5HDs

My units:
1) Advanced Financial Accounting Theory & Practice
2) Financial Management
3) Taxation Law
4) Corporation Law & Trust
5) Marketing Theory & Practice

Aim: 5HDs (2 Law paper; 1 Advanced paper; 1 Finance paper; overload marketing paper)
Watch out! will put my ass on the chair 24/7 if I have to in order to secure the HDs.

MULO

Monash University Online Lecture (MULO) is damn useful!! Have to admit that.

Problem:

It's quite difficult to catch what the lecturer is saying at the same time jotting down notes during lecture, because we won't be able to move at the same pace as the lecturer's words.

Remedy:

Listen carefully without taking down notes, then head back to room, download the online lecture and re-listen again, while this time taking down notes cause the lecture can be paused, replay, forward and stop. Great help. Moreover the lecture can be re-listen again and again to really reinforce the material presented. Sometime it could be really hard trying to catch what they (lecturers) are trying to say especially CommBank - Ms Kathy Avram, Cost Info - Dr Berekat Redda and Company Reporting - Ms Jacquline Birt (She's the second lecturer who teaches from week 2 till week 4, cause first one is Ms Wen Qu who teaches in lecture week 1 and back again to teach in lecture week 5 or 6 till week 13). Ms Wen Qu is good but a little impatient, while Ms Kathy Avram has too much patient like a grandmother that she sometimes seems to be mumbling in her own words which makes it difficult to capture what she meant.

Once again reiteration: MULO is damn good!

Quite arbitrary to just come up with this kind of typing, anyway have a good day. Sunday, hiding in room listening online lectures and researching for assignments. Cultivating the nerd lifestyle.

Daily light saving is coming to an end. Approx. around 4th April, all clocks in Melbourne would be switching/synchronise back by an hour, thus making Melbourne 2 hours ahead of Malaysia compare to now which is 3 hours ahead of Malaysia.

Eg. Malaysia 8pm, Melbourne is 11pm (Now)

Malaysia 8pm, Melbourne is 10pm (April 4th onwards)

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Introduction

I almost forgot that I haven't really explain my current situation here at Clayton, Melbourne. So I'm living in the Halls of Residence.It's an on-campus residence. The name of my hall is Howitt. The others are Farrer, Richardson, Deakin, Mannix, Roberts, and Normanby. It's the tallest hall located around the other halls, standing at 12th stories high. So if I'm walking back from campus centre (The so-called happening area), upon looking up and spotting the tall building, well that's my hall. It's like a primary landmark for most of the students staying there. The tall characteristic is essential especially while walking back during the night, because with that landmark, you know you're walking the right way. CLAYTON campus is damn huge alright. It's also a useful for people coming back from the Nott. The Nott is the local bar/pub where most students will go during Thursday nights. So far no one, even the locals can give me an answer as to why go to the bar on a Thursday and not Friday. My guess is, cheaper rate for beer and other alchoholic drinks for students. I just went to the Nott with Zax, Chieh Ai, Kane and Jun yesterday.

Alright back to Howitt Hall. I'm staying on the 10th floor, and of course we do have lifts here. Howitt is the only hall with lifts, because we're not going to climb flight after flights of stairs to our rooms. It's 12 floors man!. And damn I'm staying on the third highest floor. Not to say a very great view. I'm facing a Toyota Technical Centre and it can get quite noisy when cars passes by. But the view can be quite nice during the night (seeing street lights lah).

Now to my floor mates. The 10th floor has 19 residence. By the way, we don't share rooms, it's every room for a single person. I'll start by naming my floor mates: Romain from France; Tidja Joseph from Queensland, Australia; Debbie Dong from China; Caitlin from Australia (Saw her twice throughout my stay so far); Patrick Hutchens from New South Wales which is part of Australia; Jie Si from China; Bruno from Italy; Alex from Australia; Dale Cram from Australia; Veenah from Malaysia; Kane Tan from Malaysia; Zoe Sellwood from Autralia; Mitchell from Australia; Gracia from Singapore; Pear from Bangkok, Thailand; Bushan from Mauritius; Tiffany Chao from Canada; Eddie Moore from Bendigo which is part of Australia and finally me from Malaysia.

I'm staying in room 1011, which means 10th floor, room 11. My neighbours are Debbie and Tidja. Every floor has a Residential Advisor (RA), sort of a leader for the floor and they are not elected from us but part of the overall Howitt Hall administration-bureaucratic system. My floor's RA is Patrick. He's the one who we must find if there's any problem throughout our stay in 10th floor. He's studying journalism at Caulfield. Nice dude, and all RAs are like mentors to us, which includes Patrick.

