met my BS2 and BS3 sign lang instructor in the morning and we took bus 74 together. she works as an admission officer (if i read her finger spelling correctly) at Ngee Ann

we conversed via signing first but because i was sooo lousy, she eventually took to writing in a note pad since communication would be much faster that way. so the conversation was kinda one-sided, with her writing furiously and with me nodding/shaking my head (too) vigorously, eager to acknowledge but lost as how to elaborate upon her words

i tried to sign whenever i could and internalised more signs in my lexicon! and felt really chirpy and cheery by the time i arrived at school. it's good to put to practice what you have learnt. and it's liberating and surreal that i "talked" to another person for 30-40 mins without using my voice once. (even if i wrote in the note pad way more than i signed. ha!)

other stuff...
--there are not many Shanghainese sign speakers around. and it's difficult for a SEE user to interact with a Shanghainese sign user~she had to resort to gesturing and described the whole process as "like chicken talking to duck" (i always had the impression that different sign languages share a lot of similarities so it's possible for people of different sign lang to communicate. apparently a fallacy) lastly, when i told her that the group of people i was in charge of during NDP Spontaneous Lightpoint didn't know how to sign the pledge, she said it's an obvious way of determining a person as being schooled in the Shanghainese sign.

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Dr. Madalena is willing to supervise my Hons thesis!! (going ahead with the lang acquisition of hearing children with deaf parents) so you can imagine the rush of exhilaration and relief i felt when i read her email. plus, her comments like "this can be worth investigating, i agree, ...." and "I also think the project may have an impact on the social and learning/schooling conditions of these children in Singapore" got me so high that i thought i wouldnt need an afternoon nap today (but nay, was wrong:P)

my Hons thesis gives me a reason to be utterly convinced that i won't be wasting my time in EL Hons; it also provides me with a reason to continue taking these sign lang classes. so it's not seen as a drag liao but something viable that i can continue to draw strength from. Wooohooo!