Swiss Miss scales the Swiss Alps

Perth.

2010-05-22T08:47:00.000-07:00

It's been 1.5 YEARS since I've blogged. It took me xxxxx attempts, coupled with lots of whining, to finally log into this account. Phew! Saves me the trouble of having to start a new blog.

I've since 'left' my old employer, home and country. I treasured the opportunities presented to me by the old employer but circumstances led me to leave the country. Husband calls it my overwhelming desire to slack which I beg to differ. So here I am now, in Perth, being a student once more.

The things that I've done here can be counted using the fingers of my hands. Study, cook, perform household chores, play bejeweled blitz, fetch husband, supermarket shopping, weekly outings (a grand total of 3 shopping centres) and watching Master Chef. How exciting! The fact there there's nothing much to do here makes me enjoy life. Husband says this feeling of mine won't last long. Only time will tell.

I love my current rented place and the community that I'm living in. It's only 7 minute drive to the city, 7 minute drive to school, has a direct bus to school, has 3 supermarkets and 1 vegetable/fruit market. Moreover, it's supposedly a 'hip' place to live in here in Perth. The initial days in Perth was adventurous. Picking up the keys, buying almost all the cheapest furniture from Ikea, building up the furniture ( I do not claim credit for this), cleaning up the place (Me!), stocking up the kitchen etc. The apartment really looks neat and cosy with everything up.

I did have an unwelcome visitor a couple of months later and it really freaked me out. A possum! It made a huge roar sound one night and I actually thought it crashed spectacularly into the bedroom. I lost sleep over it for the next week or so as I could hear hissing sounds in the middle of the night. It seems to have disappeared now that it's winter, or either that, I can't hear it since my windows are closed during the night. I hope it has found a nice, warm place which it can permanently call it home and just hibernate there! I did see it one night though playing on the tree. It looked like a combination of a rat and a squirrel. Welcome to Australia!

Today marks the start of the last week of school for this semester but there's still one group assignment which is due this Friday. If there is anything that hasn't changed about me, it's my disdain for assignments, especially group ones. I should thank my lucky stars that my current group consists of a bunch of nice and hardworking people, so I shouldn't be complaining much. It will be perfect if we could finish it asap!

Work Updates..

2008-09-04T21:39:00.000-07:00

It's been a loooooooooong time since I blogged. Working has made it impossibe to do so. Working isn't that bad actually. Whatever extra time I've is reserved for sleeping so that I feel refreshed the next day to handle my clients and perform my job to my best ability.

It's been more than 1.5 years since I stepped into this company. I am grateful for the the opportunities presented to me this year as I have learnt a lot in the first 3 months compared to the whole of last year. Things that I learnt included planning, working with colleagues, time management skills, learning to prioritize, writing reports, observing and mentoring my juniors etc. Funnily, none of them has to do with my core business and ironically I did enjoy the whole process despite my numerous grumblings and complaints. I basically take pride in my job and when asked if I could improve on any aspect of what I've done, my answer is 'nothing' because whatever I am tasked to do, I've thought through it thoroughly before embarking on my task. In the midst of doing all the tasks which are not anything to do with my core business, it did set me thinking whether I was in the right profession. But after the whole major event was over and when it was back to 100% to my core business, I actually missed my clients and felt that I should have done more for them. I really loved being with them and assisting them when they needed help. Basically, I love it when they gave me notes of appreciation. Judging by the notes and presents received this year, I can say that I have definitely improved as a person and in my job.

As the year comes to an end, I have been presented a major responsibility. Initially I was excited upon the opportunity presented and was secretly pleased. It goes to show that the managment does recognise my potential and my capability. But as time goes by, I realise this responsibility is seriously too huge for me to carry. I think I would prefer to hone up my skills first in my core business before taking up other roles. My first three months have taught me that working with my clients are definitely much easier than dealing with adults and I am seriously not experienced and mature enough to handle the latter.

The Big Day is just approximately a couple of months away. Most of the major details have been more or less settled. The Significant Other is glad that my job has been keeping me busy from rushing the external vendors and obsessing over the minor details.

Ok, back to work. Just needed a place to rant about my job and to practice my writing skills!

2007 Reflections..

2007-12-26T18:00:00.000-08:00

2007 is coming to a close. As I laze in the comfort of my room on this slack cooling day, here's a reflection of the ups and downs of the year.

I work approximately forty weeks in a year. To keep myself saint, I count down by weeks. Once a week has passed, I would gleefully strike it off the calendar. I don't hate my job. In fact, by the end of the working day, I achieve a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment. I sleep very well at night as I am totally exhausted by the end of each working day. Sometimes there is this mad rush of last minute things to do, but seriously, compared to the working world outside, most of the things are within one's control. The colleagues here are fun-going and really nice people which makes a big difference in whether or not I keep myself going. My clients can be difficult at times but seriously, if you think of the big picture why they are here, it's best to take things with a pinch of salt and not to be too hard on oneself. And yes, sometimes they do make me laugh. I remember on a few occasions when I went hysterical and couldn't stop laughing when they said something silly. I sense they think I am crazy but that's the way I am. The most rewarding moment was when they requested for me to be with them the next year. I think affirmative words work best with me, not to forget Winnie the Pooh and bear-related gifts.

From the year end meetings, I came to know that I am suddenly "arrowed" with more responsibilities compared to my first year's workload. On one hand, I am honoured that of so many people, I am chosen to be the one who is tasked with all these responsibilities. On the other hand, I see myself spending more time on extra-curriculum and planning work, rather than, teaching. I see it as a challenge to juggle all the different sort of work that I am given next year. Hopefully, I can manage my time well and still have time to relax.

Enough about work. December has been an activity-packed month! It started with my trip to Macau on Tiger Airways, my first budget airline flight. For the amount that I paid, it lived up to my expectations. It was pouring on the day we flew and the creeking noises produced by the plane did make me fear for my dear life but once we reached above the clouds, everything was fine. Was really excited to see The Venetian, especially the suite, after having read and seen so much about it on the internet and newspapers. Upon getting the electronic card to my room on the 33rd floor, I coudn't wait to see it! It really did not disappoint. The toilet was heavenly and there were two television sets with a living room. I could rave non-stop about the suite but I should stop here. The Venetian is themed exactly like Venice. Having not been to Venice, I loved the Gondula ride. We took the outdoor ride on a breezy night and I loved every second of it! Wanted to take the indoor ride too but decided not to be hard-core. In the end, we used the remaining money to fill up our stomachs and place our bets at the casino. I couldn't stop posing for photos throughout the whole trip. Must be the perfect weather and the hotel!

I shan't go into details about my roulette gambling experience. Was really heart-wrenching when the number 22, the original number we wanted to bet on, came out not once but twice! All I can say that gambling is really addictive. It took lots of efforts for both of us to stop throwing our money down the drain. But it was really fun watching others playing. I attain joy when I watch others lose their money. I seriously think I am a little sadistic, haha.

We left on a Saturday, thankfully. When we checked-out, bus loads of China tourists arrived. The male headed for the casinos while the women headed for the designer labels. We initially thought that the sales was pathetic based on the weekday crowd but we were wrong. It was really scary seeing so many people. Anyway, I am really excited about the opening of the integrated resorts in Singapore. Will definitely try my luck at the casino but make sure that I do not become a gambling addict.

The second week of December was spent running errands for Brother's wedding. Preparations included decorating the house with the word 'xi', ordering food from the caterer, coming up with the best seating arrangement for our side, collecting wedding gowns and suit etc. As the day approached, the mood in the house was filled with excitement. There were some inevitable "emo" moments the day before the actual day, but it went by quickly.

On the actual day dinner itself, I was one of those tasked to handle the reception area. No one recognised me due to the heavy make-up which totally transformed me. Funnily, I didn't really have the mood to enjoy the food that day. Was too caught up with the surroundings and the significance of the day to do do. Thankfully we had our stomachs filled during the food tasting session. Its ironic that it takes months of preparation for one actual day and the day just flew by. The banquet was a success with no hiccups in my opinion. To "reward" me for my hardwork and efforts, Brother booked a deluxe room for me with American breakfast the next day. The room did not disappoint!

Anyway, I am grateful for Brother's wedding. At least we can learn from experiences, do things more efficiently, and take note of 'what to do' and 'what not to do'. As my work begins next year, I'll have less time to do research. Thankfully most major stuff have been settled. Hopefully, everything will be smooth sailing throughout the whole process!

Oh, I have a new hobby - looking at hotel ballrooms and function rooms for actual wedding set-ups! Not sure how many white lies we have told in order to do that :)

Holiday Post..

2007-06-19T12:00:00.000-07:00

Rog lost yet again to Nadal. Rog's only chance for a Grand Slam is Nadal's absence from the French. Poor Rog. Stupid Nadal. Rog's manager cum girlfriend is putting on too much weight. She seems to balloon each time I see her. It's perhaps a timely reminder for me to eat less and exercise more for fear that I may end up like her.

The month long holiday is coming to an abrupt end. It actual fact it is only a two week holiday in which I was down with a cold/sore throat for a week. So in my boredom at home, my laptop became my best friend. I actually felt weird staying at home on weekdays. For the past half a year, I've only been home on average at 5plus. Was initially not used to hearing Granny's naggings and complaints but after a while I got accustomed to them.

Met up with my nie buddies and was quite surprised to hear that one of them had broken her bond and has since started a new job. Another was highly stressed while the other two are still hanging on pretty well. I guess it really depends on one's character and mindset. Anyway ktv was a semi-disaster for me as I could hardly breathe properly and still nursing a sore throat coupled with occasional sneezes, singing was almost impossible. The only consolation was that it was ladies night so the charges were much cheaper. I don't know why but suddenly ktv seems boring. It might be due to the fact that I've not been keeping up with latest songs so I end up singing the same few songs till I'm sick of them. Another factor perhaps is the company or my reluctance to open up to them and vice versa. I get bored easily if I'm with people whom I'm not close to.

The recent HK drama serials are finally of high standard. Lawyer show is funny yet touching. I look forward to it every weekday night. 9pm show is too not bad but I'll make do with watching the repeat telecasts. Local drama serials still can't compete with HK dramas. All the new actresses look similar and the shows aren't funny at all. Not sure whether it's because Singaporeans lack humour or they are too sensitive to take sarcasm.

Now that my cold/sore throat has finally recovered, I'm going out with a vengeance. GSS has started a month back but I've not contributed to the Singapore economy. But I suspect in the end I'll just window-shop and come home empty-handed as always. I'm more than willing to splurge on food and accomodation but stinge on tangible goods. I'll rather spend on buying experience than branded goods which do not value-add my life.

In other news, property prices keep escalating. At the current rate, I can only afford a slum. Brother is lucky to have gotten his unit last year just before the property craze started. His new place is almost ready with most of the furniture and electronics already up. It's amazing what renovations can do to a place. When he bought over the unit, it was lifeless and dull. Now it seems almost brand new and I'm absolutely in love with his tv and toilet. Yes, I'm obsessed with toilets which is the main reason why I love posh hotels.

That's all for now. Though work is starting, I'm still in a holiday mood. Wonder how I'm going to get out of it.

Long Post..

2007-06-07T16:50:00.000-07:00

Much has happened since the last time I blogged. Since this blog is used for complaints, the fact that I haven't written signifies that most things are going on smoothly so far. I have nothing much to whine about in terms of my job and anyway, it's pretty unwise to do so in here. On the whole, there are days where I get upset with a certain group of clients but there are other groups that keep me saint. It's just a matter of balance. I admit I still haven't mastered the art of winning them over but everyday is a learning experience for me.

Six months into joining this company and it's easy to see who are the efficient, kind-hearted, law-abiding, responsible, lazy, bo-chap, MC kings and queens, shrink responsible, all-talk-but-no-action workers. I like the majority of the colleagues who sits in the same office as me. Perhaps it's due to the fact that our age gap is not very big. Eating, mahjong and gossiping sessions help to keep us close and make life less miserable at times. But on the whole, everyone is friendly with one another except at times, a certain someone can be too sociable and irritating which disturbs me from doing my work peacefully.

The past month of so have been spent doing mostly administrative work and attending courses. Most people in my job loathe doing the former but I seem to enjoy it. I only dislike it when my "senior" throws me last minute work to do when he realises he has no time for it. I do not mind doing it if he tells me blatantly right from the start that he doesn't even intend to get started on it. Maybe next time I should just kindly volunteer my services. But then again, in this dog-eat-dog world, most people would only take advantage of your kindness or stupidity and even put the blame on you if something goes wrong. Unfortunately, this happened to a colleague of mine and it was witnessed by many of us. It just taught her and also us a lesson not to be too nice. More importantly, we learnt to be wary of a certain someone.

The deployment schedule is out and I'm surprised that there is no change to my workload. The only adjustment is an additional hour with my favourite class for a new module and I'm working together with my senior mentor. The colleagues that joined in together with me all have increased workloads. Perhaps the time-table committee considered the fact that I have 4 hours per week with the NT stream which is extremely exhausting for a BT. All in all, I'm pleased that I'll still be with the same groups of clients. A new group would mean building rapport and setting rules and regulations all over again.

Before embarking on this journey, the institution gave us a word of advice: Avoid workplace romance. Imagine my surprise when I gradually found out that there are 5 couples in my company. It shouldn't be much of a surprise actually given that 80% of us are aged 35 and below. And the quality in here is definitely much better than SDU (though I've never been to any SDU outings, I'm making this statement based on hearsay). The couples in here are quite compatible but personally, I find it weird if my significant other sits opposite me in the office, and we have to act professional in front of our clients and fellow colleagues. More importantly, I wouldn't be able to concentrate. Anyhow, I'm still making speculations on which couple would get hitched first.

Moving out of the workplace to other matters. The past 9 months have been an enjoyable journey for me. Thanks to my Significant Other, I had the opportunities to experience new stuff: watch Arsenal play, eat at different places ranging from Bedok Market to Morton's, window-shop at heartland malls, hang around Esplanade area, take photos, watch plays/shows, fix jigsaw puzzles, play sudoku (nerds), play playstation (yes, I'm childhood deprived, the closest thing to playstation that I played is Super Mario on the Nintendo donkey years ago), learn new English words, squeeze and jostle with the crowd at PC shows, drive around different parts of Singapore, play racket games and many others.