My room is not very big, but it's definitely very small. It's furnished enough to keep me survive, but take note that, there's no fan at all in my room or any other rooms. Freaky at first sight but after staying for more than a month, the weather is not that bad, especially on the 10th floor. Could get quite cold after raining or during gloomy days. I do have a radiator though to keep warm, but definitely inadequate for winter. I'm planning to buy a blower which can adjust to blow hot air or cold air. Anyway now it's ending summer. It's quite weird to see the sun sets around 8pm. YES! 8pm and the sun only starts to set. Damn weird at first encounter, but slowly will get used to it. Apart from that, everything is really good. I do enjoy very much staying so far away from home. People asked occasionally whether am i homesick, and I say NO!. Why would I be homesick if I can contact home through msn. Moreover it wouldn't be wise to cultivate such attitude cause I've big plans to travel and work around the in the foreseeable future. During days which i have classes, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, I'll walked for 20 minutes to the bus loop to take the FREE shuttle service to Caulfield campus. The bus journey usually takes about less than 15 minutes but could get up to 20 minutes during peak hours. That's why i selected my classes to start at weird timings.

Monday: 1pm-5pm
Wednesday: 2pm-4pm
Thursday: 11am-3pm
Friday: 9am-11am (This once exceptional)

Traveling to Caulfield takes alot of my time. So considering and will be applying to course transfer again to Clayton for next semester. Hopefully.

I shop my groceries at Brandon Park Shopping Complex. There are Coles supermarket, ALDI and K-Mart for me to get everything I need. If not enough I can go to Clayton Town to shop Asian groceries but that'll cost me some bus fee (AUD$ 2.80 for 2-hour usage), whereas Brandon Park is free cause, Monash Residential Service provides free shuttle service to Brandon Park during Saturday from 9.15am-1.15pm. Tomorrow will be heading to buy food to cook. Will be sharing cooking with 8 people, namely Arik, Kane Tan, Zax Teh, Lucien Chuah, Chieh Ai, Duvyn and Jun. I'll be supervising to cook Peppered Chicken Soup on this coming Tuesday. The other days would be different people supervising. Either Saturday or Sunday we going to cook Bak Kut Teh. Wohoooo!!! Unfortunately, besides this hyping moments, I have tons of workload to be done. Assignments lah, tutorial work lah, listening to online lectures lah, blah blah blah lah and etc. Won't be going out anyway this weekend except shopping for groceries. Oh yea, Howitt hall, ground floor got Nintendo Wee. So can play guitar hero. Wee. I prefer the drums though. ahaha!

I guess the light introduction would be sufficient to call it an overall introduction. Have a good day everyone. Oh ya, since arriving here, I had met a few people who share the same surname as me. I know it sounded lame to be so proud, but I had never met in my life anyone outside my family who shares the same surname as me. Altough the spelling may be different but the chinese calligraphy is exactly the same. They are Victor Tham and Suzzane Tham. I don't think they both know each other but I definitely know both of them.

Signing off

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Barbeque pictures.

Some pictures of the farewell. Who's farewell? Me lah of course. Well besides for Lam, Chieh Ai and er Lip Boon (I dont really know this dude). A very long overdue picture post, thanks and appreciate alot for organising at Jerry's condo. Wonderful barbeque.

Lam (left) and Jerry

And yes we indeed got wet, result of being tossed into the pool. Hence, form two (2) new groups, Pakatan Kering (those managed to stay away from the pool) and Pakatan Basah (*enuf said*)

I was in the latter one.

Another mad/crazy semester

I screwed up my money & capital markets paper. Which means i failed the whole subject, which means I can't go to Monash, Clayton, which means i can't do accounting and finance (specialist) offered by Monash, Clayton. Sigh...........................all i can do now is to go to Monash, Caufield and work myself doing accounting and finance (maybe) general paper. But I'd heard that after heading to Monash, Caufield it is possible to transfer to Monash, Clayton the following semester which would be my year 2, second semester. How true is it? I'm not sure but if there's an opportunity to do so, I'll take it. Failed two (2) times try for the third. Am very disappointed with the exam. Everyone said it was extremely easy cause it was identical to tutorial questions and i said "phew it was tough, i might fail". *Heavy sigh* I can't believe...how to major in finance if the introductory, the very basic concept; fundamentals i failed to understand. HOW HOW HOW!!!??? Marketing didn't went very well either. Accounting B was also down. Now left is business law which I don't have a single unit of confidence in me. I don't know what to do now. Just don't know what to do...

