Lighthouse by UWA Student Guild

LIGHTHOUSE 2014 VOLUME 2

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CONTENTS 2014 VOLUME 2

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR 05 LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR 06 THREE YEARS AND A DEGREE LATER 08 A SNEAK PEAK INTO THE WORLD OF YOGA 12 SINGAPORE STUDENTS’ SOCIETY 14 IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT STUDYING 20 THE PERKS OF BEING A CAFFEINE ADDICT 22

Editor In Chief – Sharmini Thiagarajan Design and Layout – Kate Hoolahan Advertising – Karrie McClelland Writers – Andrea Rajwani, Fransesca Lau, Aarti Gupta, Kenneth Woo, Schuyler International Students Services 2014 Committee Director: Kenneth Woo Executive Secretary: Celine Tham Executive Treasurer: Soh Yi Jing Welfare Director: Sharmini Thiagarajan Welfare and Education Officer: Seow Sin Nee Lighthouse Editor: Sharmini Thiagarajan Social Directors: Jess Tan & Carey Lee Social Secretary: Yvonne Low Design and Marketing Officer: Nicholas Poh & Toh Hsin Fang Liaison Officer: Loke Yan Chao MCW Managing Director: Justine Wong MCW Operations Director: William Wong MCW Finance Director: Daryl See MCW Events Director: George Bowen Uy III MCW Marketing Director: Patrick Ong MCW Logistics Director: Nicholas Yap MCW Media Directors: Fiona Lie & Jacqueline Adenan Any inquires concerning the International Students Services can be directed to iss@guild.uwa.edu.au For more information on the ISS, please go to www.iss.guild.uwa.edu.au or search International Students Services on Facebook. If you’re interested in advertising in Lighthouse or have any questions regarding this publication, please contact membership@guild.uwa.edu.au Have an interesting or innovative idea you would like to share with us? Keen in seeing your writing being featured in Lighthouse? For more details please contact the editor at sharminithia@gmail.com Disclaimer The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily represent the views of the editor, International Student Services or the UWA Student Guild. Copyright 2014 UWA STUDENT GUILD

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Olah Amigos! Welcome to our 2nd issue of Lighthouse 2014! Firstly, to all our returning international students, hope you’ve had a great winter break and are all charged up for the upcoming semester. It felt as if exams had just ended but here we are again welcoming a brand new semester ☺ (How exciting!!) To our new additions, a very warm welcome to the UWA family! It must be both an exciting and anxious process transitioning into university, but fear not for Lighthouse is here to help you out and make your time at UWA a lot more fun. In this issue of Lighthouse, we have an amazing line up of articles from both past and present UWA students, who have very graciously taken time to share their experiences with us. A big thank you to these kind souls for their time and effort and the UWA Guild team as well for their amazing contributions. From yoga to tips on getting through Uni life hassle free, we’ve got it all covered for you in this issue of Lighthouse so hopefully you would enjoy reading the articles and even learn a thing or two!

“From yoga to tips on getting through Uni life hassle free, we’ve got it all covered for you in this issue of Lighthouse”

Once again, welcome back and I wish you a great semester ahead! To those of you who are entering your final semester of Uni life, make sure you make the best out of it and all the very best! Sharmini Thiagarajan Lighthouse Editor (2014)

LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR is to represent all international students in the University of Western Australia. Our mandate is to look after you guys. You come at an exciting time in the University, we wrapped up an amazing first semester with a Rottnest Island Trip, the first UWA DOTA2 League and the Guild Elections for the 102nd Guild Council will soon go underway! The ISS team is looking forward to creating more high quality and awesome events for you guys in Semester 2 (look out for the second DOTA2 League).

Hello everybody! A warm (or cold) welcome back for all returning students, I hope you guys had an awesome winter break doing fun things like traveling to the Eastern States or returning back home. I spent my break in Sydney and Adelaide attending conferences and questioning life choices that I made…and eventually sitting in a corner crying and eating a tub of ice cream. (sigh) Welcome to all incoming international students joining us in Semester 2, I hope you guys would make full use of the time that has been given to you here in Perth and UWA well! I hope by the time you seen this letter, you would have seen or heard about the words International Students Service (ISS) being thrown around or mentioned. ISS is a department of the UWA Student Guild whose sole purpose

Remember that the Guild and ISS exist to help you guys in any issues that you might be facing, feel free to approach us if you have any issues or problems (seriously, any problem…). Swing by the Guild and the ISS Office (Guild Village Second Floor), drop me a message on Facebook (add me) or at iss@guild.uwa.edu.au. Have a great semester! Kenneth Woo ISS Director 2014.