What I experienced in the past 9 months was probably more than what I experienced in my last 9 years. I never knew certain things existed and I never knew what the typical life of a Singaporean was. I am not lamenting about my family lifestyle or trying to sound like a snob but I remember once asking my parents why they didn't bring my brother and I to eat at hawker centres. Do not get mistaken. This doesn't mean that I dine in posh restaurants everyday. The fact is my family seldom steps out of the house to have our meals, or rather, go out as a family. It's really an eye-opener when I discover how other families eat at hawker centres, what Sengkang flats look like, the fact that many Singaporeans actually go to Sentosa and youths are getting more liberal these days. I finally feel like a normal Singaporean. Of course, it's not just experiencing new things that made my life more interesting. Most importantly, it is the person who goes through all these with me. Even doing mundane things like strolling around the neighbourhood or watching the last episode of a particular Channel 8 show starring Pierre Png can be enjoyable (when we start poking fun and laughing hilariously at the poor guy's acting and his Mandarin slang which is a 100 times worse than mine).

I know you are reading this, you-know-who-you are. I may appear quite unfeeling and expressionless at times but it's really not like that. I really want you to know that I'm appreciative of what you have done for me, especially tolerating my irrational grouchiness. A big Thank You to you : )

Extremely Drained..

2007-05-07T18:00:00.000-07:00

Feeling terribly drained. Energy level is at rock-bottom. Thank goodness the past couple of weeks have been spent on revision where my creative juices are not needed. Feel like I've been going through the motions.

The next 1.5 weeks will be doing mostly invigilation, marking and administrative work. I get highly irritated when I'm being called up at the last minute to do something, totally spoiling my actual plan to get work done. I wish I could be left alone to complete my tasks but with the high number of MC cases, it is virtually impossible.

Rapport with certain classes are slowly improving. Not sure why my form class is getting a bit noisy. Their behaviour is getting a bit disappointing. Too much praise is not such a good thing after all. They obviously don't see the importance of their examinations. To be fair, the majority are studious. However, the same can't be said about the other 30%. They are generally harmless but just a little mischievous. Even my favourite class is getting a little restless. Not sure if it is because exams are coming.

Looking forward to the June holidays. Desperately need a break to re-charge my energies.

Incoherent Entry..

2007-02-03T22:42:00.000-08:00

It has been one month since I've started my job. I've been lucky (or unlucky?) to be given the opportunity to teach all 3 streams: Express, Normal Academic and Normal Technical. Funnily, I'm beginning to prefer teaching English. Reason being that I'm not confined to the syllabus and there are abundance of materials and interesting activities out there which has to do with language. I'm finding it difficult to teach Mathematics as I've to stricty adhere to the scheme of work and it doesn't help that the students come in with mixed abilities. There are topics which they are supposed to have learnt in Primary school but the majority have obviously forgotten. Having to re-teach these topics would mean that I would be lagging behind the scheme of work and I would not be able to complete the syllabus. I get frustrated when they get the sums wrong even though I've told them repeatedly the rules and formulae. Sad to say, I'm the co-form teacher of my Maths class and ironically, my rapport with this class is the weakest because the only things that I talk to them about are Mathematics which they strongly detest and ya, nagging at them to bring their consent forms. Oh well.

I'm a nursing a terrible sore throat which has been going on for a couple of weeks. The flu virus has been spreading round the staff room and it doesn't help that Barb and Granny are down with sore throats too. I've to resort to buying a microphone and using it to teach even though I would rather much prefer to do without it. Barb will be forcing me to visit the doctor's tomorrow.

Cousin's wedding was a rather cosy affair. The only thing that irritated me was that it was held on a Sunday, which strongly deprived me of a good night's sleep in preparation for the week ahead. I became grouchy and sleepy a couple of times during the week and I slept more than 10 hours on two weekdays. I'm really sleep deprived. Times like this make me wish that we have a four day work week or that the public holiday would come faster.

It has been a rather incoherent entry. I'm going to sleep now despite the tonnes of marking and lesson planning to be done.

Bangkok Trip..

2006-12-20T11:55:00.000-08:00

Was greeted with 2 consecutive days of rain upon arrival in Singapore from Bangkok. It was a great time for me to sleep-in, finish reading my 514 page book, take naps and attempt to solve a Sudoku puzzle which up till now, I've yet to complete.

The trip was a relaxing one though I'm ready to swear off shopping cum eating trips in major cities for my next few holidays. After a while, it gets a bit meaningless hopping from one shopping centre/mall/market to another, looking aimlessly for cheap things to buy. The thing that I enjoyed most was map-reading. It's exciting to read the map and navigate from Destination A to Destination B. And it's extremely pleasurable when I get it right since my female travelling companion relies heavily on me to navigate our way through.

The number of items that I bought can be counted using the fingers of one hand. Yes, that's shocking considering I am a female, who's supposedly a shopaholic. T-shirts, bags, shoes and many other goods are so cheap that I fear for their quality. Afterall, I'm a firm believer of "you get what you pay for". And I simply can't bring myself to buy a 150baht (S$6.50)T-shirt. Perhaps I could wear them at home but I am perfectly comfortable with my decade old T-shirts.

My source of amusement or entertainment comes when my female companion engages in bargaining with the sales people. It's funny because I know jolly well that she can afford the items but she makes it sounds as if the difference in 50 baht really means a lot to her. I simple walk away when I can't contain my laughter. Bargaining is never for my forte. I think all the shop owners at the flea markets love me simply because I can't be bothered to waste my saliva on slashing down prices. Call me stupid but it's really beneath my dignity to bargain for a S$2 reduction for something that costs S$8. I seriously think those people need the S$2 more than me. I could always go without recess.

The moment that I enjoy most was going back to the hotel after a tiring day of walking. I admit I'm getting old. By 9pm, my legs are exhausted and I just can't wait to get back to my hotel room for a hot steamy shower and watch tv before retiring to bed. I have no energy left to chill-out or explore new places. Or maybe it's because subconsciously, I know that I paid S$90 per night for the hotel room. I'm cheapskate. I feel contented staying in the confortable hotel room rather than loitering in the streets of polluted Bangkok.

The most nerve-wrecking moment was when we almost missed our flight back. The queues at the immigration were so freaking long. As each 5-minute block passed, I felt like screaming at the inefficiency of the immigrant officers as the queue hardly moved. We tried out best to persuade the people in front to let us go first, but each time our efforts were thwarted by fellow Asians, who told us "no cutting queue", even though we pointed to them at our boarding pass that the boarding time is 1220pm, and it was already way past the time. Only the kind Japanese man in front of us let us go, perhaps he could see how desperate I was with my constant pacing up and down. We finally got past the immigration at 1245pm, which was the departure time. The ground crew were frantically looking for us and I bore the brunt of the scoldings simply because at every stage, I was ahead of my friend, who couldn't run because she was wearing sandals while I was wearing track shoes. I never ran so fast in my life. I was cursing and swearing that the boarding gate had to be so far away but I was thankful that our seats on the aircraft were the 3rd row from the front. I would never forget the old hag air stewardess barking at me the moment I stepped into the plane, " Where did you all go????!!!!" After this frantic experience, I've learnt my lesson to board-in early.

One more week to enjoyment before school starts. Sigh.

Teacher Man..

2006-12-04T21:57:00.000-08:00

Just completed Frank McCourt's Teacher Man. An interesting insight to what I may be experiencing in the years ahead though I doubt I will be encountering flying sandwiches across classrooms. Perhaps flying paper aeroplanes or rubberbands may be good substitutes.

One of my favourites from the book:
Professors of education at NYU never lectured on how to handle flying-sandwich-situations. They talked about theories and philosophies of education, about moral and ethical imperatives, about the necessity of dealing with the whole child, the gestalt, if you don't mind, the child's felt needs, but never about critical moments in the classroom.

Well, looks like this issue is not only happening in Singapore. Most of the tutors, lecturers and professors here only harp on theories from eminent psychologists such as Piaget and Vygotsky. And frankly, majority of the tutors here have only taught in JCs, autonomous and independent schools. Many of them have no idea what it takes to teach in neighbourhood schools. Their closest experiences of stepping into neighbourhood schools are supervising practicum trainees who are being posted there. Therefore, they fail to share with us any experiences on dealing with difficult students. Flying-aeroplane situations are not a norm in their teaching experiences. Students who challenge them intellectually and listen to them almost obediently are what they are familiar with. It's a major pity that they only got experienced teachers to come share with us the realities of teaching right at the very last week of our whole course. I fail to understand the rationale of it. The rest of the 8 months or so were wasted on doing projects and writing assignments based on theories, theories and more theories. To be fair to them, it is indeed difficult to teach us how to manage a class and how to react in critical moments. After all, there's no fixed formula to it. It all depends on the type of students, the teacher's character and style and the situation. Perhaps it's a good idea to scrap off certain time-wasting modules and instead put us into schools to learn first-hand from experienced teachers.

Another thought-provoker:
Serious students are not satisfied. They argue that in other classes, the teacher tells you what you are supposed to know. The teacher teaches it and you are supposed to learn it. Then the teacher gives you an examination and you get the grade you deserve.

which brings to..

What is education, anyway? What are we doing in this school? You can say you are trying to graduate so that you can go to college and prepare for a career. But fellow students, it's more than that. I've to ask myself what the hell I'm doing in the classroom.

One of the best ways to capture exam-oriented students' attention is to forewarn them that the next section that the teacher is going to teach will be coming up in the next test/exam. This works well for the more motivated students who are not quite at the elite level but certainly do not fall under the below-average category. I applaud them for their effort in at least knowing the importance of doing well for examinations. But as an educator, I constantly tell this group of students that getting good grades is not everything. No point getting straight As if your character sucks. This reminded me of a particular instance when a student shot back at me that character does not matter if your grades can't make it. Although it would be unfair to label him as a representative of the next generation, it saddened me a lot that a 14 year-old would be thinking this way. It is moments like this that I question myself as a role of an educator and what the hell I'm doing in the classroom. Teaching the subject is pertinent, but certainly there are more important skills in life than getting an A for that particular subject.

The ability for me to relate to the novel was what kept me captivated to the book. A message that I brought back after completing this book: story-telling is one of the best ways to engage unmotivated students.

The Birthday..

2006-11-26T18:00:00.000-08:00

Unlike previous years, I had someone special to celebrate my birthday with this year. The celebration took place the night before my birthday, at a restaurant which provided a stunning view of the skylines of Singapore, as well as sumptuous food and champagne to go along. The ambience was excellent but what's more important is the company - The One. Although we had no photographs taken then, the memories of that day will forever be etched in my heart. Thank you darling, for making this my best birthday ever.

I love being a tourist of Singapore. Indulging in fine dining, lazing on the sofa at hotel lobbies looking at others tourists checking-in, strolling hand-in-hand with The One along Orchard Road/Esplanade absorbing in the Christmas atmosphere, happily snapping away pictures of Singapore icons and ironically getting other tourists to take pictures of us, heartily consuming greasy local delights at hawker centres, checking out for cheap deals, exploring unfamiliar routes, taking cable car rides etc. I never knew that Singapore's view at night was so breathtaking. I never realised that our tiny island has so much to offer. With the wide array of entertainment, the beautiful sights and the right company, I'm contended to stay put here during this long vacation before I embark on my "journey" next year.

The Posting..

2006-11-13T16:29:00.000-08:00

Received my school posting over the weekend while I wasn't at home. Coincidentally the same thing happened during my previous posting. Barb had the honour of ripping apart the letter once again. So I was posted to a neighbourhood school. I kind of expected it as eighty percent of the schools in Singapore are neighbourhood schools. The odds of getting into a non-government aided school for a second time were slim.

Although my practicum school was an autonomous school, I wasn't particularly impressed with it. My practicum school just didn't live up to my expectations. Perhaps the reason was that I myself came from an autonomous school. Up till now, it disturbs me that the principal doesn't enforce any kind of discipliniary action when 90% of the students do not sing the national anthem or recite the pledge. His rationale was that the problem was prevalent 20 years ago. If it can't be rectified then, what can be done now? I find his rationale totally absurd. The fact that the students show little respect to him and the teachers doesn't surprise me at all.

Overall, I'm not too disappointed with my posting. I should have no complaints since it's only 6km away from my house and this time round, there are at least four people who are posted together with me to this school. Perhaps the relevant authority has realised how mean they were to me on the previous two occasions, leaving me as the lone-ranger in a totally new environment (not that I really minded actually). Anyway, I've heard a couple of horror stories from ex-students of that school. Ironically, I've heard positive remarks from ex-teachers. A matter of different perspective? It doesn't matter which school I get into actually. Afterall, students are all the same. It's the colleagues and the overall school environment/culture that really makes a huge difference.

In a totally unrelated note, I'm thoroughly pissed with someone who borrowed an expensive (costs more than 2k) item from me and doesn't show any intention of returning. In fact, he has been blatantly ignoring my messages. Absentmindedness is totally out of the question as the item is so freaking big that there's no way he could have missed it. I attribute it to the fact that he doesn't have integrity or perhaps his teachers didn't teach him CME. The One thinks otherwise. His theory is that all guys are jerks and that he's still sore about a particular matter which I shan't mention here. Morale of the story? It really doesn't pay to be kind. I can only blame myself for being naive into believing that he had no other hidden agenda when borrowing the item from me. I absolutely loathe people with no integrity. No use being so freaking intelligent when you seriously lack values.

Traffic Woes..

2006-11-01T18:52:00.000-08:00

In response to Minister of Transport's plea for Singaporeans to take public transport rather than drive, many Singaporeans have taken this opportunity to write in to the Forum to complain about Singapore's public transport system. Singaporeans just love whinning. Their common complaints? Long waiting times for buses, irregular timing for buses, squeezy trains and buses etc. Their suggestion? Emulate Switzerland's transport system.

In my opinion, our transport system is close to being top-notch. Those whiners obviously haven't stepped out of this little dot to experience the public transport outside Singapore. With the peanuts they are paying for public transport fares, what do they expect to get in return? Yes, public transport fares are rising over the years, but it is still low compared to other countries.

Anyway, even if Singapore does have a world class transport system, does it really mean that they would choose public transport over the car? I reckon not. Here are my reasons why the car wins hands down.

1) Comfort. Maximum number of people in a normal car? 5. Bus? I don't know. Probably 50-100 for a double-decker bus. MRT? Hundreds or even thousand. And the most annoying part of public transport: The person standing or sitting next to you might just be a stinko who keeps picking his nose or a psycho who keeps staring at you.

