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Russell is a very bright student who is able to grasp the material taught in class quickly and effortlessly. With the prescribed syllabus unable to fully occupy his time and attention, Russell actively sought extra-curricular reading material. His intellectual curiosity extends to all the subjects he studied, though it is especially apparent in Physics and Mathematics. The online encyclopaedia Wikipedia is one of his favourite sources of information because of the immense breadth available, thereby suiting his diverse interests well. In Mathematics, his reading included such advanced topics as the half-derivative and Cantor's diagonal argument. In Physics, Russell's aptitude was very clear from the start. He represented the college in the Singapore Physics Olympiad (SPhO) and bagged a bronze medal. Three months of intensive training and a few rounds of selection tests later, Russell represented Singapore at the 7th Asian Physics Olympiad (APhO) in Almaty, Kazakhstan. In addition, Russell also co-authored a scientific research report in the field of particle physics while working under his mentor Dr Phil Chan (a physics professor at the National University of Singapore), entering it for the Singapore Science and Engineering Fair. In his own time, Russell explored esoteric fields at the cutting edge of physics research, such as string theory, using general science books (an example would be The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene) as his guide. These impressive accomplishments are testament to his discipline and responsibility for his learning and he was awarded a Certificate of Merit from the college for his efforts.

Aside from academics, Russell was also active in the Astronomy Club. Having prior experience with and a wealth of knowledge about Astronomy, Russell naturally took on a leading role. The respect he commanded among his peers was affirmed with his election as the club's vice president. He was included in the team selected to represent the college at the NUS-NTU Astronomy Challenge in 2005 and after working and fighting hard for the competition, emerged as 1st runners-up. In his second year, Russell played a large part in sharing the wonders of Astronomy with his fellow club members through presentations and discussions. He was always enthusiastic in carrying out his duties as vice-president.

Russell was also someone who believed very much in contributing to the community. Among the projects he participated in were the World Vision 30-hour Famine Camp and fund raisings for a charity as well as the victims of the 2004 Asian tsunami crisis. In class, whenever his classmates needed assistance in their work, Russell was ever willing to lend a helping hand. In spite of his heavy schedule, Russell never neglected his personal development. He always found time to read and watch films, attesting to his good time management. As for his character, Russell holds strong beliefs about thinking and reasoning for himself. As a result of this philosophy, he was never one to mindlessly conform to standards he did not believe in. His major influences include the writings of Bertrand Russell, Henry David Thoreau (a consequence of watching the film Dead Poets Society) as well as Jack Kerouac's beat novel On The Road. One of the most striking characteristics of Russell though, is his zest for life and this, together with his quick intellect and strength of character, will most certainly see him far in the future.

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Russell is someone who takes great responsibility for, and is committed to, his own learning. He participated in the Physics Olympiads, representing both school and country, where he was taught advanced physics but was required to complete a great deal of the learning on his own. His achievements, a Bronze in the Singapore Physics Olympiad and participating in the Asian Physics Olympiad, demonstrate that he is able to structure his learning and meet rigorous academic demands with minimal supervision. It also shows that Russell is an intellectually curious person who does not confine his learning to the classroom or to the mundane demands of the syllabus, this being true even for subjects other than Physics. Russell frequently does his extracurricular reading on Wikipedia, where he can find information on every topic under the sun. It was on Wikipedia, for example, that Russell read about Cantor’s diagonal argument, appreciating the ingenuity of its construction. Frequently, Russell is not able to grasp everything he comes across but he is not intimidated by this. Rather, the endless possibilities of learning, thinking, and discovering new ideas is what excites him and motivates him to read further.

Another characteristic of Russell is that he believes very much in thinking for himself, being cautious of accepting anything unquestioningly. He was influenced in this respect partly by reading about science and its history and partly by watching the film Dead Poets Society.