Benjamin Thum Chun Hon's 19th Birthday

Its 3.44 a.m. on the 19th October 2008. Can't sleep yet! Why? Was overwhelmed by the surprises given by my super, cool, awesome buddies. They crash into my house to give me a surprise birthday celebration. Thats right they crash into my house at 12.00 a.m. on the 19th October 2008!! That would be the last thing I'll ever thought off at 12.00 a.m. How wonderful they are? Too wonderful!! Don't know what really need to write yet, this simple short post is dedicated to all those who had participated to organise this special celebration whether directly or indirectly, well wishes from msn, handphone messages, etc. THANK YOU ALL!!! If I were to be transfered to Australia next year, definitely there would be a permanent big place in my mind for all of you guys. Wei Liang, Melisa Seo, Esther Ng, Nicholas Lam, Andrew Lee, Jerry Yap, Chen Siang, Tom Yam, Daniel Lau, Chieh Ai, Jo Wee, Yong Hao, Kar Kien, James Chai, Logananth, Alexander Tan, Carryn Tan, Lesley Tan, Nick Chew, Pei Chern, Chou Xie, Adrian Lim, Sze Luan, Kumar, Gun Wei Chye and others. Appreciate all of it!

Now though its my B'day, as how Melisa put it, me last birthday as a teen with a number one in the front (next would be 20 adi), I'll still criticise this MCA (Used to be referred as Malaysian Chinese Assosiation), but now I've no idea what they're are called. The election just ended,we knew who won. Was expected but then again; "What can a few useless guys winning a useless organisation achieve?"

--N.O.T.H.I.N.G--

Exactly!! NOTHING!!!

With all the published news in The Star newspaper, how many people actually took the time to read, i skipped all those useless news. Financial news or other relevant news should be put forth before this immaterial election. But they'll never do it cause MCA owned a huge stake in The Star Newspaper mah.

Monash is becoming an ass

Monash University Sunway campus had terribly disappointed me with their full blatant lies and misrepresentation all over its brochures telling the world how grand and great they are. Let me share with you my experience while being coerced and later drifted away from my real intention.
At the beginning of 2008, after receiving my unstunning and disappointed SAM results, i forgo my intention to study engineering because I failed the qualification requirement of Monash and had no intention to go for other universities (those that I qualified) as Monash is well-known to be internationally recognise for it's capabilities of producing top-notch undergraduates students for the past several years. So my dad started throwing up questions at the counselors at the Finance Department in Monash University, Sunway campus regarding the chances of being transfered to Monash, Clayton campus in my year 2 which is 2009, and she stated that for Clayton, the requirement of the average marks is to be a minimum of 70% while Caufield campus is minimum of 65% and the rest (Berwick, Peninsular, Gippsland and South Africa) is lower then 65% (She was unsure). She failed to include that those minimum requirements were bounded to change from each semester. That lack of information had induce me to enrol for Monash, as if I was to be inform of the change of requirements then I would have alter my choice and enrol directly to Monash, Clayton campus or other universities such as University of Adelaide or University of Western Australia. Now, after attending two (2) "Monash transfer" talks and being briefed that the new requirement for transfer to Clayton and Caufield campuses had been upgraded to 70% for both respectively. This was due to increase in supply and demand of students and after attaining a minimum of 70%, you are only eligible to apply and not confirm a place in either Clayton or Caufield. Which means they'll pick only the creme de la creme which the earlier counselor had failed to project this information to me or my parents at the time of registration to Monash, Sunway campus. My guess is that too many people had opted for Caufield as a back-up plan if they were to fail the requirement to enter Clayton therefore they increase both to the same level of requirement. Worst of all engineering students only require a minimum of past (50%) to be eligible to offer for transfer to either Clayton or Caufield despite engineering being a much more tougher coarse (so to say) but with many people scoring high distinctions and my guess is that many people opted to study 2+2 if they ever plan to do a transfer, therefore in simple economic terms, there is no demand from the engineering school undergraduates students. Unfair it is because there was obvious a silence when it comes to transfer as many counselors were unaware of the requirements of transferring, as Monash from time to time changes it to suit to the situation without properly addressing to us students and luckily for me that I've done Specialist Mathematics in my YEAR 12 in SAM at Taylors, but to those who didn't do or had drop that subject then its too bad. But as a reasonable person, its hard to actually ask Monash University to find out the requirement as many of us were still unsure of our future path to universities. Therefore its difficult for us as we are at the loosing end no matter what happened, this is obviously a kind of moral hazard whereby one party is much more informed then the other creating an unbalance form of communication. Monash maybe be great at harnessing good undergraduates but seriously a no in terms of giving advice because many of it were omitted. Its so hard in semester two (2) to score an average of 74 marks (Distinction) for each subject. Business Law (Fat hopes), Marketing (attainable), Accounting B (Hopefully) and Money and capital markets (No idea). IN depressing shit, Fuck up la.