2) Privacy. With strangers surrounding you in the MRT or bus, conversations with your friend(s) are limited to general and trivial stuff like the weather, Singapore Idol, TV dramas etc. There's no way you can talk about personal and controversial matters on the public transport unless you want the whole world to know about you or you want to spend a period of time behind bars.

3) Convenience. Not every place that one wants to go is located near the MRT station or bus-stop. Sure one can always take the cab. But when returning, what are the chances of one flagging down a cab at the deserted place?

4) Saves time. Example: My home to Jurong - by car: 35 min (non-peak hour), 50 min (peak hour). By public transport - minimum 100 minutes. Yes, there are counter examples but most of the time, my point is generally true.

5) Increase bonding time. Imagine 30 minutes a day with your loved ones in the car. That translates to days over a period of time. Sure, you can increase bonding time with your kid on the public transport but it won't be quality time due to reason number 2.

6) Thrill of driving. I loathe it when females who can afford it do not drive/learn how to drive. They say they prefer being chauffered around by their boyfriend. They obviously don't know they are missing a lot in life. I just love blasting my favourite song on the radio while speeding down expressways. Yes, traffic jams are irritating but it builds up one's patience and lets you admire the different types of cars on the roads.

7) Prestige. One of the 5Cs. No explanation needed. If one can afford it, one would obviously drive a car rather than take public transport.

Yap, that's it. On a related topic, I didn't have to pay parking fees today even though I parked for 2.5hours. Maybe the gods were trying to cheer me up after a lousy day yesterday. I hope there would be more compensations to come.

Wedding Bells..

2006-10-19T19:20:00.000-07:00

An ex-colleague will be getting married soon. I'll be attending his ROM this weekend. It's a shot-gun marriage. He's proud that his girl is pregnant. I almost dropped my hp in the middle of the lecture when I read the sms. I really don't know what to say. I feel embarrassed for the poor girl. But then again, who am I to judge others? Different people have different values. I shouldn't use my own morals and principles as a yardstick for others. Anyway, I'm still contemplating how much to give. Don't really feel like going actually but I'm curious to see the whole ceremony. The only person who I really know that will be attending the ROM has been avoiding me like a plague in school. I really didn't expect guys to have such thin skins. Anyway, I guess I shall remain as Miss Anti-Social throughout the whole lunch buffet. Socializing is such a freaking chore.

If nothing goes wrong, I should be attending 2 family weddings next year. I'm certain there would be more to come, especially from friends and colleagues. I heard from a reliable source that a secondary school friend of mine would be tying the knot at the end of this year. I'm excited for her even though we've kind of lost contact for years. And there's another secondary school friend that got married approximately 3 years ago? This means she was 21 years old. I almost freaked out when I heard that. I think I couldn't even take care of myself at that age. I was still a spoilt brat living off my parents while mugging (hmm, too strong a word actually) for my exams. My cognitive level was probably at age 10 then. And I suspect it hasn't grown much now. Btw, her husband's hen-pecked nickname on friendster is really hilarious. I can't stop laughing even as I'm typing now.

Judging by Mr Lim's working hours, I can't help but wonder whether it's worth slogging for the monthly pay of 4k. Even though we live under the same roof, I think the last time I saw him was last Saturday morning? Btw, it's Thursday today. Come to think of it, I can't even remember when was the last time we had dinner together. I finally understand the reason for the influx of ex-lawyers joining NIE. Money vs Quality of Life. Actually, the money isn't really that fantastic if one does some simple mathematical calculation. A pay of $6 per hour for a lawyer? I'll rather work as a part-time receptionist then.

Ok, it's time to meet my basic needs now.

Inequality Issue..

2006-10-03T18:20:00.000-07:00

It's honeymoon period in NIE now for my intake. Slack timetable, 3 or 4 day week, 1 or 2 lessons per day. The only thing that I'm sore about is the lack of avaibility of parking lots which means I've to pay $3 a day for parking. Today was particularly irritating as I specially left the house early confident that I would be getting a lot. But to my horror, the lots were all filled up by 8.15am. It certainly wasn't an auspicious start to the day.

Today's presentation on inequality got me thinking a little (yes, I hardly exercise my brain cells recently). I've been subconsciously practising inequality in the classroom. Or was it blatantly? I tend to favour certain groups of people over others. But come on, it's human nature to be biased. The only solution is to try to curb favouritism (hardly possible) or if not, make it less consipicuous to the students, which is quite difficult. After all students are not dumb and they can definitely sense it when teachers are treating them unfairly. How often have we heard students complain "Cher, not fair!". Even as a student I was guilty of it. But seriously, life is never fair. Yes, teachers should treat all students equally but sometimes, teacher's attitudes, expectations, upbringing as well as their stereotypical beliefs strongly affects how the teacher treats students in the classroom. And seriously, even if there's equality of treatment in the classroom, it doesn't neccesarily translate to equality of outcomes as evident from statistical studies showing that Chinese outperform other races in examinations and males earn more wages than females.

Listening to David Tao at home and Jay Chou in the car. I still prefer David Tao's style of music. It's much more soothing to the ears. Jay Chou's rap gives me a headache. And the fact that I can't make out what he's saying adds to my dislike of some of his songs.

Current addiction: David Tao's Finally and Marry Me Today. Btw, the latter is certainly not an indirect marriage proposal.

After Practicum..

2006-09-18T16:51:00.000-07:00

I've been asked to update my blog more regularly. I was 'missing' for the past 2 months or so because of my practicum. There was simply no time to blog when you are bogged down with the numerous lesson plans to write. Besides that, I wasn't in the mood to do so. Yes, the practicum wasn't as smooth-sailing as I expected. I learnt that having so called 'better' schools doesn't imply that it is easier to teach. I take back what I said during my teaching interview. Every school has its own sets of problems. Let's just say some are worse than the other. There was a period of time when I felt really down. It seems that no matter what and how I try, the students of a particular class were not appreciative. It came to a point where I practically gave up and just entered the classroom and went through the motions. I'm glad that my other class was slightly better. They may be noisy, less academically-inclined but at least they have a heart. No point being so freaking smart when you are downright selfish and unappreciative.

As the weeks progressed, I slowly adjusted my expectations for the students. A bit of noise in the classroom was inevitable. Expecting 100% silence for more than 10 minutes is really out of the question. And ironically, the lesson plans that I came up with were stifling me. After a while, I gave up doing detailed lesson plans. Having a superb lesson plan is certainly not equivalent to a successful lesson. So I just stuck to brief lesson plans which gave me a rough outline on how the lesson would progress.

Upon return to NIE, I felt more relieved when I realised I wasn't the only person facing problems teaching. The main problems are classroom management and motivating the kids to study. There's only so much the books and teachers can equip us with. Suddenly, the 2 hour lessons that I've to attend feels like a drag and chore. This wasn't so before practicum. It's just that after practicum, you realise that theories and reflections are really redundant. The tutors and lecturers come up with the best possible ways to teach but seriously when you enter a class of 40 with diverse abilities and backgrounds, you realise that many things are not going to work. A lot of trial and error are needed before we can find the best possible way to engage the kids. Gone are the days where kids will obediently sit at the desks and do what their teachers tell them to do. I really can't wait for the day where the class size is reduced.

While undergoing my practicum, I'm grateful that I met someone. Although I hardly complain about my job to him, his companionship during weekends back then somehow took my mind off school and troubles. I just want to say a big "thank you" to this person, you know who you are :)

The Closure..

2006-08-29T17:00:00.000-07:00

Had my last lesson with my Maths class today. Ironically it was the first time that I tried out group work with this rather noisy class and surprisingly it worked rather well. Perhaps it was the Ferrero Roche that got them motivated to solve the questions as quickly as possible. Oh well, whatever it is, I gave a grand speech five minutes before the end of the lesson. The gist of it was that I had an enjoyable time teaching this class despite the constant reminders for them to keep their noise level down. I was touched when some of them shouted "Cher, we love you" and "Happy Teacher's Day (in advance)". As a token of my appreciation, I gave each of them a packet of Oreo. It was then that one of the rather rebellious female student came up to me and said, "Teacher, you are very sweet." It's moments like these that make my job rewarding and propel me to continue in this profession. Oh yah, a couple of students that I least expected even asked for my MSN.

I can't say the same thing about my English class though. My relationship with this class soured drastically since my supervisor's first visit. The entire class turned against me when they knew that I was being assessed. I've never felt so well-hated in my entire life. I was totally shattered at the end of the lesson. I admit that uptil now, I bear a grudge on them. To put in fairly, I think I put in more effort planning my English lessons rather than Maths lessons. In return, all I got from the majority of the English class was unappreciate remarks, arrogance and bad attitude. Things became so bad that we've been walking past without greeting or acknowledging one another.

My practicum will be drawing to a close in two days time. It has been a learning experience and I realise I still have lots of areas to improve on, such as classroom management and rapport building with the class. I finally understand my HOD's words "Having a social life is important in this profession," which he told me at the beginning of my practicum. I was wondering why in the world was he telling me that. Do I really look so anti-social? Anyway, time really flies when there's something to look forward to during the weekends. I hate to admit this but at times, by mid-week I'm already in a weekend mood. Oh well, I'm human after all.

Hong Kong..

2006-06-17T23:45:00.000-07:00

Hong Kong trip was good. Besides coming back with an extra lugguage filled with clothes, a pair of shoes and gifts, I've also returned with a refreshed and recharged mind. The latter is the reason why I love travelling. It makes me feel fortunate. Furthermore, it makes me realise that I'm just a tiny soul on this planet. It also reinforces my dislike for people who loves to indulge in self-pity. If you think you are the most miserable and pathetic person on this earth, just think of the millions of others who struggle to make ends meet.

The most satisfying thing about this trip was my ability to read maps and signs to navigate successfully from one place to another. Who said females can't read maps? I'm a living example. Haha. Asking was out of the question because I neither speak nor understand a word of Cantonese. Getting Barbara to ask was pointless because we would get vague answers like "go straight, turn left, walk through the tunnel, turn right." Even if those that we asked gave accurate answers, somehow or other, the meanings would get lost when translated by Barbara to me. Anyway, I dislike relying on others. I would rather find the way myself.

This trip has also made me realise what I want in life and particularly, my significant other. Choosing the one is not akin to buying clothes, which can easily be disposed of when it has worned off or when one is sick of it. So far, no one has managed to give me the sense of security and trust that I need. And I absolutely cannot tolerate guys with selfish behaviour. Yes, people tell me I'm choosy. But I think I'm just being discerning.

Lost Again..

2006-06-12T18:39:00.000-07:00

After a strong start to the match, Rog completely lost his focus and subsequently succumbed to the Spanish bull. I'm sore at the way he lost. The Spanish bull did not win the match. Rog simply threw it away himself with the ridiculous number of unforced errors. His backhand totally deserted him. Oh well, it's all over now. No point sulking over it. It's impossible to win forever. Life still goes on.

Accidentally found the shop that had shifted out of my neighbourhood shopping centre a couple of months back. Before shifting, the shop assistant told me that it will be relocating to Marina Square. But since the revamp of Marina Square, I still can't find it. Reason? The brand name is still the same but the shop name has changed. The friendly and familiar shop assistant looked at me from head to toe and commented that I slimmed down. Haha, that really made my day. Not sure whether she was trying to entice me to buy their products or what. Anyway, I replied that it was because she had been seeing me in over-size t-shirts and shorts whenever I patronised them back at the old shop at my neighbourhood. I stepped out of the shop empty-handed but I'm happy that I finally found back my source of working clothes. It's ironic that when one tries so hard to find something, one always can't find it. On the other hand, one always finds something when one least expects it. Cliche as it sounds, at times, certain things should be left to fate.

Came up with a buying list for my trip. The items consist mostly of birthday presents for my dear friends, which all concidentally fall in June/July or November/December. Recent meeting ups with my decade old friends have left me feeling very grateful for them always being at my side. My decade old girlfriends are independent females who are not the sticky kind. Although our meet-up sessions have lessen considerably due to our busy work schedules, we are fine with it. Somehow or other, we seem to be able to read each other's minds without having to say out explicitly. And due to our similar background and shared experiences, we can speak freely and not be accused of being class-conscious spoilt-brats. I find it very labourious to have to mince my words and think twice before speaking to my own friends. We throw in sarcastic and cynical comments with the intention of spicing up conversations knowing that they are not meant to harm anyone. Furthermore and more importantly, we know that the contents of our conversations are kept to ourselves. Certain matters should be kept private and we trust each other to keep our mouths shuts without having to constantly remind each other. To me, being truthful and knowing how to keep private affairs confidential are the most important factors in a friendship. I would lose faith in anyone who is pretentious or/and gossipy.

In other news, he hasn't made up his mind after all! Looks like he'll heed the advice given. Keeping my fingers crossed while waiting for the other party's response.

Mixed Fortunes..

2006-06-07T11:25:00.000-07:00

Martina Hingis is back. But it's obvious that she does not possess the weapons to lift another Grand Slam crown. Despite being a little stronger than she was just before she retired from the game, it is still not enough. Kim Clijsters outclassed her in every department yesterday. Being the best strategist in the game doesn't signify anything. The power game in ladies' tennis is here to stay. Sad to say, Hingis will always be around in the later stages of Grand Slam tournaments, but to win them, she would have to rely on her opponents rather than herself.

Rog had a relatively stroll in the park against Mario Ancic yesterday. Next up for him? Nemisis Nalbandian. All the hype has been surrounding the much anticpated final between Rog and Nadal. Everyone seems to have forgotten that Nalbandian too owns a winning record against Rog. It will be a tight match. Rog will need all the luck and the support of the crowd to pull this off. On the other side of the draw, Nadal will be too strong for his opponents. Few would bet against him being in the final on Sunday.

Had a haircut yesterday. It probably knocked some sense into me. Just realised how ridiculous it was for me to stage a 'silent war' with a particular someone. Whatever his decision, I will respect it. He's just being objective. I just have to come to terms with the fact that at some point of my life, he would inevitably move on with his own life.

I never felt that meeting someone would be a chore. I hate people who pressurize me to come up with a place and time to meet while we are on the phone, especially when it's the tennis Grand Slam season. I'm sorry but Rog takes precedence over everything. Frankly speaking, I'm just coming up with excuses. If he ain't related to Barb, I seriously wouldn't even have bothered. Maybe I shall be mean and not accommodate to his time. I don't like it when he sounds so domineering and not give me a choice. Typical MCP.

Inner Feelings..

