Due to COVID, I never had the chance to play a Volleyball match with another school, so this was my first ever match.
We played the match in groups of five due to the Singapore COVID restrictions of staying in groups of five. I am on three volleyball teams. The U14 school team, U16 school team, and International Volleyball Club Futures team. For this match, I played in the U14 school team.
When we arrived at the opponent school, we immediately started practicing. We were all very nervous and excited at the same time, and we all supported each other as a team. I was the team captain in my group, and we worked really well. At first, some people in my group were confused about the rotation, so I took leadership and explained it to them again. Our goal as a group was to enjoy ourselves and to always go for the ball. I really liked my group because we all supported each other when we made a mistake. We won the first set, lost the second, and won the third. We were very happy that we won the match, but we were even happier that we could finally play a match together.
I really enjoyed playing my first Volleyball match. From this match, I learned that being able to work well together in a group feels even better than winning.
Singapore is a very diverse country, and we celebrate lots of different holidays. Chinese new year is one of them. I go to an international school, so during classes, we learned about Chinese new year and how to celebrate it.
This year my family decided to do something special. On Chinese new years eve, we went out for dinner at a Chinese restaurant and did Lohei. Lohei is like a salad, and every ingredient that we put in the “salad” has a meaning to it. For example, Crispy crackers symbolises greater wealth. Peanuts and sesame seeds wish your business to enjoy good profits. Lime wishes you to have good luck, success and prosperity and so on. After we put all of the ingredients in, we toss the salad as high as we can and mix it in the air and say chinese phrases.
Here is a picture of us doing Lo Hei.
My younger brother’s Chinese tutor kindly offered to spend the night on Chinese New Year’s day with us, and taught us what to eat and what to do. At home, my brother and I did some activities. We did Chinese calligraphy and wrote different hopes for the new year. Then my brother and I made tiger lanterns out of oranges because it is the year of the tiger. We went to China town in Singapore and ate at a restaurant the teacher recommended. My whole family practiced speaking Chinese by ordering our own food. It was a very fun experience.
Me doing Chinese Calligraphy!Our cute little tiger lanterns!My family in China town!
I really enjoyed spending the Chinese new year with my family and learning new things about the Chinese culture.
My winter holiday was an exciting trip. I went back to my home country, Japan. I met my grandparents and my cousins that I haven’t met for 2 years. I had the chance to catch up with them. There were so many things for me to do every day. But my favorite thing was spending time with my family.
Going to Japan reminded me of my Japanese culture. On New Year’s Eve, I ate Toshikoshi soba, the long noodles wish for us to live long. On New Year’s Day, I ate Osechi which is a special big bento box, and this bento is to give the traditional housewives a rest for the first 3 days of the new year. Every food in the bento has a special meaning. On New Years Day, we go to a local shrine to greet the gods.
Here is the osechi that I ate. My family photo!My whole family at the shrine!
We also went snowboarding. I had snowboarded once, 2 years ago so I didn’t remember how to get on and slide. On the first day, I could barely balance on the board. I struggled to get on the lift and fell off every time the lift ended. On the second day, I had lessons. My teacher was very friendly and we had lots of fun conversations together. After my first day of classes, I had improved so much. I could go straight and could do curves, but fell sometimes. I could get on and off the lift without falling. I was so proud of myself. On the second day, I was able to go down one of the hard routes with my older brother. I could do curves without falling. On the final day, I snowboarded down slopes with my parents and I had the best time ever.
Family photo!
I went back to Tokyo, and met my grandparents and cousins on my mother’s side. That was also very fun. We extended our stay since we had many more things that we have to do in Japan. My older brother went back to America. It was a fantastic winter break.
Last week, I went to my brother’s school’s family weekend. It was the first trip ever in two years. I really enjoyed the whole weekend as everyone was always smiling, and having lots of fun. I watched a super exciting football game, and I felt that it brought everyone on the field together. I also watched the girl’s volleyball match, and it was so different from middle school volleyball. Their spikes were so strong, and I could see how everyone worked as a team. When someone made a mistake, they supported her and helped her get back up. I participated in some of my brother’s classes, and they were so interesting. The classes had lots of discussions, and it was very different from my normal classes in middle school. Everyone looked like they felt comfortable and not scared to say their opinion. I watched my brother’s jazz band performances and I could see how everyone supported each other and performed as a team. I also visited my brother’s dorm room several times. After the family weekend, I learned that boarding school in high school was so different from my middle school experiences. It was a great visit and learning and I was so excited.
