Dust....!!!

I find dust, cob-webs etc in this house :p oops, haven't been coming in here for donkey mths... well, some interesting/unforgettable episodes happened but no time to pen down...

Driving
Talk abt driving first. felt very disheartened aft i failed the first practical test. so perfect for circuit yet flung at road, somemore towards the end. not wanting to waste so much money, i decided to learn from pte instructor. cost $30 per hr for off-peak and $32/hr for peak hrs. don't know i hv to pay for registration fee cos the instructor din tell me when i asked him about his rates. only during the first lesson, then i realised that i hv to pay 30 for registration, already discounted as mentioned by him. as i din bring enough money with me, he even asked me to drive and stopped by place where there's atm machine. feel so cheated at tt time. this uncle not too bad when it came to teaching, n he's also very chatty n kept 'flirting' or 'praising' (to put it in nicer term) me.
learnt a total of 5 lessons from him and 5 lessons from comfort, still learnt from the latter as the former needed to pay extra for going into circuit.
for 2nd test, it was raining that day. during warming up, rain has stopped but it began to rain again towards the end of the session. i went for my balloting n got test route 9. tester is a very nice person, instructed and guided me a bit. but, when it came to vertical parking, i dont what happened tt day, i just failed to park. he gave me a lot of chances but i just unable to. i know my key points are wrong cos the time lag between them was long so i ended up too close to the pole. he pointed out tt i positioned too near to the poles--tt's nice of him. i made adjustments but still unsuccessful. haiz... disheartened with the rest of the test stations already. knew i already failed but tester still let me go out to the road. incurred 1 immediate failure n 20 points. out of 20 pts, 14 were devoted to parking. if not for this, would have pass. :'(
wanted to give up actually cos hv spent so much money on driving. also difficult to book for revision lessons with comfort. asked about the earlier driving re-test, got 13 june which is a very favourable date, 1 day b4 my advanced theory expired and during the hols. so i decided to give it a last try. this time round, my membership n PDL expired thus needed to renew. only managed to book for 3 lessons this time round.
3rd Driving test
was told by instructor that tester tend to be lenient to those re-taking for 3rd time. still felt a bit nervous but got the same tester as i got for 2nd test. really fated to see hime again. he rem me and asked how many revision lessons i had this time round b4 test. on the road, a van turned right into my lane which is wrong. it cut in b4 me and tester noted down the van number and said he could give him 'san man'. a taxi driver also cut into my lane without showing signal and there wasnt sufficient space for him to do so. i wanted to horn him but procrastinated. all in all, still managed to pass with 18 points. actually have more but tester cancelled it to let me pass--insufficient acceleration when moving off, which he felt din cause hazard or danger.

Beijing
was told by hod to go for the beijing immersion tour with the kids. put me as stand-by but later confirmed tt i had to go cos of shortage of manpower. thot i could escape from overseas trip this year due to my nie course. however this trip din clash with my nie course so i could go. first time taking flight and going to such a far place. the furthest country i had gone is only malaysia n with parents many many yrs ago.
initially, my flight is in the afternn but only a day b4, i was notified to go early to take 845 am flight. since i have prepared, i was assigned to go with 6 students tog with their guardians. booked a cab in order to reach changi airport at 630am.
(to be continued...)