2006-06-05T16:55:00.000-07:00

I dislike the way he gave false hopes. I'm against his decision although I've been keeping mum so far. It's upsetting how an external party can alter his decision so much. I've spoken to him less since he 'announced' his decision. I find it hard to maintain the relationship that we had had. Deep down, I'm hoping he would change his mind, but I seriously doubt it. Not sure if he ever considered our feelings when making his decision. Emotional ties don't seem to count after all. I am thoroughly disappointed. Can't find the right words to describe my feelings right now.

Teachers' Blogs..

2006-06-01T12:12:00.000-07:00

Recently, I've been coming across many teachers' blogs. In them, I see numerous pictures of these teachers taken together with their students. On one hand, I am intrigued on reading what is written and seeing the pictures. On the other hand, I am disturbed. These teachers are mostly in their mid-twenties.

It all started at the beginning of the year, where my classmates and I shared our contract teaching experiences with one another. Most of them mentioned that they stayed on because they love being around children. They still keep in contact with their students via MSN, SMS or even having outings with them. When I heard this from one my classmates, I thought it was an exception. But after all of them shared, I realised it was a norm. At that moment, I thought I was a complete failure. During my contract teaching experience, I don't think I built much rapport with my students. When I announced that it was the last day with them, none of them showed any reaction. There was no further probing, no goodbye, and definitely, no asking for handphone number, email or MSN contact.

Shouldn't a teacher and her student keep a certain distance? There's all this talk about building rapport with students and winning their trust over. But to what extent should this rapport building go to? I get uncomfortable with the thought of being so over-friendly with my students. I always feel that if we become on par with the students, that is becoming friends with them, the students would take advantage of the situation and climb above our heads. This notion came about from my contract teaching experience. It's impossible to strike a balance between being friendly to the class and getting them to learn. I would rather be Miss Unpopular but achieve my objective of making them learn something at the end of the lesson.

There's nothing wrong with taking photographs with students. But I feel that splattering them on one's(teacher's) blog seems rather inappropriate. Did the teachers get the students' permission before doing so? I understand that most students would love to have their faces put up for the whole world to see. But there definitely would be exceptions. After all, not everyone owns a pretty face. If I were a student, I definitely would not want my picture up on my teacher's blog.

Moving on to the point about frequently MSNing/SMSing/going out with students. Yes, it's true that through these, we can get to know and understand our students deeper. But seriously I really can't imagine myself doing those. It seems to make a mockery out of our profession. There's a limit to what we can do to help our students. I'm a firm believer that teachers should have a life of their own. Our lives should not just revolve around school and students. Otherwise, we will definitely suffer from a burnout. Building rapport with students is indeed important but it should be confined to the school premises. Anything other than that is an invasion of our personal space.

My Reflections..

2006-05-28T16:51:00.000-07:00

Finally, the end of the semester has arrived. After the past 2 hectic months which was filled with assignments, presentations, group work and micro-teaching, I finally can breathe and sleep in peace, without having to think of the next thing to submit or do. I wouldn't mind doing things that are useful to my future teaching. There are some modules and work which I find absolutely redundant. I hate doing things that waste my time and are of no worth. But well, since I'm paid, I just have to do so willingly. Just hope that they will take our feedback seriously and make some improvements to the course for the future batches. Anyway despite those redundant stuff, I generally learnt a lot of pedagogies for the the teaching of English Language and Mathematics.

There are still many things for me to learn to become a more effective teacher. Firstly, my mathematical content has diminished drastically. The Maths test that I sat for reinforced my suspicion, that I'm not as good as I thought. And my English? Well, all I can say is that I'm only proficient in one aspect: Grammar. I suck in other areas like reading, speaking, listening and vocabulary, which is basically everything that is covered in the English Language syllabus. Furthermore, I totally lack creativity. Don't expect to think of games or interesting lessons on my own. No wonder a couple of my ex-students complained that my lessons were boring then. I sincerely hope the money that I invested in those English Language books at Kinokuniya would prove useful.

Besides the lack of content knowledge, my character is proving a hindrance to my job too. I know some of my ex-students perceive me as cold. It takes a long time for me to warm up to my students and show any genuine concern for them. And even when I am truely concerned, I find it hard to express myself and show it outrightly. Maybe right now, it's because I do not have 100% passion in my job. Perhaps it will get better when the actual teaching begins.

4 more weeks before practicum. Although it's the holidays now, I think it's the best time for me to read up and plan ahead. A new friend has inspired me a great deal. She has brains and character. I'm always in awe of intelligent people because I'm hardly one myself. For a start, I really should pick up a something besides the newspapers to read. Just realised that this course requires minimum reading. No wonder I feel that I've become very shallow over the past few months.

Comeback Title..

2006-05-21T23:42:00.000-07:00

Martina Hingis captures her first title since her return from retirement.

I am elated.

At least there's something to cheer about after a rather demoralising week.

Hopefully everything ends on a high note.

Seeing Stars..

2006-05-15T01:23:00.000-07:00

What the hell. Just when I'm preparing to switch off my laptop, Nadal breaks back. Please lah, Rog. Watching live score for 4.5 hours is no joke. It's well past my bedtime. Can you please hang in there and see off Nadal asap? And why isn't ESPN showing the match live??

In other news, he finally opened his shell after 6 months. I wonder how much guts it took him to say those few lines, even though it's not face-to-face.

Can't wait for this week to fly by. I'll be officially free from assignments and presentations, not including one major test to round off this whole fruitful semester. After that it's tennis, hong kong drama serials, reading, enjoying life before the do-or-die practicum starts.

After leading in the tie-break and giving away 2 match points, Rog blew it yet again. Get lost, Nadal. I hate you.

First Time..

2006-05-05T23:20:00.000-07:00

1) ... going to ROM
2) ... having a friend who's getting married (married now)
3) ... giving ang bao
4) ... adopting the leave-it-till-last-minute to do assignments
5) ... realizing that there are more important things to do in life than work
6) ... realizing that I'm very immature
7) ... realizing that I'm addicted to window-shopping
8) ... realizing that driving is stressful (when I know I'll be late for school)
9) ... knowing people from all walks of life
10) ... that I get to vote during the Elections (how exciting)

Female Friends..

2006-05-01T19:05:00.000-07:00

Whenver I think I performed relatively well, the results always show otherwise. On the other hand, when I think I screwed up badly, the end result always prove to be the opposite. I am disappointed.

Whenever I write about something that I hope I would be able to attain, something always crops up and ruins everything. I think I shall refrain from writing my wish list from now on. I am superstitious.

After 3 months of schooling, I finally found someone who is similar to me. We share almost the same interests, we use the same brand of pen, we prefer Mathematics to English Language, we stay in the East, our names are almost similar and we come from the same primary school. As a result of our primary school education which focuses largely on discipline and drill-and-practice, we become uncreative people and we absolutely loathe group work. Both of us are also insensitive to the feelings of others and can be sarcastic at times. Another similar trait is that we do not worry over things that are not within our control. (Not sure why, but I absolutely cannot understand why females are always worrying about the most insignificant and uncontrollabe matters.) We also find it hard to empathize with people who are plagued with troubles. Furthermore, we are very particular about grammar, always picking up people's mistakes when they use horrible grammar, be it in speech or writing. We both prefer to have fun, but we are dead serious when it comes to work. Oh, and the most coincidental of all, we are both Sagittarius!

It's quite impossible to be good friends with everyone. A particular friend commented that I seem to be very picky when choosing friends. I'm generally friendly to everyone but I do not feel at ease in forming a genuine friendship with females who are not similar as me. I basically just want to have fun when I'm with my female friends. Having the same background helps a lot. Moreover, if we do not share the same interests, it's virtually impossible to enjoy one another's company.

Now I finally understand why I have so few female friends.

Last Session..

2006-04-26T00:07:00.000-07:00

It's amazing what five sessions with the kids can bring about. Yes, I'm glad that the actual teaching sessions are over. I can't believe it but I actually miss the kids already. I'll never forget the way Ah Xue, the defiant girl, walking out of the backdoor, turning back, winking, smiling, waving and saying goodbye to me. I'll also treasure the dinosaur picture that one of the male students drew for me.

The proudest moments for me during the whole five sessions are the way I handled the roudy boys under my charge and getting Ah Xue to do her work in class. I'm surprised that Ah Xue even bothered turning up since she didn't seem interested to participate in any of the activities in class. Not sure why but I seem to have an affinity with Ah Xue. Despite chiding her repeatedly during the first session, she actually listened and did what I instructed her to do for the subsequent lessons. When being asked by my other friends to complete the task, she would refuse to do the work, prefering to sleep or walk around the class.

For the first time since I started teaching, I actually gained job satisfaction. What an irony. I had plenty of job dissatisfaction during the 4 months of contract teaching. I wonder whether the reason is the change in my mindset or the kind of students that I teach. Maybe it's a combination of both after all.

Sore Loser..

2006-04-24T00:33:00.000-07:00

Stayed up to watch livescore of Rog's final against Nadal.

No such luck.

Rog still lost.

Rog can't seem to get the better of Nadal.

The French Open crown looks like a distant dream now.

I hate Nadal.

I'm a sore loser.

Wasted my time.

Looking like a panda now.

Only consolation is that I got the body of my lesson plan done.

Hungry, exhausted and extremely pissed now.

Broken EngRish..

2006-04-18T17:30:00.000-07:00

My frequent source of entertainment used to be monthly emails circulated by this particular friend of mine. Not sure why but his emails suddenly came to a halt. I suspect my email address was deleted off his mailing list due to reasons that I do not know. Maybe I pissed him off so much with my rather frank comments and perhaps indifferent attitude towards him. Or maybe he knows I'm mocking at his English. Come to think of it, I haven't heard from him for months. Not that it bothers me much. I'm just slighly upset that that I've lost one source of entertainment.

I'm just super put off with guys that write/type in rotten English. Not expecting them to use Queen's English lah. After all, it's just an informal email. A bit of Singlish here and there is also ok lah. But I just can't stand it when they spell simple words wrongly repeatedly, write totally gramatically incorrect sentences and sentences that I can't make out head or tail. Despite that, these emails are a real source of amusement to read when I'm feeling bored.

I have a fresh source of entertaining emails now. I felt really bad regarding one of the paragraphs that was written about me. I think I'm very mean. Oh well, no one is perfect and I never admitted to be a saint. I can be quite hard-hearted at times.

Ok, procrastinating too much already. Back to work.

Bloody Cat..

2006-04-13T18:03:00.000-07:00

I was in for a rude shock a couple of hours ago. I was greeted by my neighbour's bloody cat which almost pounced onto me the moment I stepped into MY house. The bloody cat has been entering in and out of my house more than a couple of times. I forgave it and it's owner when it was loitering in my garden. But there's no way I can tolerate a bloody cat strolling into my house, climbing up the stairs and entering our rooms. God knows what it does after that.

I'm absolutely freaked out. Not because the bloody cat scared the wits out of me but more due to hygiene reasons. That bloody cat's frequent hideout is the filthy drains. God knows what infectious diseases or germs it's carrying with it. The bloody cat has been walking into my garden countless of time. I can bear with that. But there's absolutely no way I can tolerate the following: Bolding strolling into my house when I'm reading the newspapers (that bloody cat obviously underestimated my detective powers), climbing onto my mango tree and then jumping onto the top of my car (haven't checked if there are any claw marks left on my car), walking into my brother's room and then lying itself comfortably at the balcony and lastly, hiding at the stairs and trying to pounce onto me.

Just now's incident was the last straw. I walked over to the opposite house and rang the doorbell. The only person at home was the old grandfather. Trying to keep my temper in check, I told him nicely in Mandarin to either tie his bloody cat or watch it properly. I explained to him that his bloody cat has been walking in and out of my house. That old man responded by giving my hand gestures, basically telling me to just shoo the cat. Hello. You think I'm at home 24hours a day to check if your bloody cat has strolled into my house. Anyway, again controlling my temper, I told him that it's alright if his bloody cat just loiters in my garden. But I cannot take the fact that the bloody cat walks in and out of MY house and almost giving me a heart attack. After a while, I figured out that it's pointless telling him too much because I suspect he didn't really understand me. I ended off with telling him to look after his bloody cat. I think I even said "thank you" before leaving. Just didn't want to make things awkward as we are neighbours after all. But I just felt I had to tell them how I felt as it's unfair that I've to suffer in silence just because of their bloody cat.

Anyway I doubt that that family will take any action to prevent their bloddy cat from loitering into other people's houses. After all, that family has been notorious for being barbaric and inconsiderate. They wouldn't care less if their bloody cat causes inconvenience to others. I think I'll heed Duckass' advice: get the 'cat' power and sprinkle it onto the driveway. I dare that bloody cat to step into the boundaries of my territory ever again.

I LOATHE cats.

Normal Technical..

2006-04-05T12:28:00.000-07:00

A few gestures by a couple of students made my day yesterday.

My friends and I are allocated to conduct an English enrichment course to a lower secondary normal technical (NT) class. I was initially quite worried as I've never had any encounter with N(T) kids. The first two lessons with them confirmed my stereotyping of them. Restless, hyperactive, not paying attention in class, talkative etc. The students were just not listening when we were teaching. They were also constantly breaking rules. As usual, the fault lie in the student.

But after the second lesson, it suddenly dawned on me that it ain't their fault. Being an observer in class, I finally understood why they were behaving this way. They were just not engaged in the activities we designed for them. In plain English, our lessons were boring. Our lessons would have worked quite well for the Express stream, but certainly not for N(T) class.

After the third session yesterday, I finally found the root of the problem. I was in charge of this 'cannot-sit-still and constantly speaking Mandarin' group of rowdy boys. I was initially in-charge of a group of guai girls, with the exception of one who's just a bit more defiant. Being Miss Nice, I swapped with my friend because she just couldn't tahan them anymmore. Anyway, the group of boys kept having loud private converstaions in Mandarin even when one of my friends was teaching. So as usual, I attributed the fault to them. Since the rest of the class could keep quiet, why couldn't they?

