Goodbye My Locks...

Mummy said my hair is getting way too long and wanted to snip it off. She said she can't stand my messy hair-do anymore and wanted it to be short. So its easier for both of us... I was to be mentally prepared for the new look...

Daddy tagged along on this memorable occasion. From this length to...

...this shoulder length...actually mummy wanted a bob-style, but daddy said its too drastic change and both he and me can't take it. So mummy relented ...

...for only a day! We went for another round of hair cut without daddy the next day. This time, mummy got what she wanted!

It feels funny with my hair so short and suddenly my head becomes so light! It took me a few days before I fell in love with this new hair-do! Its so convenient and easy to manage! But I still miss twirling my long hair some times.

My First - Flower Girl

I was so excited when my uncle told me that I get to be the flower girl on his wedding! Its my first time and its so thrill! Cool!

The Chess Marathon

Today we had our Chesskidz Marathon. It was SO cool! We played 22 rounds altogether.

The first 5 rounds were 'Bullet' which, BTW, means 1-minute game. *(See * at the end of post)I lost almost every single game due to flag drop!

The next 3 rounds were 5-minute Blitz which, BTW, means 5-minute games.** (See ** at the end of post)

I won most of the games so it may be just luck or the effort that I spent training has payed off! LOL! And then we had our Classical game which ,BTW, means that we played 25-minute games. Well, for Classical games it is not easy to win by Flagdrop so... ... I kinda lost all the games. See? My words are littered with Singlish. Heehee! But let's get on with it.

After Classical, we played Blindfold. Our Blindfold chess is a game where we don't get to move the pieces immediately. The player have to look at the numbers and letters on the board and say the move without moving it. You have to visualise and it was pretty tough. Well, for most people. I was board 5 and the GM said that players on Board 5 and Board 6 didn't need to play Blindfold chess. That was so sad but I was paired with Jerald for a 15minutes game and I won. At least, it something to cheer about!

Then it was Random chess/960 chess. You have to get someone to jumble up the pieces for you and it must be the same position for both Black and White. Then you try and do checkmate from there. It was pretty hard but I managed to get through it somehow. I played with Kota and he was like super super super super super hard! I complained when I came out of the playing area," SO HARD!" or " I fed up already lah! Don't want to play anymore can or not ah? Very hard leh!" But still I did my best and tried like, super hard.

Then, after Random/960 chess it was (drum roll please... ...) ROTATIONS! I love rotations! Rotations just rocks! Rotations means the whole team lines up from Board 1 to Board 5 (we skipped Board 6) and plays against another team. And when one of the teams has only 1 minute left, the Board 3 player takes over the whole game. And whose team do you think win? My team won! My team won! Well, what can you expect? If not why would I go and mention it? LOL! I think I'm gonna be out of energy soon so I guess this is officially.... THE END!

Rotation Chess...

hope I made the right moves...

My team came in 2nd!

My dear trophy!!!

*Those who don't know about chess,when you play chess, you are given a certain amount of time to play your game and you must attack your opponent's king and make sure he has no where to move, then you have won the game. In every game, you will be given the clock with the timing that the people arrange the competition want you to use. Then, if the clock is an analogue clock, it will have a tiny flag at the top and when you use it, the hands of the clock will move and when the minute hand reaches the clock moves past the flag, you have won the game by 'flag drop' (if it happens to your opponent, NOT you) so if the game is 1-minute, you have to move kind of fast.

**Those who don't know about chess,when you play chess, you are given a certain amount of time to play your game and you must attack your opponent's king and make sure he has no where to move, then you have won the game. In every game, you will be given the clock with the timing that the people arrange the competition want you to use. Then, if the clock is an analogue clock, it will have a tiny flag at the top and when you use it, the hands of the clock will move and when the minute hand reaches the clock moves past the flag, you have won the game by 'flag drop' (if it happens to your opponent and so NOT you) so if the game is 5-minute, you have to move kind of fast.

Children's Day Chess Challenge 2011 - SCF

On Saturday, I participated in the Children's Day Chess Competition organised by Singapore Chess Federation.