“We wrapped up an amazing first semester with a Rottnest Island Trip, the first UWA DOTA2 League and the Guild Elections for the 102nd Guild Council will soon go underway!”

ORIGAMI KOALA:HOW TO

1. Fold in half to make a crease, then fold back

3. Fold to meet the centre line

6. Fold in the dotted line

2. Fold in half

4. Fold in the dotted line

5. Fold in the dotted line

7. Turn over

DRAW A FACE - ITâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S A KOALA! 8. Fold in the dotted line

9. Fold back the dotted line 7

THREE YEARS AND A DEGREE LATER

It was the year 2010 when I had just completed Year 12 and A levels. Despite having studied in Singapore all my life, I’ve always had the ambition to pursue a degree of my interest abroad. In making my decision, I recalled my various visits to Australia during vacations and I really liked the environment. This in turn really influenced me, as I had always wanted to experience the Australian lifestyle. Having been fended for by my family for my entire life thus far, a decision to study abroad in another continent was certainly a daunting one. It finally dawned on me that I had to get out of my comfort zone to pursue the goals in life that I had set for myself. With that in mind, I began looking through Australian universities to study in for the next three years. Upon persuasion from family and friends and various brochures later, I decided to apply for the University of Western Australia (UWA). In spring that same year, I received an acceptance letter/email from the university and was accepted into the Biomedical Science course. As a young adult, I was excited for this, as it marked the beginning of my Australian adventure - an adventure set without parents, siblings or friends. I applied for St. Georges College and got offered a place of residence. I stayed in the residence for three full years from 2011 to 2014 and after my 3 year stint there, I know that I can now safely call it my second home. In 2011, I started my degree mid way through the year and it was a bumpy experience at first as I had so many things to adjust to - the stormy winter

weather which was something I never had to deal with in Singapore, the food which consisted of a lot of pasta, sausage rolls and vegemite (I was more accustomed to rice to be honest), the not so frequent TransPerth transportation system and most of all, the various online portals UWA had. I was making new friends in college and university, especially in lab classes. And over the years I would eventually find

“I had so many things to adjust to - the stormy winter weather which was something I never had to deal with in Singapore, the food which consisted of a lot of pasta, sausage rolls and vegemite” that I am still friends with these very same people I had met in freshmen year. In all honesty, it is hard not to be friends with someone when you “collaborate” data to make it fit better with the teacher’s example - you know you’ve done it too. By my second year, I had finally adjusted well into Perth. I knew where all the great cafes were, which day to get cheap Dominos Pizza or Gelare waffles (it’s Tuesday by the way), all the discounts I could get with my guild membership around Perth city and finally and most importantly, I knew how to use OLCR. While I was in Perth and going about my new life, I missed home, especially my family and even though I loved Perth, UWA and college, I was always ever

so ready to head back home for the 3 months summer break. It was mid 2013 and I was in my final year, a lot of my friends had graduated but I still had a semester left in 2014. I was sad to see them go but at the same time, I was also really excited as that meant I had one semester left till it was my turn to finish up my degree. In 2014, I had my last semester in UWA. In wanting to experience the other side of Western Australia, I took the time to go on a couple of road trips and saw all the beautiful scenery from Esperance to Margaret river; sceneries I had never seen while living in the heart of the city the entire time I was in Perth. The little getaway was certainly a befitting little send-off gift for myself! June 2014 marked the final time I had to sit for University examinations, I was a nervous wreck because after my examinations, I had to pack up my life in boxes and move back to sunny Singapore. In retrospect, I had thoroughly enjoyed my three-year experience in Perth. If anything, Perth and UWA have clearly shown me that if everything pans out, I will be back to further my studies here. Thank you Perth, you are my second home. by Andrea Rajwani

Andrea has just completed her Biomedical Science degree in UWA and when sheâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not occupied with studying, she enjoys hanging out by the water.