During the group activity, when I was helping the boys, the defiant girl shouted "Not fair one cher, you help them, never help us. You suppose to be here. I don't want to do already lah!" I explained to her that I had swapped with another teacher. I would no longer be in-charge of them. She looked a bit disappointed. (I had initially expected her to be pleased because I had constantly picked on her in the previous lesson.) The boys were quite pleased that their initial teacher was no longer with them. They said during their private conversations that their teacher never listened to them. Anyway, during the group activity, the boys were just not engaged in the activity. Pissed off, I told them, "Ok, no more private conversations." One boy retorted back, "Teacher jiang3 niao3 hua4." The rest of them started bursting into laughter. I found it quite funny but of course being a professional, I had to control my laughter and instead act annoyed. I stared at his eyes and told him "I'm not amused." "Huh?" was his response. (Probably doesn't know the meaning of 'amused') I said sternly, "If I hear that one more time, I'm going to take action against you." He got quite frightened and said "ok ok". Putting the incident behind, I told them to proceed with their work. Instead, I got this response in Mandarin "Cher, don't know what to do lah."

After explaining to them, they were still unsure. It then struck me that the instructions we gave them were too complex and perhaps we spoke too quickly. If a group of 5 couldn't understand when they were given individual attention, what more a class of 40? After glancing across the class, my suspicions were confirmed. The students looked lost and each of us had to repeat the instructions to each group. After working with them, I realised that their command of English language is really weak. All along, I thought they intentionally spoke Mandarin to irritate us. When I got them to read a short paragraph, they couldn't even do so. It then occured to me that they seriously needed help. So I explained to them and helped them along in their activity. I didn't have a chair then and I was practically squatting. Upon hearing that I said "I'll help you all", the boy who said that I jiang3 niao3 hua4 immediately grabbed a chair and told me to sit down. I was very touched and I started laughing. I've never seen a student so enthusiastic when I said I will be offering help.

Anyway, I had an enjoyable time teaching this group. Whenver I taught something, they will confirm in Mandarin with me what I just said. After a while, I just allowed them. At least they know what they are learning now. It's a vast improvement from before, when they didn't even know what they were doing. And I absolutely loved the way they volunteered their answers. With my help, they were more confident of their answers. Hence, they were motivated to raise up their hands and gain points also because theirs was the lowest in the class. By the end of the day, they managed to overtake another group. Boy were they happy about it! It also meant that for the first time, they need not rearrangement the furniture back to the orignial position. The lowest scoring group of the day had to do it.

I really empathize with these kids. With such a weak command of English language, the objective of teaching English to them is to make sure that they know how to communicate with the outside world, or rather in supermarkets, banks etc. Another is to teach them to understand what people are saying in English. Giving them comprehension passages and endless of tests would not help them in their oral communication and listening skills. For NT kids, a total different approach of teaching is needed to entice them to learn. But for a start, I think my group and I need to work on giving clearer instructions.

My views on N(T) kids are very different now. Despite being a little hyperactive, they are generally more appreciative of the teacher's help. They are also a very helpful bunch. When I was having difficulty sticking something on the board, one boy just came up to me and magically took out scotch tape from his pocket and helped me to stick without even asking. I was really grateful for that.

Now I finally understand why a couple of my friends prefer teaching N(T) kids.

Inspector Guardian..

2006-03-18T18:43:00.000-08:00

Doing online tests regarding personality is my current favourite pastime because it gives my brain a well-deserved break. Of late, I've been doing so much thinking that I'm mentally exhausted. This makes me ponder whether I've been using my brain cells for the past 23 years.

Took a test and the result is that I'm an ISTJ type. (Incidentally, the initials of my name are found in there.)

Strength of Preferences:
Introverted - 89%
Sensing - 38%
Thinking - 75%
Judging - 89%

Below is a description of an ISTJ -

"ISTJs are often called inspectors. They have a keen sense of right and wrong, especially in their area of interest and/or responsibility. They are noted for devotion to duty. Punctuality is a watchword of the ISTJ. The secretary, clerk, or business(wo)man by whom others set their clocks is likely to be an ISTJ.

As do other Introverted Thinkers, ISTJs often give the initial impression of being aloof and perhaps somewhat cold. Effusive expression of emotional warmth is not something that ISTJs do without considerable energy loss.

ISTJs are most at home with "just the facts, Ma'am." They seem to perform at highest efficiency when employing a step-by-step approach. Once a new procedure has proven itself (i.e., has been shown "to work,") the ISTJ can be depended upon to carry it through, even at the expense of their own health.

ISTJs are easily frustrated by the inconsistencies of others, especially when the second parties don't keep their commitments. But they usually keep their feelings to themselves unless they are asked. And when asked, they don't mince words. Truth wins out over tact. The grim determination of the ISTJ vindicates itself in officiation of sports events, judiciary functions, or an other situation which requires making tough calls and sticking to them."

Source: http://typelogic.com/istj.html

Another description -

"Inspector Guardians look carefully and thoroughly at the people and institutions around them. Making up perhaps as much as ten percent of the general population, Inspectors are characterized by decisiveness in practical affairs, are the guardians of institutions, and if only one adjective could be selected, “superdependable” would best describe them. Whether at home or at work, Inspectors are nothing if not dependable, particularly when it comes to examining the people and products they are responsible for—quietly seeing to it that uniform quality is maintained, and that those around them uphold certain standards of attitude and conduct.

Their thoroughness and orderliness, combined with their interest in legality and standardization, leads Inspectors to a number of occupations that call for the careful administration of goods and services. Inspectors feel right at home with difficult, detailed forms and columns of figures, and thus they make excellent bank examiners, auditors, accountants, and tax attorneys. Managing investments in securities is likely to interest this type, particularly investments in municipal bonds and blue-chip securities. Inspectors are not likely to take chances either with their own or others’ money, and the thought of a bankrupt nation, state, institution, or family gives them more than a little uneasiness. The idea of dishonoring a contract also bothers an Inspector —their word is their bond—and they naturally communicate a message of trustworthiness and stability, which can make them successful in business. With their eye for detail, Inspectors make good business men and women, librarians, dentists, optometrists, legal secretaries, and law researchers. High school and college teachers of business administration, home economics, physical education, civics, and history tend to be Inspectors, as do quartermaster officers in the military."

Source: http://keirsey.com/personality/sjit.html

Couldn't have been more accurate about my personality.

Character Traits..

2006-03-14T19:08:00.000-08:00

My interpersonal intelligence is as good as negligible.

I don't see the necessity to initiate conversations with people to break the ice.

I can't effectively translate my ideas and thoughts into speech.

I prefer working alone than working in groups.

Sometime I can't help but wonder if I'm chosen the right profession.

Feeling mentally and physically drained right now.

Travel Fair..

2006-03-10T19:12:00.000-08:00

Being overwhelmed with work. I intend to finish as much as possible this weekend. Someone interpreted all these as me being too stressed out. I'm not. I just hate the feeling of having so many incomplete assignments. I can't enjoy myself thoroughly if I have so much going on at the back of my mind. As usual, I'm more worried about group assignments than individual ones. Certain things don't seem to be working well for the former. Not sure if it's generation gap or some internal conflict/misunderstanding between my other two group members. I can feel the tension when we are seated together. I hope all these will be resolved as soon as possible. It's a bit worrying that we don't seem to be heading anywhere with our discussions. Sigh.

The NATAS travel fair will be held in two weeks time. I can't wait! I just love collecting itineraries from different reputable companies, comparing their prices, itineraries and departure dates. Still awaiting news from my travel companion regarding her availability in June. I really wish to get out of the country in June before my practicum. Not trying to sound snobbish but I don't wish to travel within Southeast Asia or developing countries this time round. My idea of a holiday is to see beautiful scenery, breathe in fresh air, enjoy the cooling weather, eat good food, sleep in comfortable beds, snap a few photos here and there, and of course a bit of shopping. Basically, I want to enjoy myself. If I've to go to anywhere worse than my current living conditions, than I'll rather just stay at home. Why pay to suffer or see depressing sights? And I really can't understand why people will fork out money to experience something that can be found in Singapore.

I'm thankful that certain modules are ending. Looking forward to a more relaxed timetable. Whoever said that the teaching training course was honeymoon period should eat their words. However, although it ain't honeymoon, it's actually not that unbearable. It can't be that bad if I can still afford to blog and procrastinate.

Miss Nice..

2006-03-01T12:12:00.000-08:00

I can't stand myself for being so bloody soft-hearted. I hate being Miss Nice but I don't know how to reject others without hurting their feelings. Some people just can't take 'No' as an answer. Wonder what in the world is wrong with them. Their persistence just leaves me vexed and highly irritated. I'm in no mood to entertain people these days. I find socialising a chore especially when I've one thousand and one things to do between now and early May. Not sure why some people can be so freaking thick-skinned even though I made it clear that I've no time for their nonsense. They say it's up to me to manage my time. That's true. But sorry, even then, they are certainly not high up there on my priority list. Time is very precious to me now. Being overwhelmed with work now. Why can't they be more freaking understanding and leave me alone for the time being.

Too Fast..

2006-02-26T19:20:00.000-08:00

I dislike rushing into things. Under normal circumstances I wouldn't accept to meet up with someone I hardly know. But the person is someone of relation which is why I find it hard to turn him down. I don't want to be labelled as 'rude'. This would not only reflect badly on me and my family, it would also make things extremely awkward in future. Hence, under those circumstances, I gladly accepted to meet up.

It was a little uneasy at the beginning. After a while, things weren't so bad. But as usual, the topics revolved the same old matters. I didn't like the part where he described his Final Year Project. Maybe I shouldn't have pretended to sound interested in the first place. As a sign of courtesy that I was listening attentively to each and every word of his, I kept nodding my head. Hiaz, common sense should have told him: would an Econs grad really be so fascinated with electronics, programming and such?

The only consolation was that we had some common interests, which kept the conversation flowing. That was also the prime reason why I agreed to meet him. But things didn't turn out as fairy-tale like as I expected. On the whole, he behaves, speaks and looks like a typical engineer. I should have known that in advance from the way we corresponded. Oh well, as usual, pinning too high hopes will only lead to disappointment.

Why Teach..

2006-02-24T23:42:00.000-08:00

Why teach? The first and most asked question I get when I tell people my occupation. Neh, my answer doesn't go "I have a passion for teaching" or "I love kids" or "I get a sense of satisfaction when I see a kid change or improve" or "I was inspired by Teacher X". The above are model answers that one gives during the interview with a certain organization. But of course, even though I don't tell people that, it doesn't mean there isn't a tinge of truth in those answers.

Have been getting calls from unknown insurance agents and bankers regarding financial planning. Upon knowing that I'm a trainee teacher, their first question, "You love teachiing?" Being a person who doesn't know how to lie, my instinct answer is "Not really." I would either be greeted by an awkward silence or a cynical laugh.

What's wrong with that answer? Teaching has never been a childhood dream of mine, so 'love' would be too strong a word to use. Not loving teaching doesn't imply hating it. How in the world does one know whether one loves to teach when one has hardly taught a class of 40? Giving tuition is entirely different from teaching in a school. Giving tuition is simply giving attention to one child with the main aim of covering the syllabus and teaching the child tips to be exam smart. In a school, teaching is about providing holistic education to each and every student under your care, being a counsellor, being a friend, preparing lessons, doing administrative work etc. There's a vast difference being a tutor and a teacher.

Next about loving children. Generally, that's true but there are always exceptions. Lower secondary, especially the secondary ones, are on the whole still adorable and harmless. But from secondary two onwards, the kids go through puberty stage and start getting defiant, rebellious and having a mind of their own. These kids grow up to become teenagers. Of course I'm not saying every kid starts growing into a 'monster'. Most are still angels who would not cause any kind of trouble for the teacher. Let's just say I love kids, but I don't love teenagers. I don't dislike them either. I am basically neutral towards them.

After 2 months of being a trainee teacher, I've learnt much about the current education system. There's a move away from the traditional teacher-centred learning towards a more student-centred learning. Rote-learning, along with drilling, is strongly discouraged. Also, more emphasis is placed on problem based learning, with the focus on collaboration with other peers, higher-order thinking and independent learning. Sounds like an advertisement for SMU? There's also a whole bunch of theories regarding students' learning, thinking and development.

The above are what we are learning on paper. In reality, which is in the schools, is there really a shift in the way students are being educated? I doubt so. From my contract teaching, I can still see that finishing the syllabus and scoring high marks are still the main priority. This is especially for upper secondary, where there are hardly any project works. The mode of teaching is still the same: White board, transparencies and markers. With students who are academically weak, projects definitely won't help them learn concepts faster. Yes, it may help them better prepare themselves when they enter the workforce. But let's be realistic here. Paper qualifications are still essential in this nation. You are not going to get a high starting salary job with lousy qualifications. Student-centred learning will only work well with more intrinsically motivated and academically stronger students. Armed with the basic concepts, they will be able to explore the projects further. Academically weaker students may be able to enjoy the project and learn from it with proper scaffolding from teachers. However, this means that the projects would most probably have to be done in class, which ultimately translates to less time left to finish the syllabus and eventually, not being able to prepare the students well for examinations.

The Ministry has made changes and reduced the syllabus considerably. But from what I witness in schools and hear from current teachers, it seems that there's still not enough time to cover the syllabus. Even if the teacher has covered the entire syllabus, it doesn't mean that students have understood everything.

I'm not sure why but I seem to be very sceptical about every new proposal that is being implemented or whether a certain theory will work in reality. A tutor assured us that it's normal to have such thoughts regarding the latter. It goes to show that we are thinking. I greatly need this assurance from her. As for being a cynic, at least it isn't as bad as previously before I entered this training course. My tutors and peers have managed to convinced me a little about some new implementations to the education system. However, whether I'll be fully convinced will only be known when I become a full-fledged teacher.

Unmotivated Kid..

2006-02-20T12:57:00.000-08:00

Upon hearing his 'O' level results, I was stunned. Not so much for his L1R5 (kind of expected), but rather his Elementary Maths grade. 5 months ago, I was just telling my students that it was nearly impossible to flunk E.Maths. Now, here I was, being proven wrong by a cousin of mine. He owns the 'honour' of breaking the impeccable record set by all his elder cousins: scoring an L1R5 of less than 20 and entering JC/Poly.

I wasn't sure how he would react upon getting such atrocious results. Thinking back, I realised that he probably expected it. When he told us a year ago that he expected to go through the ITE-Poly route, I thought he was joking. But now, I know he's not. He ain't stupid, just plain lazy with no focus in his life, preferring to spend his whole life in front of the computer screen playing some senseless game and talking to the virtual world while killing demons.