I played 7 rounds in all. On the first three rounds, before lunch, I lost. But my coach pulled us aside after our lunch and talked to my sis, Nic and me. He said this to me, "Even though you lost in the games before lunch, it is done. Now just forget about it first and play the next 4 rounds." And looking at the 3 of us, he reminded us "You must be determined to win. If you think that you are going to lose because your opponent looks tough and you think he plays the moves very hard, you will lose. "

He also said something that made me very happy, "We wear the Chesskidz t-shirt so that when we lose, we lose together. When we win, we win together (and, yes, if you haven't already guessed, I am from Chesskidz and Chesskidz is my chess school)" When I heard that, I concentrated really hard in the rest of my games and sat down quietly, which was pretty hard considering the fact that I am pretty much an active and 'can't-sit-still' kind of person. But still, I managed. And believe it or not, I actually... ...(drum-roll please) won the next three rounds!! So happy that I kept jumping around. Big mistake. *sigh* I didn't sit still so my mind wasn't focus while I was playing and I lost the last round. So sad. I wanted to scream, "@#$%@#$%!" But instead, I just sat down and started blaming and scolding myself. So much for my positive attitude during the game.

I was not expecting anything given that I only won 3 rounds and there are so many players with that score. And so when my name was called during the prize-giving, I did not realised it was ME! The man had to call my names a few times before I finally realised it and went up the stage. I unbelievably won a medal! I was like, yes! And I still couldn't believe it when I looked down at my medal... I was 4th for the girls under 10 category! I was like, cool! I was super, super, super, super, super happy!

I enjoy this moment...

I'm 4th from the right. Spot my sister? She was 2nd!

With all the Chesskidz warriors

with my siblings...

My merit medal...

I learned something from this competition: To set your mind on what you are doing and be happy together. ( The happy together part was because I met loads of my friends there.)

Well, it looks like I am out of energy so this is officially

THE END.

Intra Club Chess Challenge 2011

After playing 6 rounds over 3 Mondays, we finally have the winners for each group. I was tied with another girl for the 3rd placing but I won in Blitz and so, I got 3rd for the Under 11 in the Advance group. The teacher-in-charge actually wanted to give us only medal but some girls request it to be trophy and here we have it!

Everyone have a trophy! The VP's speech said that they hope with this small little trophy will spark the fire and spur us on in the bigger arena. Yes, I remember it was a medal I won in this Intra Club back in 2009 that stir up my interest in chess and I truly enjoy every Chess lesson and competition!

I was very happy for my sister too! She is the champion for Under-9 of the Advance group! Yeah!

Prize Presentation In School

This Prize Presentation is for our winning in the National School Chess Team Event. Our teacher will always get the medals from us and have it presented by the VP again in school. It such a honor to be "crowned" in front of all our school mates.

I'm in blue T-shirt receiving the medal from our VP.

Our School Chess players/ winners...

I'm 3rd from the left (in blue). meimei is 3rd from the right (in white)

A team photo with our VP

52nd National Inter-school Team Championship 2011

The long awaited National Inter-School Team Chess Championship is finally here! I was so looking forward to it but.....since the coach placed me as reserve under the U11 team A, I hardly got a chance to play until the very last round.

U11 girls team A (without our team captain cos she went off for lunch)

Group photos

Parents were invited to take the group picture. Spot mummy? hahaha..she was the talk of the town that day!

Throughout the competition, I kept bugging the coach and mummy to let me play but since the team is doing well, the coach did not want to change. Mummy told me that this is a team competition and we have to learn to work as a team and not for personal interest. I relented.

When my chance came at the last round, I was very excited and nervous too. Mummy didn't want me to play cos both my personal coach and her felt that I'm too "cold" to play in the last round. But 1 of my team mate is not performing and there's no way she can play and win, so the school coach decided to place me in. At least I might have a chance to win but I let her down... I was sad and felt very bad as I had lost a point for my team but my teammates were very nice and comforted me saying that its ok as it makes no different with my 1 point because even if I had won, we will still be half a point less than the champion.

So we got 2nd position in the National Inter School but Champion in the Zonal category! Our team got 2 medals each..something I don't deserve to have since I only played 1 round and lost. But everyone said I am part of the team and I deserve every single bits of it. Thanks mates!