A SNEAK PEAK INTO THE WORLD OF YOGA

I had my first experience with Yoga, through the guidance of my mother, who also happened to be a fitness instructor. I believe she utilised yoga to recuperate from sports injuries and to recondition her body. Years later, I can know say that I am no different to her. From ankle to knee, hip, lower back and neck, I experienced various injuries sustained from competitive sports like netball, basketball and ballet. I tried various types of yoga including Vinyasa, Hatha, YinYang, Hot yoga, Iyengar, Aerial and Bikram yoga. The basics are truly the challenging phase of yoga. I never realized how simple things like sitting down and standing straight (mountain pose) could be such astounding and epiphanic postures. You might want to stop reading now as you might feel the writer is such a nerdy weirdo who thinks sitting down and standing still is a form of exercise. (Editor’s note: Definitely not! Keep reading it only gets better :) ) If you’re still with me, I would love to share with you more about my experience, particularly with Iyengar yoga; the form of yoga that made me reach the realization above. I discovered Iyengar yoga just two years ago. Firstly, I gained lots of benefit from it, as it was a small group yoga class of about 4-5 people. The teacher was thus able to provide constructive feedback with respect to each individual’s form and also provide assistance in various ways. Another advantage of Iyengar is the use of props to slowly enable you to indulge into the poses. There are blocks, belts, bolster, weights, ropes etc. Not many people have a naturally ‘perfect’ and balanced strong body to begin with and therefore I think these props allowed me to make baby steps in realigning my body and gave me the foundation to try other various forms of yoga. If you have some spare time, do try and look up this

man (Iyengar) who initiated this form of yoga. However, in my opinion, there is no better place to be than a Bikram studio during winter. Sweat and warmed up muscles is like a long hot shower, or even better I would say. If you love vigorous, fast paced hot yoga with a specific sequence- Bikram might be suitable for you. When I first started, I did find it a bit overwhelming and I felt light headed. Eventually, I got used to it and still attend classes regularly. My latest adventure would be the aerial/air yoga where I am hoping to gain more strength especially in the core. The weight loss, body toning and general health benefits of yoga are pretty widely known. In addition to those benefits, I find the spiritual and character building component of yoga unique and interesting to explore. My fiery, strong-willed, paintolerating character has gradually over the years subsided. Instead, yoga has moulded me in a way to listen to my body, to be gentle yet disciplined and also to become more open emotionally. In conclusion, yoga is not just a physical exercise that I enjoy. It has subtly changed my mindset and attitude towards life. An instructor once said in class ‘ some people come to class to stretch their glutes but instead found something spiritual; while others come to look for their soul but in turn stretched their butts out.’ Give it a go, you might surprise yourself with the experience you gain from yoga! by Francesca Lau Francesca is a fourth year medical student who enjoys doing yoga, reading, travelling, having fun and also baking amazing goodies.

SINGAPORE STUDENT’S SOCIETY

Welcome back from winter break, returning students! And to all the new students, congratulations on starting a new phase of life here at UWA, you’ll never want to leave trust me. While the transitioning and settling period can be really trying and challenging, rest assured you can always approach me for anything and I will be of the best help I can be to you. I assure you, you’ll never want to leave the friends and the memories you make during your time here. My name is Aarti Gupta and I am the current President of the Singapore Students’ Society (SSS). I am currently pursuing a Bachelor of Science with Neuroscience as a first major, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine as a second major. I warmly welcome every one of you to join all our events and even feel free to be a part of our SSS committee! We run many events ranging from bonding events to formal ones like Student Welcome Reception and meet and greet sessions, career fairs and internships back in Singapore which involve two very big organizations from home – Overseas Singaporean Unit (OSU) and Contact Singapore (CS). We are also part of the Singapore Western Australia Network (SWAN), a group of Singaporeans who are currently living here and they plan events such as community day for Singaporeans, sporting and leisure events. SSS is made up of different races, religions and even countries! We have had events such as Catamaran, inter-uni soccer, seminars and clubbing events. We usually team up with the Singaporean committees in other universities – Curtin, Murdoch and Edith Cowan when it comes

to National Day Celebrations. NDP is a large scale event where we screen the parade live and invite all Singaporeans to come together to commemorate this day. Goodie bags from Singapore are given out and food from home will be available too! Every now and again we get ministers from home visiting us for dialogue sessions, meet and greet sessions or even just a formal get together. Last year, Minister for Law and Foreign Affairs, K Shanmugam, graced us with his visit to Perth for a dialogue session. In June 2014, President Tony Tan and First Lady Mary Tan visited Perth for a heart-warming meet and greet session. H.E. Mr. Michael Teo, High Commissioner of Singapore to Australia, based in Canberra, makes many visits to Perth as well.