In my next few years, I would probably be facing teens like him. Unmotivated, aimless, complacent are the few traits prevalent in these kids. Of course there are kids who have really tried their best. But there are a handful like my cousin, who have not even attempted to maximize their ability. Despite having tuition and parents nagging at him, he prefers to shun away from reality and coop himself up in his room, hiding behind the computer screen. I've never heard of anyone who hasn't woken up even when the tutor has arrived at his doorstep. And being complacent is what I can't tolerate. His favourite line: "I passed without studying!" People with low expectations are truly a headache for teachers. He still has the cheek to say that expectations are the roots of all headache. What kind of expectation was he having? If he was a Normal Technical student, I would have told him that wanting to enter ITE was realistic. An Express stream aiming to go ITE? You don't have to aim to go there. Anyone who doesn't study would end up there by default.

After seeing and speaking to my cousin for the first time after the release of the results, I'm not sure he has changed for the better. He confidently told me that it's quite easy to get into Poly from ITE. After all, most of the people in ITE are from Normal Technical and Normal Academic streams while he is from the Express stream. His attitude seriously needs checking if he wants to fulfill his dream. I wish him all the luck that he needs.

No Romance..

2006-02-13T19:15:00.000-08:00

A few of my same aged female friends are getting engaged. I can't help but ponder if it is too early to do so. Perhaps age is not a good measure to justify so. The level of maturity, one's experiences through life and how much one really knows about one's partner would be more appropriate. I'm feeling a bit left behind as week by week, I seem to be knowing of more and more people my age scouting for HDB flats with their potential spouse.

In Singapore, the best way that males indirectly propose is to ask "Shall we apply for a HDB flat?" or something along that line. Is romance really dead in Singapore that our males have to resort to this most practical but sincere way of proposing in their humble opinion? When a new friend of mine broke the news that she was getting engaged, the first question that me and another friend simultaneously asked was how her boyfriend proposed to her. She seemed a bit stunned by our question. Her answer was that he didn't propose. It was just a natural development for both of them as they have a already reached a mutual understanding. For her, it didn't matter that there was no fanciful proposal. How her guy treated her was the most important.

No offence to people who belong to that category, but I simply can't imagine myself getting married without a proper marriage proposal. Asking me to apply a HDB flat to meet some ridiculous deadline seems to be that we are rushing to get married just for that dream HDB flat. Call me immature or maybe I've been watching too many hong kong drama serials, somehow there seems to be a lack of sincerity in there. To me, a proposal should be a beautiful end to the dating process/singlehood status and a new start to the next stage of our lives - marriage.

Read from The Straits Times that SDU actually came up with a guide of social graciousness for males. In it, it actually states that bad breath is a big turnoff. It is indeed amusing that a guide like this actually existed. Some of these facts are so common sense. Are the males here really lacking in social graciousness? Sadly, my friends and I all agree so. Literally slamming doors into our faces, pretending to be digging for their wallets when the bill comes, not even a single 'thank you' when we drive them to their doorstep (yes, girls sending guys back), rushing into his house as he was afraid of getting wet by the the pouring rain without bothering to guide us in reversing as his house was at a dead-end street, walking by himself without even bothering if the girl is next to him etc. How do guys expect females to get any sense of security from them if any of these are being portrayed? Alright, it's a bit unfair to say that all Singaporean males behave like that. All I want to point out is that females generally want to feel protected and well-taken care of. If a guy can't even provide a female the basic needs or display proper mannerism in public on the first date, what more about the future? Therefore, never under-estimate the importance of first impressions.

Tomorrow would be 14th of February. Here's wishing all couples not only a wonderful Happy Valentine's Day, but more importantly, hopefully the other half that you spend this day with would be the significant one accompanying you for the rest of you life. As for all singles out there, fret now. Console yourself that you are still in the process of choosing for your Mr/Miss Right :)

Home Visit..

2006-02-10T16:00:00.000-08:00

I'm getting exasperated. Is it so hard to come straight to the point instead of beating around the bush? I hate things which are leading no where. I dislike converstations which are left hanging in the air. Anyway, I've given up on that particular person. Perhaps that person is just not fully cognitively developed yet.

Visited a Home yesterday. This particular home was set up to help troubled youths, especially teenage girls with complex family backgrounds. It was a humbling experience at least for me. The 20 of us were brought around the home to look at the living conditions and the facilities that were available. Ironically, this particular home was once a hostel stayed by many scholars and foreign students from my secondary school. In fact, one of my 'idols' and another classmate used to stay there. Anyway, as a form of respect to the girls in the home, we didn't intrude into their rooms. If we did so, it would be a classic example of the term 'zoofication', which by the way is a geographical concept.

Finally see some light and usefulness in what I'm learning in school now. But I'm still procrastinating too much and have totally no urgency in school-related work. It doesn't help that my modules are non-examinable. Another reason could be that I've already learnt some of the stuff that I'm currently touching on. I'm glad I took life span development and english in NUS. At least I don't have so much reading up to do compared to my other peers. And more importantly, I don't feel like a lost sheep in class because my tutor doesn't spoon-feed us.

My slack life is coming to an end pretty soon. My full time-table will set-in once the one week break is over. Sigh. Better enjoy all I can now before I get overwhelmed with assignments and lessons. One good news though. The July intake (approximately 1000 students) will be going for their practicum soon. This implies that I'm almost guaranteed of a free parking lot regardless of what time my lesson starts once they are gone. No longer need to go earlier to 'chop' for a free lot or pay $3 at the pay car park. Not sure why can't they make all the car parks free. After all, besides staff and students of NTU/NIE, who in the right mind would want to come to such an 'ulu' place to park?

Some Thoughts..

2006-02-05T18:34:00.000-08:00

For a moment, I thought the heaven gods were rather unkind. Fortunately, the skies cleared when the time arrived.

The weather was perfect. The ambience was good. The food was heavenly. The time spent together was precious. However, the ugly scenerio could have been avoided had they been more accustomed to such situations occuring.

I'm not sure why they always have so many lame excuses and strict rigidities being imposed upon but somehow I wish we could have embarked on such outings more often. Perhaps it's not too late to rectify this.

In Tokyo..

2006-02-03T16:30:00.000-08:00

Martina Hingis in Action

Victorious Hingis

Hingis, Sharapova, Sugiyama at Press Conference

Dog Year..

2006-01-30T23:59:00.000-08:00

I couldn't have asked for a better start to the lunar new year. Victories for both my idols, Martina Hingis and Roger Federer, on the first day of the Dog year. It was really a great day for Switzerland indeed.

This year's final was a bit different from the previous Grand Slam Finals which Rog featured in. For his past 6 grand slam victories, I've been watching alone, sitting on my 'lucky' seat of the sofa. I couldn't do so this year because this year's final fell on the first evening of the lunar new year, which meant that all my relatives would be here. Fortunately, one of my cousins, an uncle and an aunt are ardent supporters of Rog. The rest are pretty neutral. However, I was afraid that their presence would affect the 'fengshui' which would in turn cause bad luck for Rog. It certainly did for the first 1 and 3/4 sets. Rog's luck only took an acute change when we all changed seats.

Everyone felt that Rog's victory was all but expected. Therefore, it was a bit shocking to see the great man being so emotional when he broke down and was at a loss of words. Poor Rog. The weight of expectation put on him by the public and himself was too great even for Mr Cool. Having to hide his emotions during the match was really a great strain on him.

Anyway, this year's CNY is quite significant compared to the previous years. It has been a while since all my cousins are present during the CNY. One of them had been away to UK for a couple of years while the other was doing his undergraduate studies in UK for 3 years before heading to the US for his masters in the 4th year. My brother himself was away 2 years back when he went for exchange in Canada. Although we've drifted apart all these years and that I hardly exchange a word or two to the elder cousins, it just feels good to see everyone back in Singapore. Another significant matter is that all of us have started working, with the exception of the 2 youngest ones and the male cousin who's of the same age as me. You can't help but marvel that time has really flown. It seems not too long ago that we were all kids playing monopoly or badminton together. Now, we've all grown up to be adults. The only thing missing is that none of us are married yet. I think it would be quite a while before wedding bells are heard in this family. None of the elder cousins seems to be interested in getting married.

After seeing my male cousins, I can't help but wonder why the Singaporean males that I've come into contact with are nowhere near any resemblance of my male cousins. I'm not only speaking in terms of looks and physique, but also family background, character, intelligence, sense of humour, social etiquette, values, hobbies and exposure to the outside world. Perhaps all these traits that I'm looking for are only present in my family. I know I'm being thick-skinned here but I guess genes play a very important role :)

She's Back..

2006-01-26T11:55:00.000-08:00

The lack of entries is due to a lack of happenings revolving around me. My life has practically come to a standstill for a fortnight because of the Australian Open.

The return of Swiss Miss, Martina Hingis, brings about a fresh lease of life in the woman's game which is largely dominated by the power game. After retiring at the 'grand' age of 22, Swiss Miss decided that she missed the game too much and hence made her comeback. The fairy-tale return lasted for 10 days which saw her knocking off a seeded player and 3 top 100 players, before succumbing to the number 2 seed Kim Clistjers. For a set and a half against Clistjers, it looked as though she was totally blown off the court and the decision to comeback was a wrong move. One can't help but feel sorry for her then. But with her vast experience and the massive support of the crowd, Hingis reeled off the next 6 games to take the match to a 3rd set. It could have been 7 games in a row had it not been for a bad call that went against her. The Swiss Miss of the past would have complained vehemently about it but the more matured Swiss Miss took it in stride and before going on to lose the all important first game of the final set and subsequently, the match.

Hingis can hold her head high despite the defeat. Being a great thinker on the court, her ability to mix up her shots and outwit her opponents would stand her a chance to win a Grand Slam tournament. However, she still has much work to do to be a more accomplished player. Since her return, her service, especially her second serve, has been the focus of attention. Serving at the range of 110-115km/h for her second serve would be a gift for her opponents. Whatever it is, it's a great to see her back. Her goofy smile and cheekiness on and off the court were sorely missed. Her comeback means a diversification of attention away from Rog. Haha.

Life is good so far. Three day week and getting paid. Mundane life but I like it ironically because of the seemingly lack of a life. A recent spate of events led me to find a Mr Helpful whom I'm grateful to. I've come to see the good side of people instead of focusing on the negative traits. After looking at the people around me, I've also realised that the family plays a very crucial role in the development of a human being. This has never occured to me because I've always been mixing with people who are similar to me. The way one is brought up really shapes a person's outlook of life, character and social etiquette. Whenever I'm with someone who's lacking in any of these, I can't help but think that he/she would have been a different person had he/she been brought up in a more family-oriented environment. Having intelligence is just not enough to be a complete person. Other aspects are equally important.

Second Week..

2006-01-14T18:36:00.000-08:00

Two weeks of school so far. Two months of slack timetable. Still not in the mood of studying. Still sticking to the old and stubborn thought that I'll learn much better outside. I'm sick of theories, theories and yet again theories. I'm tired of ice-breaking sessions and orientations. I'm dreading all the upcoming assignments and projects. I'm not exactly enthusiastic about what my tutor has proposed for my group for a community involvement project. I can't imagine myself embarking on a community service which would help save a non-human organization. I would rather aid our fellow human beings or perhaps Singaporeans, which would definitely be more meaningful. I always believe in the saying: charity starts at home. If we can't even save ourselves, don't try to be noble by saving others. My group has been so 'on' through the yahoo group that I've lost track of what's happening after not opening my gmail account for a couple of days.

Went back to NUS yesterday to watch this new local singer, Gong Shi Jia, who previously graduated from NUS. My obsession with her started when I found out that David Tao specially penned a song for her. I must admit her 'live' singing far exceeded my expectations. Here's a big thank you to the person who invited me to watch this concert, and of course, not forgetting the CD as well.

Anyway, the trip to NUS brought back nostalgic moments. Comparisons between my current institution and NUS inevitably surfaced. Even minor details such as the size of the parking lot or the general perception of the people in the canteen was not spared. I guess the grass is always greener on the other side. I find myself pinpointing ridiculous faults at my current institution though its definitely no fault of theirs. But anyway, I've always enjoyed my life in NUS. It was the best period of time throughout my education life-span. I love the freedom of being a student there. There was always a balance between studies and play there. Nobody breathed down our necks pleading us to study and lay down obvious expectations on us. In simplier words, the philosophy was, if you don't want to study, it's your own freaking problem. Be responsible for yourself.

In other news, my laptop is on the brink of death, which explains my lack of enthusiasm in doing any school work. Everything is reliant on technology now. Heck. I have tonnes of minute things of school -related stuff to do but I somehow end up doing non-important and other more interesting things. Now I finally understand why my students dislike school so much.

Schooling Again..

2006-01-06T16:49:00.000-08:00

I'm back to being a student once more after having graduated more than 6 months ago. I've lost the momentum of having to put myself through studying, rushing for assignments, downloading lecture notes, jotting down notes etc. I've grown accustomed to the life of going home knowing that I can relax till the next morning. Given a choice, I would rather go back to teaching in the secondary school where I taught in for the past 4 months. Having compared my time there with my other peers who were posted to other secondary schools, my life was probably paradise in comparison to theirs. To think that I actually complained so much back then. Haha.

I always feel that learning takes place best outside the classroom. There's only so much that books can teach you. Hence, it will be most optimum to learn while on-the-job. A pity we would be assessed the only time we actually experience teaching during this course. Based on feedback from my previous colleauges and lecturers, the course I'm currently undergoing is too theory based, with little hands-on approaches. This is especially so with regards to classroom management. The textbooks provide us with details on how to tackle the different kinds of students. But whether it works is another story. In the end, it all boils down to experimentation. No single method would work for one kind of student. There are obviously useful parts of the courses. The most relevant would be the teachings of the subjects itself and communication skills. A pity these modules would only begin in late February.

I love the drive to my current institution. It is the only highlight of the trip to the school during this whole week. I love the long bends and windy roads of the PIE. Perhaps its the thrill I attain from speeding down these curvy roads, which is in stark contrast to that of the long stretch of straights on the ECP that I drive through while going to NUS. The only nuisance is road hoggers. It take a great amount of skill and guts to overtake them due to the nature of the road. I wish they would check their rear-view mirrors more often to see the massive jam they are causing on the extreme right lane. The most guilty parties? Taxi drivers.

New Year..

2006-01-01T18:24:00.000-08:00

2005 had been a rather eventful and colourful year to me. I'll always remember 2005 as the year that marked the end of the studying era and also the beginning of being an employed worker. Besides that, I'm especially pleased with the new friendships formed and the old friendships renewed. Here's a breakdown of my 'achievements':

Academically: I've never ever been very academically-inclined. From young, Barbara has always labelled me as a 'slow learner', especially with any subject related to alphabets and words. So to have graduated with an Honours degree is quite an achievement in itself. If there was a value-added award tracking my results from JC to University, I won't be shy to admit that I utterly deserve the award.