In science, ideas are never taken for granted (if they were, Einstein would never have rejected Newton’s laws in favour of his own relativity). Russell found the constant reinvention of science throughout history to be remarkable and it inspired him to put his faith in scientific thinking. That is, of searching for truth, of constant thinking, of never deceiving oneself (Feynman) and of appreciating the wondrous beauty of nature and of physical law.
In Dead Poets Society, Mr. Keating urges his students never to take authority for granted, instead exhorting them to seize the day and never to ‘live lives of quiet desperation’ (Thoreau). Watching this inspiring film led Russell to explore some of Thoreau’s writings, such as Walden, which he found hopelessly quixotic but felt the message of self exploration and introspection was a good one to live by.

cny

harlowz..backk frm dinner. well, anyway, it's chinese new year over here now, so i shall give an overview of the past few days.

cny eve (08/02)

rj had some (mostly) rubbish celebrations which i stayed for, no idea why. then went over to ri to visit some tchrs and wish them. denise was with me cos she didnt see the pt of going back to rg and she was very conspicous among all the ri guys. after meeting as many tchrs as we could find, we wanted to go out but the idiot moks wanted to play tennis. of all days, ive no idea why they insisted on playing tt day.

anyway, we slacked arnd j8 for a while, waiting for shengle and george to come. then we (me, aloy, poon, george, shengle, jason, ngiap, denise) went to orchard for some reason. we decided we didnt want to watch a movie and (predictably) took ages to decide where to eat lunch. after some walking in the sweltering heat, we ended up in some rubbish ramen place in cine. aloy's and george's food took a full hour to come so we obviously werent very pleased. xueying and her friend steph came and chatted with us for a while, as did rongsiu and 2 of her friends.

then after tt, some ppl went home. the rest of us met xueying and then walked over to taka. we bought some orange julius and sat on the floor and played cards for a while. it was quite late after tt so we went home.

i was v tired so i took a nap and only woke up at 7. luckily my reunion dinner was at my house. anyway, it was ok lar. after tt i slacked arnd watching tv and waiting to welcome in the year of the rooster. watched the ch8 countdown and slept arnd 1.


cny day 1 (09/02)

went visiting in the morning.. lunch at my grandmas place. went home to sleep a while and then went back to my grandmas place for dinner. ok the first day wasnt v interesting. there wasnt even gd tv to watch.


cny day 2 (10/02)

my grandaunt/uncle and their children, who are incidentally my age, came over for lunch. then i went out in the afternoon for another round of visiting, but not to relatives' houses. i met george, shengli and poon at shengli's house. we sat and chatted for a while b4 going to my house where we did the same thing. then we went for dinner somewhere near george's house b4 going there. we had the most fun at george's house. we rummaged thru his stuff and i found this photo of our p6 class which i havent seen for years. and so we started reminiscing abt our pri sch days. and shengli played the tao nan anthem on the piano. hahaha.. we managed to drag ourselves out of george's house at abt 9 and took a bus to poon's house. by the time we got there it was like 10, so we left after 40 mins. yar..so i managed to spend 7+ hrs at 4 ppls houses just talking cock. well, it was really funnn.


cny day 3 (11/02)

woke up early, met shengli at vj to meet george running his x-cntry at east coast park. actually i went to laugh at him cos he had sch while we didnt. anyway, due to some miscommunication (mostly george's fault), by the time we got there they had finished running. arghh...such a waste of time. then we met aloy and went to mrs tays house together.

ok its like almost 2am so i shall finish up day3 of cny tmr.. need to sleep now.

backk.

er...hi, im back after 7 months to the day. hmm..im determined to start blogging cos i think it''ll be great to look back after a year or two and see how i was like and stuff.

well, i think an introduction to myself is in order. im 16 going 17 years old. currently studying at raffles junior college, singapore. i was frm raffles institution b4 tt and tao nan pri sch b4 tt. actually i think i'll just put the intro on the side. my og's called vivaekeus and our ogls are sok (zhiwei) and vicky (ng) and my class is 1S03O (med fac 2, trip sci).

ok thats all for now cos i gtg for dinner..i'll be back (i honestly hope so..) later tonight to finish the rest of my life story. =p

testing

my first post. im very bored. be back later.