First day: we ate, did some math problems, ate again, did more math problems, ate, then slept. As you could see, we were always eating and solving math problems. Ryan Chan was my room mate. The food was not very nice as some were spicy and there was no chicken rice (my favourite). The hostel room was as bad. The bed was hard and the toilet was very tiny, probably it only had the length and width of a normal room door's width. At night, we, I mean they (senior team and national team, minus the 6 of us in the IMO team), had ice breakers.
Second day: we ate, did some math problems, ate again, did more math problems, ate, then slept. (I copy-and-paste from first day, as the schedule is quite similar). At night, we had a talk by the X-men, not the wolverine one. X-men are people who have participated in previous IMO.
Third day: we, I mean they, had their vertical training, where they were given 4.5 hours to solve 10 questions in a group. The hardest questions were 8 and 10, but 8 seemed to me like an easy problem. At night, we had an amazing race, which I failed miserably.
Fourth day: we had our first quiz, which was a disaster. Q2 was an extremely easy problem but everyone except Aidi got 0 for that particular question. At night, we had a talk by Jun Wei, one of the younger X-men, about his trip in IMO.
Fifth day: we had our second quiz, which was also a massive failure. In the evening, we had a buffet at a certain NUS bistro/restaurant. According to Ryan, the buffet cost only $15 per person, no wonder the food was lousy and not appetising. Then we went back to the hostel. We stayed in the music room until 12 midnight. Actually, at 11pm, all the gates and doors would be locked and no one could enter or exit, but ingenious us put a slipper at the music room door so it could not close.
Sixth day, which is the last day, we, I mean they again, had their oral quiz in the morning (we conducted the quiz), which was about mine sweeper. After lunch, we packed and left the hostel room for good, no ... not until I reach year 5 (when 1-year hostel stay is compulsory for NUS High students).
I am glad to be back at home :-)
Photo of me solving a geometry problem, courtesy of Shi Fangying (RGS).
We had a gathering for families of the Year 2s yesterday afternoon, organised by the NUSH PSG (year 2 reps). It was a picnic at the Botanic Gardens, near the Symphony Lake. As you can see from the photos (courtesy of Kendrick's father), not many people turned up. The following people were at the gathering - Kendrick & family, Rania & family, Cheryl's parents, Jordan's (205) family and my family. I think the parents of a 202 student also came. It seemed that families from 203 formed the majority. There were lots of food, like mee-siam, Japanese rice with seaweed, fried chicken wings, chicken shreds with mushrooms soup, meat balls, fish balls, corn pudding, tidbits, packet drinks. Some of us played cards, while the adults chit-chatted with each other, sharing stories (complaints on classes, teachers and students?).
We left at about 6.30 pm.
