Happy new year!

2025 was really a tough year for me. Being able to wrap it up is such an achievement for me!!! I’ve completed the notorious SC2079 Multidiscipline Project and my first internship in this year. =w=

Now, we are in 2026! This year I’ve made a lot of exciting plans and can’t wait to start! >w<

2025 Recap

I will be dividing this into sereval parts: Year 2 Semester 2, Huawei Internship, ICPC and personal life

2026 internship search will have its own post, we will leave that for later :P

NTU Y2S2

So, as I’ve mentioned, I’ve completed my MDP. It’s a 4AU course with 4 components: robot car, android app, path-finding algorithm and image recognition. Obviously, I took the algorithm part.

It was a very intense 10 weeks. Even though I’ve completed my part very early in the project, out robot car always have some minor issues that we had to adjust over and over again. I remembered the 2 nights before each 2 tasks, my team were all staying in school working on the car. The robot car did not work as expected until the last second. Although in the end we failed the 2nd task, we still put a lot of work into it.

I loved my teammates in MDP. However, the course is 100% bullshit and I would not recommend anyone to take it. Although, it is a core module and not really possible to skip it.

For other courses, it’s mostly the same. I had teammates that only write the report and doesn’t write any code in my Machine Learning course. Then I had a guy who only told me he couldn’t make the demo work on the very last day for Computer Security. CC is the same bullshit as usual. Fucked up a few quizzes and tests, but eventually I made it through.

Huawei Internship

Starting from May, which is only 2 weeks after NTU’s semester ended, I started my internship at Huawei.

I wouldn’t say I contributed a lot to the company, but I definitely learned a lot. I have been reading paper since day 1. Learned how to use LLM properly and how to train them with open-sourced trainers. A lot of technical knowledge were also learned.

I’d say the experience sparkled my interest in Reinforcement Learning, it also taught me how annoying RL could be. I’m not too sure whether I will commit to this, but will continue to try.

ICPC

After failing to qualify 2025 APAC Championship, I almost gave up doing ICPC. Our team, Ciallo～(∠・ω<)⌒★, is formed with 3 competitive programmer on the edge of retirement. Our only goal is to have fun and travel with school. In practice sessions, although we were often top 4, I often doubt that I can still compete on this level. (based on recent codeforces activity, maybe the answer is no)

However, in the practice before departure, we had an amazing performance on the 2023 Hue City regional virtually. This momentum continued for our actual contest: 2025 Ho Chi Minh City Regional. My teammates went absolute godlike, and we ended up solving 8 problems, winning the silver medal!! Our performance were so good that we were only 1 place away from Gold Medal!!

Sadly, only 2 NTUsg teams qualified to 2025 APAC, but I’m still excited to meet people and compete.

Personal Life

This year I’ve played many games.

League of Legends: I picked up Dr. Mundo and Malphite and enjoyed targeting and destroying enemy ADC.

Apex Legends: Back to this game after 3 years, I still loved FPS but not as skilled as what I used to be :(

Maimai DX: Probably my most played game in 2025, I’ve climbed to 15.7k (and almost reached 15.8k), SSS+ed my first 14+ and unlocked Xaleid◆scopiX at 100/700.

Stellar Blade: A fun game to play with. Heroine is so well designed and definitely was a big plus to the gaming experience

Yuzusoft: I won’t explain too much. Natsume best waifu :3

2026 Resolution

Let’s make my 2026 new year resolution!! If 2025 was the year of perseverance for me, then 2026 will be the year of preparation. There’s a ton of things I’d like to get prepared for:

1. Do well in Final Year Project
2. Study for N1
3. Get an internship for Summer
4. Work out, get fit
5. Be happy