I love doing Japanese Caligraphy, it is one of my favorite things to do. I started Japanese Caligraphy because my mother wanted me to remember some of the Japanese cultures when I moved to Singapore. Japanese Calligraphy is from the 4th century, it has a long history. At first, I was doing Japanese Caligraphy for my mother, but after a couple of years, I started to do it for myself. Every month, depending on our age, we have a different assignment. I like to compare my first practice paper to my final best piece of work. When I do that I can see how much I improved in my writing. When I write my piece, lots of concentration is needed, because every stroke has a certain angle, length, width, and position. Each artwork takes 40 minutes to write, and I had to write 3-4 of them each lesson. After around 2 pieces, I start to get very tired, but I remind myself to not give up because I know that I can write my best work on the next try. When I am writing Japanese Caligraphy, I don’t think of anything else other than what I need to do in the next stroke. I think Calligraphy reflects one’s personality and state of mind. Yes it is simple, but it is very deep. It requires a lot of energy, commitment and allows myself to reflect.
This piece of work means “The beauty of nature” I received the highest recognition award (Kanpo-sho).
I had the privilege to participate in the Meiji Jingu (Shrine) Calligraphy Exhibition for three years. This piece means “The appreciation of life“.
I started my freehand painting during lockdown. My parents bought me some paints and canvases to have fun. While I paint, I do whatever I want and I try out new things on the canvases. For example, I thought of mixing glue with my paints so that the colors would flow nicely and it sometimes makes interesting patterns. I love freehand painting because there are no instructions, I can just put anything on the canvas.
Most of the time, the colors I use are blue, but recently, I have been trying out new colors that could go well together. My paintings are mostly abstract paintings.
This summer I also tried knife acrylic paintings and I really enjoyed it as well.
During the summer I wanted to learn more about plastic, so I decided to try volunteering for the first time. It is at the place called Ground-up Initiative (GUI), the plastic project. The GUI plastic project collects plastic from beach cleanups and from neighbors and transforms it into something useful.
(I also wanted to join the beach cleanups, but at the moment due to COVID restrictions in Singapore, it is prohibited for people to gather in large groups, so when the restrictions are lifted, I would like to join the beach cleanups.)
At the plastic project, they collect different types of plastic and try to make a product out of the waste. First, they sort the plastic depending on the type of plastic, because each type of plastic’s melting point is different. The types we sorted it into are recycled numbers 2, 4, and 5 only. Then they clean the plastic and separate them into different colors. After that, they cut the plastic into smaller pieces, then shred it. The last step is melting the plastic and molding it into different shapes to make the product.
When we went to the plastic project, we sorted the plastic, cleaned the plastic, and helped with shredding them. There were so many different steps to do to make a small item. What really surprised me was that everything there was homemade, the container-house and the machines (the machine was made by volunteers). I am really happy that I got to go because I had a chance to learn more about what can be done with plastic. I plan to continue volunteering here.
As climate change is becoming our real issue globally, I started wondering how Singapore has been addressing this issue as a country. I heard that there is a gallery called “Sustainable Singapore Gallery” near the Marina area, so I visited there to learn more about sustainable actions in Singapore. As Singapore is a small country surrounded by the ocean, stabilizing its environmental sustainability has always been important to Singapore’s development.
In the past decade, Singapore noticed some severe changes in the climate, for example, the annual mean temperature increasing, or that sea levels are rising at the rate of 1.2-1.7mm per year. Singapore also experienced extreme conditions in recent years like heavy rainfall or the hottest year on record in Singapore. So Singapore committed to addressing climate change very seriously and pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emissions intensity by 36% from the 2005 levels, by the year 2030. They are committed to achieving that goal for the benefit of future generations and their vision of a sustainable Singapore.
One example of reaching the goal is to promote Solar Energy. It is summer all year long in Singapore, so Solar Energy adoption is growing rapidly. They are adding more Solar Energy in housing estates, Industries, and even at our Reservoirs. My current school plans to install 3,000 solar panels to decrease the school’s environmental footprint and to teach students about renewable sources of energy.
Another key area is water. A safe and stable water supply has always been one of the top priorities for Singapore. When Singapore became independent from Malaysia, there was an agreement between both countries that Singapore can use the water from a river in Malaysia, but Singapore needs to provide a percentage of treated water in return. Singapore is recognized as a model city for managing the water and technology to recycle and supply clean water. The Singapore government tries to achieve three points; collect every drop of water, reuse water endlessly, and desalinate seawater.
One of the projects they made for water recycling is a Deep Tunnel Sewerage System (DTSS). DTSS uses deep tunnel sewers to transfer used water by gravity to water reclamation plants located at the coastal areas. Before they built DTSS they used a night soil bucket. The night soil bucket system served Singapore for over a century from the 1880s as the main method of human waste collection. Today, 100% of Singapore is served by modern sanitation.
