The Insignificance and Vulnerability of Simplicity

Monday, April 27

Yesterday was a damned monochromatic Monday.
Just at lunch, saw 1,2,3,4,5,...
Stoning zombies..
Not exactly in the best of moods..

The weather, as usual its humid self.

The best thing to do in such a temperature..

Run with the heat.

Yes I let off A LOT of steam and I sweated like a big fat pig.

A cool shower thereafter plus home cooked dinner..

Shiok-ness.

*****

This morning,

First thing I did..

I helped a coll with her second essay for this semester.

Been feeling guilt pangs when I showed a visibly irritated face when she asked me mark her Uni assignment yesterday.

Well,

How would you react if a coll asked you to help her assess her essay?

Not once but thrice..

*****

Few weeks back

On her first assignment,
She asked me explain an essay question on Motivation..

One of my favourite topics in Organization Theory.
Then she asked me to go through her case study, because she could not understand some of the Caucasian accents in the video.
So I did and I clarified and contributed some points after the video..
Added some analytical suggestions stemmed from the various theories based on what I remembered doing in my Uni days as well as my vague understanding of what her lecturer really wanted..

When I thought that should get her started pretty well, she sent me her whole essay twice..
I was asked to help see if she's on track -,-

When that first essay came for the first time,
The immediate thought that crossed my mind..
It was a straight flunk on grammatical errors.
I would love to tell her..
To start all over again..
But I merely told her she had to further brush up by showing more discussion and show better efforts to link her essay to the question.

After that she added (not brushing up) more points to her essay,

and then send it to me a second time.

*****

Yesterday,

She came to me again.

Sent me her second assignment and asked me help her "mark" her essay and to see if she did her essay incorrectly.

All right,

I snapped, literally.

Please tell me how to "mark" an essay for a Uni assignment?

There is no right or wrong in an essay at such a level of subjective study.

It's a matter of how you convince the marker.

I am definitely not in that professionally skilled position to assess her essay..

I dont ace every essay during UOL days..

If I'd knew how, I would have been a lecturer now..

In any way..

I was feeling a lil pissed when she asked me yesterday.

Yes partly because I felt obliged to help,

I could not find a better way to tell her without hurting her pride or making her feel uneasy.

She had flunked 2 subjects the previous semester and I can feel her paranoia.
And the last thing I should do is to demoralise her further.

The other reason I felt pissed,

Such dependency is definitely uncalled for.

She needs to get used to understanding the questions all by herself,

Cos she will be the one who is sitting for the exams ultimately..

Sighz..

*****

After repeated attempts to make it more tactful..

This is what I returned to her this morning..

And it sounds so much nicer on paper..

*****

irony @

2:51 PM