prior to enrolling that the five hours of math a week I'd had were enough as basic knowledge to follow the courses. Boy, were they ever wrong. All kinds of algebra, physics, graph theory... and only two 'practical' computer-related courses: Operating Systems and Programming. The OS professor only told anecdotes during his classes, so we were left to study the course book without any kind of context or explanation. The programming language was Java - I missed one class and suddenly couldn't grasp anything that followed, even after catching up on my own. In addition, though on an unrelated note, my first relationship was severed on December 23rd of that year. The Ramones: Merry Christmas. Segue to Elvis: Lonely this Christmas. How emo. In any case, it didn't help. My highest grade that year: 8/20. Of course, the low results didn't come as much of a surprise. I knew I'd never be able to finish this course, and my interest in IT had plummeted, whereas the job market's demand had skyrocketed. Once again, looking for a new educational venue. At the time, there was a shortage of teachers, and the government was promoting a job career in the educational system. (They also raised the required retirement age for teachers, and my mother, who used to give classes at a medical college, would've retired the year after.) Bottom line: Schizo takes up teacher studies. This was possible because the Belgian goverment heavily subsidizes higher education. Courses I would've been teaching: Dutch, English as a foreign language, and History. I had to do the first year twice. Not because of a lack in knowledge, but because of a lack in teaching skills. My traineeship killed my chances the first time around, so I started youth animation work at the local summer playground organization. New experiences, new friends... It was all for the best, both outside and inside of college. During my second year (I've been studying for four years at this point), I encounter a breakdown. Upon reviewing my first traineeship lessons of that year, I noticed I wasn't cut out to be a teacher. Or at least, not the kind of teacher I wanted to be, which was someone who could motivate, entertain and inspire teenagers during classes. But I was a big old bore, more focused on course content than any of the above. I couldn't envision myself doing this for the rest of my life, at the cost of youthful minds being blunted. It was a hard decision to make, both for myself and for my parents, who were suddenly faced with another failure on their son's part. Not to mention that after three attempts, I was very much starting to doubt myself and my options for the future. I ended up getting depressed, and not just about my educational career: old stuff started surfacing again, adding to the whirlpool of negative emotions. With some counseling, I was able to get back on my feet and able to look around again. I discovered another passion of mine: languages. I wanted to translate, and there were two options: another university course, with the main focus on two languages of choice, or college business translating. I ended up choosing for the latter, as it was a Bachelor course, which meant I would only add another three years to my studies instead of four or five, and I could recover some of my credit points from the teacher studies. Now I find myself close to graduating, finally! I've currently got my Final exams, and I hope they'll go well. I've managed to get through my finals in the first round in the previous two years, both with honorable mention, and I see no reason why this year should be different. I had also been given a job offering at my first traineeship location at the end of '05, so I'll be contacting them soon to see whether the offer still stands. I truly hope so, because I enjoyed working at the translating bureau, and I enjoyed working with the people there. So what's the snag? If you're happy, why are your emotions supposedly schizophrenic? Don't tell us you're really schizo. No worries. It's just that at this point, I'm looking back on it all, and I've discovered there still is a bit of regret. I'm at an age where both my older sisters got married after three to four years of living together with their better halves. Looking at my age peers from back in the day, I see people in steady relationships, settled down or planning to, working steady jobs and looking forward to a nice and comfortable life. Security. None of which I have at the moment. One tends to feel left behind in situations such as these, thinking about how it could've all gone differently, had I started this particular course from the moment I had left high school. But playing the 'if' game doesn't do me any good. Sure, I regret being this old and having gotten nowhere in life yet. But I've met a lot more people than I would have, had things gone differently. I've formed new bonds, new friendships. I moved from youth animation over the summer to cooking at Scouting camps to joining the Scouting leader team. I've discovered new friends in my home town and beyond, and I enjoy that. I have friends ranging from 17 years old to 30 years old, all in different situations, jobs, studies... I may be behind schedule, but there's no doubt that my life is rich with experiences and encounters. So far, so good. Tomorrow's BioLog, on occasion of my 4th BZP anniversary, will deal with my time here at BZPower, which partly intersects with the short 'autobiography' above. I'll catch you guys on the forums. (And if you're pulling tricks, I will catch you on the forums. )
-
Hey, you all know me as Kohaku. And yes I am a fan of Nintendo's WiFi connection. But more on that in a bit... First my name, Kohaku is a character in Inuyasha which is an anime. Kohaku is a boy who gets controlled by an evil demon. Sounds fun doesn't it. Anyway translated Kohaku means amber. Let's see... Bionicle. I have every set that is avaliable except some of the new ones. I have all of the comics, seen all of the movies and am an expert. Yes, I also have all of the books, except for a few of the more recent ones. And now for the games. Nintendo is one of my favorite company, although I've played Xbox and have a PS2. I plan on getting the Wii and an Xbox 360 when the price goes down. I was going to get a PS3 until I found out it would be $600. I love Super Smash Bros. and am almost unstoppable, so when Super Smash Bros. Brawl comes out you guys better watch out. I am currently playing the DS everyday. Some of the games I'm playing are: New Super Mario Bros. Metroid Prime Hunters Brain Age Animal Crossing There are more but it is late, where I am and I have to go to bed. I'll add more to these topics tomorrow. Kohaku
-
Hey there everyone, thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. This will be pretty short, since I have lots of stuff that needs to get done today. Taking summer classes is really great in the long run, but in the short term it's hard to balance between doing homework, a job, and trying to have a social life. If you ever have the chance to get ahead in school by taking courses over the summer, go for it, but just beware of the consequences. You have to work hard, but just remember that it pays off in the long run. Besides that, I finished Moving Pictures, by Terry Pratchett, the other day. A great book, I encourage anyone that like a good laugh to read some of his Discworld series. The man truly is the Douglas Adams of fantasy. That about wraps it up, I suppose. See, I told you it was going to be short. See you on the forums...