I also saw the huge Marina Barrage facility there. This whole infrastructure is built to desalinate seawater, but it also works as a flood control. During low tide and heavy storms, the gates will release excess stormwater into the ocean. During high tide, the gates can not be opened so they use the 7 giant pump drains to get the excess stormwater into the sea. Each of the pumps is capable of emptying an Olympic size swimming pool of water in one minute. To me, the idea is fascinating and really shows how hard Singapore is working for its sustainable water management.
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Singapore is working hard to achieve its goal. Singapore is determined and I always admire Singapore as they always keep their word and follow what they are committed to. I would also like to do what I can do for its sustainable environment as one of the community members.
I wrote an essay about the documentary and what I learned from it.
First, I am going to talk about what is already happening to the world from climate change. The world already has a lot of problems and it’s getting even more severe in recent years. For example, Greenland. Greenland is a large island and the ice there has been melting. Greenland has lost 532 billion tons of ice, and the water that melts from Greenland all goes to the ocean and affects the people living in Greenland and also goes to other countries like for example Miami, Florida USA. Miami, Florida is flooding because of the glaciers melting in Greenland. So it connects from one problem in climate change to another problem. We can also see in a disease expansion for another example. Zika and malaria are diseases near the equator, but now it’s coming up to the north including countries like Japan. Natural disasters are also becoming more powerful and frequent. In 2013 in Tacloban city in the Philippines, there was a very strong typhoon that made 4.41 million climate refugees, and thousands of people died. Because of the water vapor coming up into the air from the soil, when there are storms, it just causes rain bombs and water comes flushing down from the sky, just like what happened in the movie ‘Weathering with you’.
The second point I would like to talk about is global collaboration. Because this isn’t an issue about one country but it is all connected so all of the countries have to collaborate. We started to see good hope in collaboration such as the Paris agreement. The Paris agreement is an agreement that avoids dangerous climate change by limiting the number of fossil fuels that the world uses. All of the countries met up in Paris to talk about climate change. Thankfully, the US is also back again to this agreement after President Biden’s administration and I truly hope this will play as a good international platform to bring this collaboration forward.
The last point that I want to mention is there are also hopeful movements to solve climate change in technology, business sectors. It is becoming very clear that carbon dioxide emission is one of the major reasons for the climate crisis. Burning fuel and fossil fuels for energy produces a lot of carbon dioxide and the carbon dioxide that we are emitting right now will stay on earth for 10000 years. There are many companies and countries that are installing renewable energy production such as solar energy, hydro energy, and wind energy.
Not only the country like US or EU, but the second-largest country, China also made their decision for more usage of renewable energy that brings Beijing’s air pollution more moderate.
As a responsible individual, I would like to study more about climate change since it is impacting the world greatly. I would also like to spread awareness and take action.
Since 2020 was such a crazy year I decided to summarize it.
First of all this is a world-wide problem and it has affected everyone on the planet. Even though there is a vaccine for the coronavirus but I don’t think that the corona virus will fully go away because many people in the world won’t be able to afford the vaccine. The most affected countries from the pandemic are The United States, India, Brazil and Europe. Since the UK has gotten a new virus this will be harder to recover from. I really hope that the vaccine can reach all around the world so that people can get free from this terrible pandemic.
Talking about countries this brings me to the country that I stay at, Singapore. In Singapore lockdown started in April and the goverment said all of the restaurants would have to be closed for a month but soon we found out that it would be way more than a month. We couldn’t go outside other than shopping and exercise so we were all just stuck at our houses most of the time. All students started online school and online school actually wasn’t hard but it was boring because we couldn’t hang out with our friends or talk with them during classes. But now we have finished lockdown and we can all go outside of the house but we still have to wear masks and we have to scan a QR code whenever we go inside a shop or place for contract tracing. The coronavirus was not really spreading at the community level but most of the cases are from the worker’s dormitories and imported cases. Overall the situation in Singapore is thanksfully well managed and there are no new infections in the community at this point.
My family during the coronavirus wasn’t actually that bad, we as a family we did more things together like for example we played a little bit of badminton, biking, working out and running. One thing that was good about lockdown is that I got to spend more time with my parents. We also learned how to wakesurf but that was after lockdown. During lockdown everything was online so sometimes I had to take a break from screens because I kept getting headaches and I didn’t really enjoy online school either just in general I thought that normal school was better because we got to interact with students as well as teachers. When school went back to normal I enjoyed it way better and I was very happy and joyful. Our whole family was safe during the pandemic and luckily none of our family members have caught the coronavirus. We also moved into a house which was really enjoyable. My whole family except for my older brother stayed in Singapore and we missed our grandparents and cousins a lot. The worst thing about the pandemic to me is that we can’t go visit our family members and we can’t travel that was a very sad thing to me because I love traveling.
2020 was not the best year for the world but my 2020 wasn’t actually that bad, and I hope that 2021 can make the world and everyone more happy.