“ I warmly welcome every one of you to join all our events and even feel free to be a part of our SSS committee! ” The two events in line are NDP on the 9th of August, for which details will be made available really soon and Community Day which is happening in September! SWAN is overseeing the community day and we expect many people to turn up to enjoy the great food, games and performances lined up. Students will have an opportunity to be volunteers as well and more details will be up as soon as they’ve been finalized.

For those of you who might be starting to feel a little homesick, there are many places you can check out here in Perth to get a feel of home: For chicken rice: • Tak Chee House in Northbridge • Ten Ten Kitchen in Victoria Park, Bentley For a range of Asian dishes (roti prata, nasi lemak, char kway teow, hor fun): • Spencer Village, Thornlie • Broadway, Nedlands For Malaysian food: • Malaysian Delights, Bentley • D’nonya Penang, Victoria Park • Makan Makan, Victoria Park • Kitchen Inn, Kardinya For bubble tea: • Easy Way, Perth Station • Utopia, Perth Station • Presotea, Perth Station With that, I end off my welcome note to all you amazing students of UWA. Should you need any assistance at any time, please feel free to drop me an e-mail at 21005606@student.uwa.edu.au and I will be there for you to help you out to the best of my ability! Sometimes everyone needs a helping hand and/or a listening ear. I look forward to meeting as many of you as I can and I am an extremely friendly person so you will never have anything to worry about! by Aarti Gupta Aarti is currently in her third year of her Bachelor of Science degree and is also the president of the Singapore Student’s Society. Her interests include drama, debate, reading and swimming.

UWA STUDENT GUILD & INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ SERVICE PRESENTS:

MCW MULTICULTURAL WEEK 2014

6th-10th October 2014

WWW.FACEBOOK.COM/MULTICULTURALWEEK . ENQUIRIES@MULTICULTURALWEEK.ORG . HTTP://MULTICULTURALWEEK.ORG th e pla ce to be

ORIGAMI HEART:HOW TO

1. Fold in half twice to make a crease and unfold

2. Fold forward in the dotted lines

4. Turn over

3. Fold forward in the dotted lines

6. Fold forward in the dotted lines

8. Turn over

5. Fold forward in the dotted line

7. Fold forward in the dotted lines

FINISHED!

IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT STUDYING!

Five years in the University of Western Australia should most probably earn me a badge or a medal or at least something... especially considering that I am an international student, who has paid full fees for both my degrees and honors year. Five years has also given me a perspective that I feel many other students lack, I am not saying that other university students are newbies but that spending half a decade here has given me the chance to encounter a wide array of diverse students and experience, all in the city that many have written off as “Boring”. So in my final semester (finally haha), allow me to share some thoughts and comments on the five years, was it worth it? Let us not kid ourselves, universities are no longer guardians of knowledge and wisdom in the world. Wikipedia and Google are the new providers of knowledge, whatever questions and issues we need answering can simply be solved by “googling” online. So what is the point of university besides giving us a piece of paper, that companies all arbitrary decide we need, in order to prove that we are educated and responsible adults? (A question that I have struggled with for a long time) If I may be so bold to argue that universities are no longer places for us to simply get a piece of paper but instead places where we are irrevocably shaped by the people we meet and the experiences we encounter. We can no longer simply come to university, attend tutorials (because really, who attends lectures nowadays), hand up assignments, do exams and walk off with a degree. We should embrace the entire concept of being involved in the student culture and university life. I spent two years of my university life simply going to classes, going home to do my assignments, studying for exams and occasionally playing a video game or two and honestly, it was depressing.

