The grass seems so much greener

Well, today's Good Friday, and my school is taking leave; which means that I've got a three-day weekend ahead, starting from today. And guess what? It's only Friday, and I've already almost finished all of my homework from the rest of the week! Ah, freedom! This means that I have the whole of the rest of the day, plus Saturday and Sunday, to kick back, relax, and...


...study. Yup.


...hmm.


The last homework of the day, which I am in fact finishing up right now in front of the laptop, goes something like this: Our English teacher said, "Cut out two newspaper articles and underline 10 words on each article, and find their meaning." Then she added, very pointedly, that we should choose proper words, real vocabulary-enriching words, and not words like, an example taken at random, "sit".

This came as a very slight problem for two reasons: A), devout reader as I am, I hardly ever read the newspapers, except for two sections: the funnies, and the weekly Tuesday video game review; B), this is Malaysia, and I've honed out my vocabulary on the freaking world wide web. How many "vocabulary-enriching" words would I be able to find on a standard Malaysian newspaper article?

Then, something amazing happened. A flash of inspiration, a strike of epiphany. The two problems cancelled each other out! I flipped the light-switch in the storeroom, waited for the bulb to flicker to life, and began digging through the old newspapers, and rooted out two Tuesday's worth of video game reviews. Then I took out my ruler, and began underlining suitable, vocabulary-enriching words.

It worked. Those video game review writers have decent English, so it appears.

My explanation for this is that video-gaming is such a colorful experience - much like hallucinogenic drugs - that no one with a weak vocabulary would be able to properly convey the experience in their writings. Only with the proper selection of rich words would a person be able to deliver a complete account of the experience of playing a video game; and unlike hallucinogenic drug consumers, video-gamers still have half a functional brain working at the time to be able to actually recall what it was like the next morning.

Some of these writers really surprised me. I mean, "freneticism"? Really? Our English teacher requested two newspaper articles; both of mine are video game reviews. Thanks to our concise video-game critics in the Star newspaper office, I was able to complete the assignment neatly and without botherly harm. All I can say is, our English teacher might be slightly surprised when she opens my English note book and finds a picture of a heavily-armored Cerberus Centurion in there.

Mass Effect 3 fans, please forgive me for having horribly mutilated one of the most iconic enemies in the game.