Waltz in A minor

Yet to really master this piece but trying. I like this piece because its very nice...

2nd Swensen's Open Rapid Age-Group Chess Championship 2011

On August 2oth, Charmaine, mummy and I flew to KL for our very FIRST overseas chess competition. We were very excited but also nervous. When we arrived at the airport, we took our luggage and headed for the hotel. The hotel was splendid! It had an enormous lift lobby and comfortable chairs that you could sit on while waiting. I thought it was a 5 star hotel until... ... Everything turned my mind inside out.

1. We had to wait for a loooong time before we got attended to at the front desk.
2. The people at the counter took soooo long to give us our room.
3. The room was sooooo small!
4. The toilet was so stinky and now I thought this was a 1 star hotel.
5. There were only 2 beds and the beds were really tiny so when we wanted to sleep, one of us had to get squashed. I got the longer end of the stick in this case cos Charmaine slept with mummy and I had the entire bed to myself!
6. The soap was the stinkiest soap there could ever be (so whenever I was done showering, I smelt worse than before).
7. There was no entertainment source so we were bored the whole time and the only thing we could do was to play chess, eat and read the books that I brought along.
8. There was no hot water shower before 7am and mummy had to endure showering in cold water. We were lucky cos we took our shower after 7am.
   

Just before I screamed out the word "BORING!!" Aunty Vivien (our chess's captain) and her daughter cum my best pal, Sarah came to our room to rescue us! We chatted for a while before heading down to the mall to have our dinner at a Japanese restaurant. After that, we went for some shopping and I bought a key chain for my friend. She was delighted! By then, it was already very late and we were all tired. Thus, we headed back to the hotel, brushed our teeth and slept.

The next day was the BIG DAY! We were all so excited! But I was shaking. Shaking maybe with fear or maybe with excitement. At the end of the day, I think I did very well, winning 4 out of 6 games...

the first game;
the second game;
the fourth game; and
the last game (sixth).

Because normally out of 7 games I would only have won 3. Which is worse than the fail mark. I was ranked 36th out of 141 players and within the top 10 for U10 girls. Wow!

Anyhow after the games, we had dinner with our friends at a Chinese restaurant before rushing off to the airport. During my trip back home on the plane, I thought about everything that had happened. Which was hard to do properly with Charmaine making so much noise and mummy telling me to try and get some sleep cos its a school day the next day. Although I didn't win any medal or trophy, I had gained experience and I looked forward to the next 2 competitions (Inter-School Team Chess Championship) which was on 10th of September and 18th September (Patrick Tay Chess Challenge).

Well, It looks like I'm out of space so this is THE END. *tee hee* ( copied from Diary of A Wimpy Kid book)

Soap Making Project

We were told to collect used cooking oil in Term 2 for our Soap making project. Cooking oil ..... Soap...? Can't put a link to it? What has cooking oil got to do with soap?!

Anyway, when the day of the soap making project came, then I realised how we can change the oil into soap.

Things needed:

• 1 empty bottle with a mark of 350ml.
• 1 bottle of recycled oil (used for cooking or expired).
• 1 mold (tray)
• 60ml of Sodium Hydroxide
• 1 teaspoon
• 1 funnel
• A few sheets of filter paper
• 1 empty container
  

Steps:

1. Line the funnel with the filter paper and put the funnel on the empty bottle.
2. Slowly pour the recycled oil into the funnel until the oil in the empty bottle reaches the 350ml mark.
3. Pour the filtered oil into the empty container and stir it with the teaspoon (while doing this, pour in the Sodium hydroxide slowly).
4. After the mixture becomes milky (as in a bit chunky), pour it into the mold until the mold is full.
5. Leave the mold undisturbed for 2 days, then remove the soap from the mold and turn it upside-down.
6. Let it dry for 2 weeks
7. TA-DA! Your soap is ready!

Caution: Do NOT use this soap to shower, wash your face, wash your food or anything like that because you might have sensitive skin and if you use this soap to wash your food you might get food poisoning! :)

We were supposed to sell it (1 for $2) for fund raising but I decided to buy all 8 of them with my pocket money to give it to my family members as gifts.