Only after deciding to somehow engage myself with university life did my existence become somewhat more exciting than before (yes, my life was that boring). Now you might wonder, what was the point of sharing all this with you? Well it is to drive across a simple message. Ladies and gentlemen, don’t just come to this university and study. Well…err…I mean studying is important, you are paying big bucks for this but please go out and be a part of the adventures waiting for you as well as the diverse range of people (from strange to super nice) that enroll in this university. Go to the Reid Library and talk to the weirdos (editor’s note: they are actually really nice people hahah) who work there (like me! I have had people call me the crazy librarian, till today I have no idea what I did to deserve that). Go join the Guild or some faculty society, go find a club that caters to that very specific interest of yours (medieval warfare? Check. Nerf guns? Check.) You will never regret the decision to step out of your comfort zone, trust me you are definitely bound to learn something new about yourself, and in the process, broaden your mindset about the society around you as well. I would not be the last person who would remind you of this but well it is my final semester after all, so let me have my say. I’ve spent a long enough time in the University of Western Australia and have certainly contributed to the best of my ability. The only thing on my mind now is…Can I please graduate? by Kenneth Woo Kenneth is in his final semester of his Bachelor of Education and Bachelor of Arts (Honors). He cannot wait to graduate and commit all his attention to his first love. Writing Game of Thrones Slash Fiction.

THE PERKS OF BEING A CAFFEINE ADDICT

It’s 4AM and all you can hear are the faint rumbling noises of water coming to a boil in the cheap generic electric kettle that sits on your kitchen counter. The deliciously familiar smell of Indomie still lingers faintly in the still twilight air; your emptied bowl with its licked-clean chopsticks strewn haphazardly across, has been pushed to the corner of your desk in order to make way for your laptop. You put your hands to the keyboard and ponder for a moment, trying to align your thoughts and string together a coherent sentence, and then it clicks. No, not your brain, you have yet to reach an epiphany there. It’s your kettle that’s announcing to its lonely audience of one that the water has boiled, thank you very much. You trudge into the kitchen and rip open a sachet of instant coffee. You don’t even know what flavor or brand of coffee you have in your hands, you merely purchased the cheapest one you could find at the supermarket. You think it might be Nescafé, and it probably is. As tiny brown granules of the magical lifeprolonging substance begin to dissolve near-instantaneously, the aroma of coffee casually snakes toward your everwelcoming nostrils. Tonight this little packet of 3-in-1 instant coffee is your salvation, your god. You briefly consider changing your religion to Nescaféism, before you accidentally burn your tongue on a tentative sip. The coffee is painfully hot. This is the occasional kind of nightly lifestyle you’ve slowly started to grow accustomed to. When you were eighteen, all-nighters usually meant bobbing your head and moving to the rhythm of pulsating beats amidst a convulsing mass

of other warm (and often sweaty) bodies in perpetually too-crowded clubs. You’d wake up the next afternoon and swear never to touch alcohol again; but you’d know the cycle would repeat weekly.

“ You don’t even know what flavor or brand of coffee you have in your hands, you merely purchased the cheapest one you could find at the supermarket. You think it might be Nescafé, and it probably is.” Now your late nights have come to this – furiously tapping on keys to form words, then sentences, and paragraphs, pages… you know the drill. You’re up till the sun rises at least once a week, either working on an assignment or anxiously studying for a test. Some tiny part of your caffeine addled brain has vaguely begun to resign to the fact that those late nights you had at eighteen were a mirage of the distant past; instead of downing shots of alcohol, you now spend your nights throwing back espresso shots. And when you think you’re just about ready to throw in the towel, you’re done; an entire semester has flown by. You finally have an entire month (or more) to snooze through all your alarms, or better yet, forget about the existence of alarm clocks. Now you can spend your late nights in whatever fashion your heart desires.

Your life seems a little emptier without all those looming deadlines, but who cares, you get to sleep. Nescaféism? Who needs it? Not you. At least not until the next semester slowly creeps up on you again, and you’re sitting there in front of a blank word document, save for your name and student number in the corner. You hate those late nights that each semester has imposed on you, but you don’t really have a choice. You might need Nescaféism after all. As the cycle begins again, you start to wonder if this torture will ever end.

“ Nescaféism? Who needs it? Not you.” Dear reader, I’ll let you in on a little secret. That endless cycle of late nights in front of a blue screen and the resulting zombie mornings you hate so much does end eventually, when you graduate and move on to a post-graduate course or a 9 to 5 job. The sad thing is, you’ll eventually start to miss every moment of it. Hold on to your grueling nights of Indomie and steaming mugs of instant coffee, it’s a strange, slightly masochistic part of the joys of being an undergrad. Don’t give up on your Nescaféism. by Schuyler

Schuyler is currently doing her honors in Asian studies and she enjoys having her head in the clouds and a rainbow for hair.