During the recess week, I went to Malaysia with my friends.

This is the first time I DIY tourism routes with my friends to a foreign country and it is really a unforgettable nice experience!

During this trip, we got to know Malaysian lifestyle, such as the food they eat , the clothes people like to wear , transportaion and so on.

One thing that is most inspiring is sea in Semporna.I have never seen such beautiful sea water in person in my life before. Swimming in the sea seeing different creatures is also amazing!

This week, as we didn’t have any classes, we flew to Thailand for leisure. Firstly, we went to Bangkok and it was out of my expectation. Its streets were crowded and traffic there was a mess. It made me recall Singapore’s tidiness and order very much. However, the hotels in Bangkok were really nice and cheap, the place was big and it was very entertaining. After checking in, we went to downtown for dinner, it astonished me that the MRT service was so expensive that it was even cheaper to take taxis! It was quite unreasonable for me, because in my eyes, civilians can afford the public transportation instead of taxis, but the MRT fees was so expensive! The second day, we went to visit some Buddhism temples in Bangkok. There were so many temples in Thailand, even in downtown area, you could find a temple in ten minutes’ walk.

On the afternoon of Oct. 4, we attended a workshop about emotional intelligence. The trainer was very passionate and well-prepared. The topic is quite related to the TF leadership program. If we ask what makes a leader, IQ or EQ? Most of us will choose IQ. But for being a leader, having a high EQ actually is gaining more popularity against IQ. The trainer also introduced five components of Emotional Intelligence at work which are self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy and social skill. Our group worked at the motivation parts and we had drawn several conclusions such as tracking every progress and remain optimistic.

It’s a really engaging workshop that includes multiform activities to mobilize the enthusiasm of students. Also, the group work helps me learn to cooperate with native students. I would say I enjoyed the informative workshop.

The closing ceremony of the TF LEaRN program is the sharing forum held on Oct. 17 in NUS. It’s a bit of shame that we haven’t been to SMU through this program. But seeing all those familiar faces which we have already seen on the friendship day is quite genial to us. We heard a lot of currently on-trend topics concerning Employment issues, entrepreneurship, environment and the like. We are all too aware that there are lots of obstacles to achieve a peaceful and sustainable future, but it’s important for us to keep pace with the times. And this, I think, is the point of the forum.

As for the sharing of students, it resonates with me up to a point but theirs seemed more diverse. Listening to their experience provides us with vivid scenes without actually being overseas. Besides, I have seen various kinds of national attires and had a nice chat with some foreign students during lunchtime. Hope this friendship will last forever.

Today, I came to Arab Street with my friend. The scenery on the street brought me into Arabia at once. There are colorful lighting shops and a variety of carpet shops. The most attractive thing for me is the bar street here. People from all over the world gather here to chat and drink. The band on the street also performed wonderfully. Nice day!

As Halloween was coming, the ghost house in Universal Studio was open finally. Although we already went there before, we still wanted to see what it was like in the ghost house. Unfortunately, it rained heavily that day and it was like the heaviest rain that I had ever been into. However, we can not refund, so we made it there anyway. Some activities were not open that day because of the heavy rain, and the open activities were full of people. Everywhere had a long queue and lots of people, it took us almost an hour and a half to get entrance. It was quite disappointing that the ghost house was not scary at all, instead, I felt quite funny when the NPC jumped out and tried hard to scare me. After playing two activities, as it may be too late to catch the last MRT back home, we planned to leave early to catch MRT or buses as the taxis here was too expensive. To make matters worse, the MRT station had already closed and we just missed the last bus back home. In all, it was very unsatisfying to go to the ghost house in Universal Studio, and I would never recommend it to others at all.

This is my first volunteer project to play with children. Of course, in addition to playing games with them, our main job is to tutor their daily work and give answers and guidance. What impressed me was the badminton event that started at 5:30. I played badminton with others. In the process, I also became a teammate with other volunteers. The whole event was light and pleasant, and I was very happy to see the children’s smiles!

Singapore’s bus system is well developed. Through the cooperation with Google Maps, real-time tracking and forecasting of bus routes can be achieved. The on-time arrival of the bus has provided me with great convenience, and the equipment in the car is also fully considered for the needs of the disabled.