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September 05, 2004
Orientation... Success or Not
Orientation M2/04 ended yesterday with BBQ night so I assume it's a good time to blog about it now. I'll try to be impartial here, so here goes...
Signature Hunt (SH)
12 groups running around, trying to get signatures from various groups of seniors. This time 'round, the SH people tried to make the list better by changing the signature sheet format. It may be a small thing but IMHO, it did make a lot of difference. It is, however, disappointing that there are complains against the seniors on the list. Most of these seniors hold leadership positions and one would have expected them to adhere by the rules. Severe humiliation and scary threats is just plain wrong.
Dresscode
I sincerely believe that guys should never ever ever be made to wear skirts because they look HORRIBLE! Imagine the horror that overcame me when I saw 2 guys in cheongsam having lunch when I got to uni one day. OMG. On the plus side, the juniors were really enthusiastic and put in a lot of effort. :) Some groups' bugs costumes were wonderful and I was really impressed!
Ice Breakers (IB)
This was the first main activity in orientation and there were problems with manpower because it was 2 days before Respi exam. The batch was not really enthusiastic about it since, well, it is 2 days before an exam and semester 3 isn't exactly what you'll call a honeymoon-sem and everyone's worried worried worried. Kudos to the IB people! If I'm in their position, I'll never be able to coordinate an activity in these circumstances.
Treasure Hunt
This may just be the most major event in the entire orientation since it's the one program that has people running all over the place outside campus. In the beginning, miscommunication made things a little messed up but I'm glad everything worked out fine in the end.
Variety Night
One thing this variety night proved was that things can be funny even without extensive sexual connotations! Even the IMCCs were less sick and perverted than I remembered from M2/03 and M1/04 orientations. Thank goodness. Some sketches were a little too lame and boring though but well, these things are always up to the groups' creativity and humour is subjective right? Thank goodness that the boring sketches were "made interesting" by seniors' jeering and flying newspapers. My birthday was also made special by this event and for that, please read my birthday post.
Telematch
Quite a huge turn out from the juniors, that's good. No large crowd from the seniors, that's bad. I guess most of the seniors wanted the morning to catch up on the past few weeks' sleep (We did just have an exam, you know), so that they can at least attend BBQ night later that day. One thing that made me really happy during Telematch was the integration of the different orientation groups. :) It's great to see some groups merge and cheer for each other. On another note, OOs were given instructions to lead the juniors to the field by a certain time and I guess one can't blame the committee for some OOs' irresponsibility right? And to anyone who is wondering, we did make a trip to IMU to ensure that all juniors have left before starting the activities.
BBQ Night
This semester, we had a dance floor. Initially, I thought it will be a dead floor rather than a dance floor but was pleasantly surprised to see that many enjoyed themselves dancing. I guess the main difference between this dance floor and the one you find in clubs is that here, you're among friends and the embarassment factor no longer matters. :) No dirty stink bombs this time around, just water bombs and I'm proud to say that we have more than 17 juniors left at the end of the night. *grinz*
Soon, I'll be blogging about ragging and about the 2 distinct styles of orientation we have here.
Posted by yeepei at September 5, 2004 09:22 PM
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Comments
hahaha! made me feel for my uni orientation days. have loads of fun! but doubt you guys have ragging, or do ya?
Posted by: Buaya69 at September 6, 2004 12:32 PM
It depends on how you define ragging. We did make our juniors do silly things but the guidelines seniors were given was that we are not to demean them or have any sexual innuendos in what the juniors were told to do. :) Getting them dirty with eggs and flour.. well.. it's part of the fun lahz. No horrible stuff with maggots like some other batches kena though.
Posted by: YP at September 6, 2004 12:54 PM
I dun think Treasure Hunt is "moderately" messed up. Eventhough I'm not an OO or SM, I was always with Group 9 when they go from station to station. The group was unhappy and frustrated over all the mistakes that forced us to run around the same places over and over again. Thaven's group was also very frustrated over the unfairness of the go-back-to-IMU-bcuz-it's-raining thing. Some of the groups continue on, and that gave them an unfair advantage.
Also, on Variety Night, the IMCCs ARE perverted man. IMHO, I think it's actually MORE perverted than the ones in our batch. I'm most disappointed at the questions for the IMCC. They're so explicit that the only answers they can give have to be sexual ones, and not to mention all the "show-us-how" stuff after they answered the questions... Damn sick. One of the juniors in group 9 sez it an eyesore and avoided watching the performances altogether!
Oh and another thing, I really really HATED that flying newspaper thing. Although some of their performances really suck, but do u guys think of their feelings when they've done their best preparing so much juz to get boo by the crowd? And I will personally like to strangle the one who shout to group 9 about walking faster in their South Park sketch. I can see that the idiot has no idea at all wat South Park is, and so do most of the crowd. ** deleted by admin **
And for Telematch, it's a good thing that u guys have made a trip back to IMU to check if all the juniors have arrived. But still, I think it's a big mistake to not have at least a committee member at IMU to direct or guide the juniors to reach the field, since most of them are a bit lost there, waiting. In the end, it was Chik Ian and another guy that helped us out!
As for Ice Breaker and BBQ Nite, I can't say much bcuz I'm not present then. The dresscode was quite impressive, and I really like the crativity of the new batch. But I really think the guys in cheongsams are cool la... Seriously, and that's not juz from me... Eerily, some guys actually look right in cheongsams! >=)
Whoa, soree for the long comment ya. Oh soree if I sound critical, but these are my honest thoughts about the orientation. Hope u dun get offended!
-Edited by admin at 9:24pm 06092004-
Posted by: Thom at September 6, 2004 01:30 PM
I'm not going to be defensive over this. Just a note though, don't make assumptions and therefore baseless accusations. I'll ensure that the committee hears about how you feel, thanks for your feedback. Since it's over, all I can say is that I pray orientation M1/05 will be a success and that you guys won't be having your respi exam on the same week.
Posted by: YP at September 6, 2004 01:45 PM
Er... which parts that I've make are assumptions? All my comments are on my observation la, I dun assume anything! >=)
Posted by: Thom at September 6, 2004 04:34 PM
Assumptions because what you see may not be all there was to it. :) If you're involved in organising the next orientation, maybe you will see more light.
Posted by: YP at September 6, 2004 07:49 PM
count your blessings that you didn't get eggs and flour thrown on you when you're walking your way into the campus.. phew!
Posted by: Jen at September 6, 2004 11:41 PM