Career-wise: I was initially in a state of confusion and frustration into deciding my career line. I only applied for teaching because the friends around me did so, or rather, just to have a taste of what the interview was like. I was initially elated that I was allocated to teach secondary English and Music. Through projects done in my 4 years of university, I've always been dismayed with the standard of written English Language of my peers. This was especially so in the 1st 2 years of university. Having had to read through lower secondary school standard of English made me want to vomit blood. It makes me wonder whether these people have been taught grammar, sentence structure and even spelling during their English lessons. It would indeed be a satisfying job to be able to raise the English standard of the future generations. Anyway, I was more glad to be given the opportunity to teach music. I thought it would be a breeze as it is afterall a non-examinable subject (not MEP). I'll probably just have to play some pop music on the piano and get the students to sing along. I was totally shattered after the music audition. I could only blame myself for being so shallow. Classical music still reigned after all in our education system. The matter was worsened as my music audition was delayed due to a clash with my school exam. By then, the vacancies in NIE were already filled up. I was only left with the option of contract teaching, with the teaching subjects of English and Mathematics. I could only lament the poor timing. But if I look on the positive side, at least I was still given a chance to teach. After not making through the audition, they could have just threw away my application and not bothered about me. So while most of my friends went directly to NIE, I was thrown straight into a secondary school to be an untrained teacher. As all of you would probably know, the initial stages were very difficult for me. I found it hard to adapt to the neighbourhood surroundings. All along, I've hardly come into contact with the mainstream, only mixing with similar people. Elitist would be the perfect word to describe me. But as time went by, I began to understand the kids better and got used to their style. I initially concentrated too much on their weaknesses, which totally blinded me from their strengths. If the students were represented by a piece of white paper smeered with patches of black dots, I only focused on the black dots even though the white areas were much larger. As an educator, this was a grave mistake. Anyway, I'm glad to have started off with contract teaching first even though it meant that I would lose out on some monetary gains compared to my other peers. It was indeed crucial for people like me to have a taste of what teaching neighbourhood school students would be like. Hopefully with this experience, I would be able to manage the students much better during my school experience and practicum.

Health (Sports and Games): Believe it or not, I only picked up tennis this year. The Federer racket that I bought was meant to be a lucky charm for Rog's matches. I must say that playing tennis was much easier than I expected. Perhaps the one decade of watching tennis aided a lot. Who needs a coach? Constant exposure to watching skilful players like Steffi Graf, Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi, Martina Hingis and of course Roger Federer would do. Besides tennis, I've also been hitting the gym.It takes a great effort to get started in exercising. Ironically, I only started doing so when I began teaching. I was desperate to do something to feel more energetic and recharged. Running on the treadmill keeps my mind afresh and improves my stamina which I greatly need in my job.

Friendship: As stated above and probably in previous entries, the new friendships formed in my honours year is probably the highlight of my undergraduate studies. My females friends aided me a great deal in my studies while my male friends and a few girl friends provided me with much entertainment and companionship (when playing tennis, mahjong, singing ktv, watching movies, eating, talking crap etc.). Hopefully our friendship would last as the years go by.

Romance: Did enjoy some blissful moments with certain people but no further attempt was taken on both parties to move on to the next stage. Perhaps there was but the hints dropped were not straightforward enough for me to understand. On the other hand, I played the devil by rejecting people. Irony in simple English: People whom you like don't like you but people whom you don't like like you.

I don't want to make any New Year Resolutions as I hardly ever achieve them. I just hope I would be able to manage my students more effectively. More importantly, I wish everyone good health. Afterall, health is wealth. Good health does not come in a vacuum. Alrights, this has been such a time-consuming entry to read. So get your butts out of that comfortable chair now and start exercising!

Merry Christmas..

2005-12-24T12:15:00.000-08:00

Impulse buying is a bad thing. Jay Chou's November's Chopin is a disappointment. Maybe it's my bias taste of songs but only track numbers 1,3,6 and 10 are worth listening to me. Heck, I can't even be bothered with the title of the songs. Can't make out what he's singing 3/4 of the time. I must admit that constant listening to these 4 songs causes me to suffer from depression though. This is no good at all. I'm sticking to the Best of David Tao Collection bought by Barbara from China. Costs a mere 15 RMB only. Haha. Shouldn't have wasted by hard-earned money on Jay's album. Or maybe I should have just bought the $9.90 CD. Can only blame myself for not being observant. $9 for the VCD is a bit too exorbitant. Haven't even touched it yet.

The crowd at Orchard/town area is crazy these past few days. I can't even squeeze into the MRT at times. Even if I do, I'll have to endure like packed sardines almost throughout the whole journey. With Christmas day looming, everyone seems to be rushing to do their last minute shopping for presents. I'm glad I'm not one of those people. My job gives me the priviledge of doing my Christmas shopping early. Buying presents when there's a storewide discount is not my cup of tea. Squeezing and jostling with the crowd, hoping that the object is in tip-top condition is not my idea of shopping. Despite the early shopping of gifts, I've only given out one present (not even a gift, just a treat) so far. Not that I bought many to begin with, haha.

In a totally unrelated news, I think I successfully embarrassed myself but surprisingly, I'm not bothered as I anticipated it all along. At least he proved to be a real gentleman though.

The act of waiting is really torturous. What was I expecting? Fairy tales do not exist in reality. In the end, it's just a wishful thinking on my part.

Home Alone..

2005-12-18T19:00:00.000-08:00

A pretty amusing scene happened while Mr Lim and I were at the airport pick-up area waiting for our parents. I received a call from Dad that they would be slighly delayed as one of their luggage was missing. So Mr Lim and I decided to wind down the windows and switch off the engine.

While waiting, I stuck my head out of the window hoping to catch them. Instead I saw this middle-age man with a polo T-shirt carrying a laptop bag walking out. After a while, I realised he was heading straight towards our car! My first reaction was to laugh to myself. He hurriedly opened the back car door and plunged himself onto the backseat of our car. I was getting hysterical at this point of time. I turned my head slightly and starting laughing at him. He was still oblivious of the situation until Mr Lim turned over and said to him, "Er, excuse me." It was then that he realised he got onto the wrong car. He gave a quick "Oops, sorry!", with that he hopped out of the car. I was laughing too hard to notice his facial expression. But I noticed him getting into a black Toyota Vios parked in front of our car. I guess the long flight must have caused his muddle-headedness; the inability to differentiate between black and blue, and a Vios and a Corolla.

I'm glad my parents are back. I've practically been the slave of the house for the past week, only going out one out of seven days to relax and unwind from the household chores. Despite that, things are not that bad actually. I feel like a housewife for the past week. A typical day goes like this: waking up early to prepare breakfast for my family members, putting the laundry into the washing machine, fetching brother to the MRT station, making my own breakfast, read newspapers, sweep the floor (I didn't know it takes so freaking long to sweep just one level), mop floor/wash toilet, take out the laundry for hanging, cook lunch (in the end, Granny was the one who did most of it), eat lunch, clean the kitchen, bathe, bring in the laundry, fold/iron the clothes, put the clothes into the respective wardrobes, REST and RELAX (watch 2 hours of korean drama), supposedly to cook dinner but I'm half-dead at this point of time so we'll end up buying dinner from outside, fetch brother from MRT station and then order takeaway, eat dinner, clean up table, wash the necessary dishes, throw garbage and FINALLY massive lockup of the house. Yes, I did all these 6 out of the 7 days that my parents were away. The initial days were tiring as being blessed with the luxury of having a maid, the pampared me hardly needed to lift a finger to do household chores. So having had to do the household chores is a real novelty to me. Funnily, I got a sense of accomplishment after cleaning up the house. I hate to admit this but it's the first time I've made a positive contribution to this family as I've practically been a good-for-nothing in this house.

Doing the household chores is not as difficult as I thought. It just seems to be a never ending job which would cause one to have aches all over if one does the job thoroughly. With that, I really salute all the maids and housewives out there. Even though its a brainless job, it's really a noble one. I'm beginning to appreciate my maid a lot now.

Oh yah, I didn't manage to accomplish what I aimed to achieve: cooking. Ironically, I mastered every household chore except that. I still have two more weeks to salvage that.

Dancing Show..

2005-12-16T23:58:00.000-08:00

Was watching the last episode of the 9pm show on channel 8. Some stupid dancing show starring Jeanette Aw, over-the-hill Hong Kong artistes and some dancers/actresses/actors/ang mohs roped in from China, Africa and god knows where. By the way, it's the first time I'm watching this crap show and by the first five minutes of the last episode, I could figure out what happened for the past 29 episodes. It's also the first time I'm watching a Mediacorp show in a decade. The last complete show that I watched was produced by TCS. The cast included Sean Say, Ivy Lee and her fellow Star Search finalists.

Anyway, since I didn't watch the past 29 episodes, I can't comment much about the script. The acting skills by the artistes were so terrible that it became amusing after a point of time. It also gave me goose pimples. I was practically laughing throughout the whole show until Mr Lim commented that he thought I was watching a comedy. Jeanette Aw's acting was a real disappointment. I finally understand why she can't rise up to the Ah-jie status. Based on her performance, I thought she just freshly graduated from acting school. Or rather, I thought she was a dancer and have had no previous acting experience. Her acting was so raw and expressionless. She displayed the wrong emotions at the incorrect moments. She was no different from a flower vase. As for the actors (I don't even know their names), I absolutely loathe it when they frequently inject a few phrases of English here and there. What in the world were they trying to do? Sound hip?

The lack of talent in the local scene is leading to the death of the entertainment industry. Since Fann Wong, I've yet to see someone in the media with the X-factor. Besides looks and style, what I'm more concerned is artistes with decent acting skills. Turning to Hong Kong stars, even those who often play supporting roles can act a thousand times better than our fellow Singaporeans. Perhaps Mediacorp should look into polishing up the acting skills of their entertainers. If they do not possess the natural talent to act, I'm sure some proper training would aid a great deal. And I wish Mediacorp can recruit some fresh faces. All the current new actresses look as if they are from the same clone. The typical Singaporean actress: petite, girl-next-door look, boney, looks mal-nourished. Mediacorp should start pulling up their socks or maybe do a major revamp. With shows of calibre like the dancing show, it's no wonder that everyone is now turning to Korean and Hong Kong dramas.

Old Women..

2005-12-12T23:22:00.000-08:00

Old women are a handful. You hear people complaining about difficult mother-in-laws or grandmothers, seldom do we hear people whinning about their father-in-laws or grandfathers.

Old women, especially those who are retired or have lots of time to spend, tend to be very meddlesome. This could be due to the inherent characteristic of women. However, I'll largely attribute to the fact that they have nothing better else to do in their lives. The older generation of women are more likely to be illiterate. They can't read or listen to the English Language. Perhaps they can understand some basic Mandarin but they are more proficient in dialect, which is not the main medium of mass communication here in Singapore. Therefore, they have no awareness of the world affairs or the happenings surrounding them. Their lives only revolve around the people in the house. Hence they like to scrutinize every action of each person in the house, command people what they should and should not do, make cynical remarks about people who do not listen to them, indulge in self-praise when they compare themselves with the current generation or with the maids and so on. At times, they can be such a earful that it really gets into one's nerves.

The ironic thing is that these old women do not know that they are extremely irritating. Reprimanding them would not work. They keep insisting on their point of view. The best method of dealing with these ever-complaining women is to treat their words as music. Never let their words affect you. Let the words enter one ear and exit the other ear immediately without registering them into your brain. The masterful act would be totally not hearing their ear-piercing words. To be able to perfect that would probably take at least a decade.

However if one slowly takes time to understand them, it is quite easy to comprehend their need to incessantly complain. Having been through heaps of sufferings and hardships such as World Wars or practically single-handedly bringing up their children in not so ideal living conditions while taking care of the household chores, they feel that they are vastly superior to the maids and their daughter-in-laws. Hence, they self-set a strict and high standard for their maids and daughter-in-laws to adhere to. When these ladies do not perform their tasks properly, be prepared to let the scoldings and complaints begin.

Another reason could be the old ones trying to gain our attention. As busy working class adults or students being so caught up in own lives, the first immediate action when we reach home would be to plunge ourselves onto the sofa and reach out for the remote control or to head straight into our rooms. The last thing in our minds would be to entertain the 'old cranky'. As such, our long periods of neglection towards them cause them to constantly whine and make sarcastic remarks just to spark off any form of communication (be it arguments) with us.

If one observes carefully, elderly people behave exactly like kids. They sulk to seek attention, cry when they are behing scolded, make ridiculous demands at times, insist they are always right. They are also unable to piece together information to make logical sense and get curious about everything that is happening around them.

It is almost impossible to keep this bunch of elderly from complaining and making comparisons with the past. A high level of threshold to irritation is needed to tolerate their grievances and moanings. Most crucially, a caring heart and filial piety would be required to truly understand and put up with the child-like behaviour of these old women.

Catching Up..

2005-12-09T13:02:00.000-08:00

The best thing about my job is that it allows me to relax for a couple of months which lets me stay in touch with my friends. The past week or so have been spent catching up with schoolmates, having heart-to-heart talk with close friends and meeting new people.

The immaturity of a group (introduced by a friend) of 25/26 year old men, or rather boys, initially amused me but gradually frustrated me. I know they are very nice people. However, at times, their simpleness was too hard to endure. Their inability to take point blank hints and take intiatives amazed me. Their lack of interest in their surroundings can be really scary. No wonder everyone stereotypes people of this occupation as 'no-lifers' or boring.

A good friend of mine gave me a piece of advice which got me seriously thinking. I'm tempted to give it a try but I'm afraid of ruining everything. There are certain burning questions that I want to ask but somehow, I can't summon enough courage to do so. Sigh, the only solution is to leave things as status quo.

I have so many things to do but I just can't get myself started. Have been procrastinating too much. It doesn't help that my maid has returned home to spend Xmas with her family. Maybe it's about time that I start learning how to perform simple household chores. I started off with cooking lunch for my family last weekend. Nothing sumptuous, just Maggi Mee together with ingredients such as fishballs, vegetables, yong tofu and chicken breast. Quite a feat for someone who hardly steps into the kitchen. I'm glad I didn't create a mess in the kitchen. Hopefully I would be able to whip up some simple dishes in the following weeks to come. At least I can claim to have accomplished something this holiday.

