- aikoais . siaokia -: - sleeping with cockroaches wasn't that bad -

as compared to standing at the drawing table from dinner time till wee hours of the next day, oh yeah... even if it costs me sleeping in a sleeping bag on the floor, in a room filled with crawling insects and annoying smells of styrofoam and glue, with people forever walking in and out of the door some 2 metres away from you.

*****

i got some friends from the other departments to come and help me with my final design project - the theme was "a house which provides a space for the residents to enjoy the outside world".

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some 6 days before the deadline, a girl came to help me with the house model. we bought a minimum amount of materials for the model before heading to the university.

at first she seemed unhappy with my design, commenting that my house and the room allocation were "too square" - i agreed that it was too symmetrical. and she drew me 2 brand new designs for the house, saying that these designs would be so unique that nobody in the architecture department would have thought of them. she even took a tour around the 2nd year drawing tables to check if her hypothesis was true. and of course it was true, because nobody would want to take the risk, making something so special that the teachers might not approve. but anyway, i couldn't be bothered to change my plan since i had very little time to redo everything.

i know what's my biggest problem. i don't have an entrance. why? because my hallways are outside the house, they're the wood decks. and the staircase to the 2nd floor is attached to the "outdoor-ish" hallway (with a sliding door). so basically the 1st floor is absolutely dangerous, especially since it's the floor where i allocated the bedrooms. however, building walls or fences around the hallway would destroy the idea of giving "a space to enjoy the outside world" on the 1st floor.. well, just to excuse myself, a space to "enjoy the outside world" doesn't necessarily mean a "24/7 100% safe" space. THERE IS NO ABSOLUTE HAPPINESS IN LIFE. besides, nobody ever said anything about designing a comfortable, safe and live-sable house. the assignment handout only says "外の生活を楽しむ家". famous houses like Villa Savoye by Le Corbusier and the Fallingwater by F.L. Wright weren't 100% efficient too.

pffft. talk like professional sia. sure kena bashing from the teachers on 11th Aug. hahahahaha.

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on the day before the deadline, 23rd of July, i forced *grin* two chemical engineering majors to spend the night with me at the drawing room. one of them (who initially promised to help me but i didn't tell her the exact date) was very reluctant because she hates overnight work and didn't bring her contact lenses' case.

got them to help me with my model and perspective drawing. and i learned a few lessons through recruiting helpers....

never invite outspoken English-speaking friends while everyone's working in the lab. they make everyone stare at you like you're some kind of a newly discovered species of dinosaur. sadly (?), most of my friends who aren't in the architecture department are foreigners, among which nearly half of them are English speakers. outspokenness? well.. we're all outspoken. otherwise we wouldn't be able to survive in Japan.

secondly, choose your helpers wisely. i.e. get an Art major or at least someone who's gifted in painting if you wanna paint. and get someone who knows how to cut styrene boards and use a glue so that it cannot be spotted on the model at all, inside or outside. yeah so... one of the two friends who came to help, was an amateur in Art (like me, i can draw but i paint like shit). so my drawing turned out..... funky. but it was pretty much what i've expected.

the model was... decent. i wouldn't say it's good, since it looks like a wreckage on the inside from certain angles. but it must have stood out among the 50 models in terms of colors and choice of vegetation in the garden.

and i must be the only person who has stars and artsy letters in my name and registration number. not me, i wasn't the one who wrote them. *sheepish grin*