whistler’s blog

Today was my last IB exam, and finally after months of hardship, its over. I must say although IB may have given me a little different experience, I am an A Level kind of person. My grades have been very low, reason for getting rejected at universities where I would really like going to. I am pretty sure my grades would have been superb if I were doing A Levels.

Well, I should also blame TIS for the bad grades and frustration. At my new school, EIS, it was fun and exciting, while very tough at the same time. I would really miss this place.

I have never waited for any other day as I have waited for today. I had put a counter on iGoogle and google desktop(when I used it) for this day. Finally it counts 0 days.

Now I am planning to focus on my health. Have hardly had any exercise since I moved to UAE. I’ll take up some open source project. Redesign this website. Finalize where I am heading for uni, as everyone but me knows by now.

I am very happy with my computer, running feisty makes it ultra productive and it looks amazingly cool too, with all my customizations of course.

Well, I just finished doing my World lit essay, yaay! Have the rest of the night to complete my Extended Essay. Just got hold of how to cite, using the footnote system, its the best! Anyways my Extended Essay is gonna be really crappy. I did get a really cool new topic for an extended essay though, lol. but Its really late to change. So my extended essay is gonna suck like the rest of the theoretical ones in physics.

Well the good thing is, I finally think i’d be able to complete all my coursework and not fail ib diploma. Lol, i even say that when i have economics portfolio and business coursework due tomorrow which im not gonna hand in. I performed really poorly for exams so i donno if im gonna get in to a good uni. Inshallah the finals are gonna be great.

Doing the economics portfolios would take 3-4 days, then I have significant progress over my other math coursework. And i finally figured out what to do about my business coursework. Hamza’s restaurant would be a good thing to study. Then I have TOK essay to hand in, have to almost redo it but, it took me 2-3 days to write it anyways.

Whats left are the physics lab reports and cas(creativity) hours, hopefully i’ll be able to complete that aswell when im done with the rest of the things. Oh and what about sending out those uni applications…

No post for a long time, I have been quite busy and am trying to reduce the amount of time I waste using my computer, i.e. being carried away browsing sites which are irrevelevant to any of my IB assignments.

A little update on my life, I have started taking guitar lessons, and have to buy a guitar, just that I cant find any time to go to some place to shop for it. Finally my extended essay is beginning to take some shape but still far from complete, instead of doing lab experiments I want to create a computer simulation for the essay. I am making some progress catching up with the french class, but really need to work on my vocabulary.

I am still quite screwed with work, have to cover another 45 CAS hours, do courseworks, revise previous things, get done with university applications, so I dont think I will increase the frequency of blogging, particularly when I dont get much comments or hits.

After spending a few days working in an accellerated pace including sometimes keeping awake overnight, I am now in a somewhat better situation. I have finally finalized my extended essay idea and am going to start working on the experimental part of it during breaks. I need to get in to some sort of activity, probably music classes to cover some CAS hours. I have to do my world lit essay before the end of ramadan, so i can prepare for my english oral presentation and TOK presentation in the eid holidays and also complete a math coursework. I badly need extra french tuition, I seem to know nothing compared to others in the ab initio class. Have to work during breaks on french sometimes but that is not sufficient. I lost my TI 83 on wednesday so doing math work has become painful. Almost forgot I had to buy lemons for group 4 project tomorrow.

Last week got a TI-83 Plus, cost me around Dhs. 500, sadly my dad could not find a TI-84 in Dubai. Five minutes after playing with it I wanted to connect it to my computer and add some additional applications, but to my surprise the package had a CD-ROM with more applications for the calculator but did not have a cable to connect to a PC. However there is a small cable which can link two calculators. TI-84s come with a USB cable with them.

I have almost completed my IB math syllabus and more than half of physics without requiring some fancy calculator like this. At least I’ll be able to use it during my exam. But should I or should I not? I hardly know how to operate the calculator properly and I am pretty sure I will be able to do as good without it.

Anyway it would be great to make program little programs on it in BASIC, although till now I haven’t been able to figure out how to take user input in the program. Another thing I haven’t been able to figure out is that how come I unknowingly manage to press the on button every time I open the cover. Whenever I try to observe how I press it I don’t press it. Funny, my previous calculator did not have the on button on the same place as this one.

By the way I have to study economics, exams are going on, I have given all my standard level papers and all my higher level subjects are left.

Today the physics class was more interesting than usual. It got over before we knew it and we did not take a break either, not because there was a clown to entertain us but because we decided to sit on the floor for a change. The class went on like usual at first discussing some current issues, then learning something new, which this time was a projectile motion formula, then we proceeded to do questions. School as a whole was not bad at all today. The Language teacher not coming made the Monday good too. Maybe also because I spent a lot of time in Taimur

Thankfully someone cleaned up the fridge and its been days since the water has been in the common room so yesterday some of us put water in the fridge and today we also drank some. Somebody removed the blinds so some of our fun is taken away. But some guys say they know of a secret stack of sticks in another such blind. If you havnt already, you should read my older post about the common room.

Here are the pictures of the throne i was talking about:



This setup was then converted to a bed:

And here are some people sleeping on the bed:

A closer look at the water boxes they say “Save yours’ family health” (i didnt make the error the manufacturer did) and God knows what non-carborated means:

This is the koala bear i was talking about somebody broke its nose:

The blinds from where we take out sticks to play with:

A view of the corner:

It

After completing my O levels and getting reasonably good grades, I had to find a good school to go to for A levels. It was a matter of fact that I was tired of my current school then, and kids used to say:

Around two months back I was in a dilemma whether to go for IB or A levels for my two years before university. Many people face difficulties choosing between IB Diploma and A-Levels. I am writing this to help these people to make the right choice. If you don