Being Paranoid..

2005-12-02T17:00:00.000-08:00

I'm suffering from a serious disease: paranoia.

In the long-run, I realise this can be very damaging to my mental state of health. I'm constantly on the guard, not wanting to reveal much about me, my family and my friends. I have the tendency to beat around the bush when sensitive questions are being presented to me. Worse still, I'll ignore them and abruptly change the subject if possible.

When I reflect back on this behaviour of mine, I realise the crux of the problem: I am an extremely untrusting person. I'm always thinking that people must have an ulterior motive for each and every action she or he takes and that cheats are in abundance out there. This doesn't only apply to human beings. I too become very sceptical when good deals are presented to me. This phrase automatically comes to my mind when such good deals arise: there's no free lunch in this world.

Being brought up in an environment where I'm being exposed to stories regarding cheats and the deceitful acts of normal citizens, this had led me to become extremely wary of the people around me. Hence, I tend to take a much longer time to become close friends with anyone. Not that this bothers me much. After all, I'm a person of few words and I always believe in quality rather than quantity.

When someone suddenly becomes very nice to me, the first thought that springs to my mind will be: What does she or he want? At times, I do feel guilty on having such horrid thoughts, especially when that someone happens to be my friend. I find it depressing that I've forgotten that simple goodness actually exists in human beings. Blame it on the dog-eat-dog world we are living in, it's been a long time since I saw a kind or touching gesture from strangers or unfamiliar people. In this stifling environment where everyone is only concerned with his or her survival, few give a hoots about people surrounding them.

Of course at times, my inclination towards being 'safe rather than sorry' helps. I've encountered a fair share of people who are up to no good. However, if I have a choice, I would rather be less paranoid and be more trusting towards my friends.

David Tao..

2005-11-27T18:15:00.000-08:00

David Tao's concert last night was a brilliant showcase of the man's musical talent. Unlike other weird singers who love to choose the noisiest and least familiar songs to show-off their dance steps and expose their weak voices, Tao stuck to his music and selected the best of the best amongst all his songs. There was a variety of songs that he performed: R & B, rock, unplugged and of course, love ballads. As expected, he ended off with his sentimental favourite, Love is Simple.

Tao's powerful yet soothing voice mesmorized the audience. Not once did his voice break down or go off key. His albums do injustice to his voice. His voice is so much more superior 'live' than recorded. Furthermore, Tao's ability to get the audience engaged was one of the winning points of his concert. Within his second song, he managed to get most of the audience on their feet. His humour coupled with his charisma on stage made everyone break into laughter. His sincere appreciation to his band members, parents, friends, fans, audiences and the less fortunate displayed his humility which made him even more likable. The constant switch between Mandarin and English was forgivable as it all seemed so smooth and natural. His piano and electric guitar playing skills were also brilliant. It goes to show that a good musical concert need not have fanciful constumes, extravagant settings or complicated dance steps. A good concert should leave the audience captivated. For that to be possible, only two things are needed: a clear and powerful voice of the singer, and the singer's ability to get the crowd going. Tao scored full marks in both departments.

The 3 hours spent there was certainly worth the money. I enjoyed every moment of it and was a bit sad when it ended. I just heard from a few non-David Tao fans that they were left totally awestruck by the man's stage presence and his music abilities. Like them, I feel that this is and would be the best concert we've ever witnessed. It would take a miracle and superman's effort for any current singer to put up an even better concert.

Oh, and how could I forget! I was 10 cm away from shaking Tao's hand! If not for the damn couple of sumowrestler like security guards, I would have been able to shake the music genius' hand. Urghh!!! And I love the way Tao said, "I guess I'm going to break the rules." With that, he glided down the stage to come up close and personal with his fans at the front row. I felt like a 13 year-old all over again when I too rushed to the front to catch him. So near yet so far. Sigh. I can only look forward to his next album and cherish the magical moments in my heart.

Human Beings..

2005-11-22T15:52:00.000-08:00

The study of human beings is an intriguing subject. Psychology and Sociology give us a better understanding of how and why human beings behave in different situations. However, the study of human beings is best learnt outside the classroom when one comes face-to- face and interacts with our fellow species.

The initial stage of 'getting to know a person' is always a novelty. It's refreshing to hear about the lives of people who are so different from oneself and one's circle of friends. As time goes by, the novelty wears off. Suddenly the more one knows about the person, the more one cannot comprehend his or her train of thoughts, behaviours and actions. This stems from totally different upbringing. There are certain values that I cannot tolerate and accept. Opposites attract at the beginning but to sustain a frienship, similarities become more crucial. Communication gradually becomes redundant and finally non-existent when there are no common interests and when both have totally different values and directions in life. Now I finally understand why I have so few friends.

There are also certain people who love to stick to their own principles which stops them from improving their quality of lives and moving up the social ladder. Perhaps they are satisfied with their current lifestyles. Their streak of stubborness is preventing them from breaking the vicious cycle of 'poverty' which continues from one generation to the next. In some genuine cases, the lack of vision for the future can be blamed on ignorance or the low education attained. At times, I find it rather sad but there's a limit to what one can do to help them, especially when they refuse to heed your advice. On the other hand, the total lack of ambition and drive in the relatively well-off male is what females fears most about their Significant Other. There is no point in earning so much when the Significant Other has no great aspirations in life.

Damn it. My flow of thoughts has been abruptly interrupted. Just received a phone call which would have made me so excited a few months back. Hiaz, in a dilemma now. Of all days to call, that fellow had to do so today when he was supposed to call more than a month ago. Can't even let me have peace on my big day. Urghh..

Oh, btw, to all my good friends, thanks for all the greetings, presents and treats. I'm not a very expressive person in real life. So here's a big THANK YOU to all of you.

"The language of friendship is not words , but rather meanings . It is an intelligence above language."
-Thoreau

Sad Ending..

2005-11-20T23:08:00.000-08:00

Eventually, all good things must come to an end. The lack of match play and stamina became evident as the match progressed. It became too painful to watch towards the end. He could barely serve. He hardly ran for balls. He tried to keep the rallies short by hitting outright winners but they all turned out to be unforced errors. Despite putting up a mini-comeback and giving me a brief sense of hope, it was simply not enough.

The unblemished winning record in finals has become history. The 34 match winning streak is finally broken. At least he showed great sportsmanship by hanging in tough and not retiring. He knew the fans wanted more. He did not go down meekly. He could have stayed home and recuperated in the first place but he chose to fly half the continent to take part. His efforts should be greatly commended.

No birthday present from Rog this year. Anyhow, I'm proud of him.

Last Day..

2005-11-17T17:51:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow marks the last official day of my short teaching stint. Memories of my first few days here came flashing back to me this morning as I was clearing my desk. Despite the numerous complaints I have had, I will leave this school with a tinge of sadness and valuable lifelong lessons. I'm thankful to my amiable colleagues who provided me with much entertainment and tips on teaching. Without them, life would have been very miserable. Of course, most importantly, I'll not forget a handful of students who really brightened up my teaching days. Although I'll miss the school, I'm definitely looking forward to the holidays. Finally, I'll get to wake up after the sun rises and there's a long list of things that I want to do. Hurray! Freedom after 1pm tomorrow, I can't wait!

A Poem..

2005-11-14T16:30:00.000-08:00

The sparkling and charming eyes mesmerized me.

The boyish grin melted me.

The innocent laughter enthralled me.

The intelligent face captivated me.

The unique voice attracted me.

The unison answers amused me.

The presence of an unfamiliar person inhibited me.

The blunt tactics embarrassed me.

The seemingly lack of interest disappointed me.

The inability to express myself frustrated me.

Inconsolable Mood..

2005-11-13T15:52:00.000-08:00

Damn it!!! I missed Rog's 1st match at the Shanghai Masters Cup. I'm so sore about it, urghh!!! Months of waiting to see him and I actually missed it! I thought it's only starting tomorrow. Damn it!! Why in the world did they start a tournament on a Sunday???

While I was whining about it, Mr Lim had to rub salt on my wounds, "As a number 1 fan, you should be responsible for your own tv schedule." Duckass' response was worse. "I thought you knew."

The only consolation was that Rog won, but only barely. At least he got past his nemisis though.

Farewell Lunch..

2005-11-11T16:57:00.000-08:00

Everyday has been a learning experience in my short working life. My job encompasses mainly around management. Managing large groups of children, managing one’s time well, managing one’s relationship with one’s colleagues and superiors and balancing one’s private life and working life. I’ve also learnt not to be too idealistic. It would just make one frustrated about not being able to meet that high expectation set by oneself.

Furthermore, I’ve outgrown the fear of getting lost (literally and physically). Panicking would get one nowhere. Instead of worrying, why not find a solution to get out instead of wasting precious time and brain cells on fearing for the worst? If seeking for help is out of the question, trusting one’s instincts would be a good alternative.

Moreover, I’ve been initiating things which I would not have done previously. I’m not sure what gave me the courage but I’m learnt to put things into perspective. The worst scenario would be getting shamed or embarrassed. On the other hand, positive or totally unexpected developments may arise. So why not think on the brighter side rather than being so pessimistic?

In addition, I’ve learnt to stick to my own principles and do what is right even though it may cause inconveniences to others. I do not think it is my problem should these people get into trouble since they did not perform their tasks properly in the first place.
___________________________________________________________________

I did a personality quiz (http://quizbox.com/personality/test82.aspx) while I was toying away with time. The accuracy rate for me was approximately 90%. Here are the results:

Your view on yourself:
You are down-to-earth and people like you because you are so straightforward. You are an efficient problem solver because you will listen to both sides of an argument before making a decision that usually appeals to both parties.

The type of girlfriend/boyfriend you are looking for:
You like serious, smart and determined people. You don't judge a book by its cover, so good-looking people aren't necessarily your style. This makes you an attractive person in many people's eyes.

Your readiness to commit to a relationship:
You prefer to get to know a person very well before deciding whether you will commit to the relationship.

The seriousness of your love:
You like to flirt and behave seductively. The opposite sex finds this very attractive, and that's why you'll always have admirers hanging off your arms. But how serious are you about choosing someone to be in a relationship with?

Your views on education:
Education is less important than the real world out there, away from the classroom. Deep inside you want to start working, earning money and living on your own.

The right job for you:
You have plenty of dream jobs but have little chance of doing any of them if you don't focus on something in particular. You need to choose something and go for it to be happy and achieve success.

How do you view success:
You are afraid of failure and scared to have a go at the career you would like to have in case you don't succeed. Don't give up when you haven't yet even started! Be courageous.

What are you most afraid of:
You are afraid of having no one to rely on in times of trouble. You don't ever want to be unable to take care of yourself. Independence is important to you.

Who is your true self:
You are mature, reasonable, honest and give good advice. People ask for your comments on all sorts of different issues. Sometimes you might find yourself in a dilemma when trapped with a problem, which your heart rather than your head needs to solve.
__________________________________________________________________

Just came back from a farewell lunch for my mentor at Parkway Parade. I had the priviledge of fetching both the principal and a senior teacher since no one was willing to take up the responsibility, or rather, no one volunteered. It was not such a daunting task after all. Just that their lives were in my hands. haha. Somehow, I managed to park well despite my car being at some awkward angle. I think I perform much better under pressure. Anyway, I was just glad that I gave them a smooth ride and that I didn't embarrass myself with my parking. Oh, by the way, lunch was good, considering how much we paid!

Defending Myself..

2005-11-06T19:17:00.000-08:00

A recent spate of events, conversations and perhaps my blog entries have had family members, relatives, friends and acquaintances create a negative impression of me. I've been labelled as being high-maintenance, a spoilt brat, a snob amongst many others. I normally do not bother about others' opinion but this time, I find it mentally disturbing.

To get the record straight, yes, I do like to patronise at air-conditioned cafes and restaurants but I do that only once a week, which is the weekend. Weekday lunches are consumed either at home or in the school canteen. And seriously, most of the time, I would rather starve than eat the school canteen food. Since I suffer on weekdays, I feel that there's nothing wrong with paying more to enjoy a better ambience and better food during the weekends.

Next, driving. If driving a car makes me spoilt, then more than half the population in Singapore are spoilt brats. Furthermore, I find it ridiculous that I've been labelled 'materialistic' for wanting to own a car of my own in the near future. I hope these people would put themselves in my shoes. I've been fortunate to have a car at my disposable since I obtained my driving licence. It's only natural that I would want to maintain my current lifestyle.

Moving on to purchasing expensive goods and leisure. Again, how often do I do that? I reckon it's probably once in two months or even less. If money can buy happiness and boost the economy, what's wrong with paying to get enjoyment? This is especially when it's my own hard-earned money. Talking about that, Dad has kindly sponsored my David Tao tickets as my birthday present. Haha. By the way, I just did a quick calculation on my spendings. I spend less than 20% of my income per month for myself on all these so-called enjoyment and expensive meals. I do not have the luxury of enjoying free meals from my boyfriend because I do not have one. Even if I do have one, I'll make sure I pay my own share unless it's a special occassion.

Next, snob. Yes, I ignore the noisy and irritating kids. But that's because I understand their needs. Come on, they are kids. It's hard for them to shut up from 7.30am to 1.30pm everyday. Of course, I definitely would not tolerate mayhem when I'm teaching. So when do I ignore them? I do so when I'm reliefing classes, those whom I would only see probably once in my life time. Contract teachers tend to relief a lot because they are deemed to be the most free among all the staff. I always feel like quitting after I've finished reliefing a class. The noise level can be terrible at times but I allow them to talk because it's a free period. No point shouting at them to shut up since they have nothing to do anyway. And I do not look down on any kid. I've come to accept the fact that people come from various backgrounds and different people have different academic abilities.

I know I've been complaining a lot of my job. The downside of this job is that most of the kids do not appreciate what teachers do for them. Only a handful of them come out with "Happy Teacher's Day" cards or presents on Teacher's Day. But come on, at the end of the day, what is it that I really hope to get from them? Gifts? Being friends with them? Getting 'A's for the subjects that I teach them? No, none of them. I just wish they would be able to find a niche for themselves and be upright and responsible human beings. The fact that they've ended up in neighbourhood schools speaks much about their academic ability. If they can't excel in their studies, I'm sure they excel in other areas. That's not the most difficult part. Teaching a child to be responsible is the most arduous task in the world. Why? Just look around, how many adults are actually responsible human beings? If we can't even lead by example, what do you expect of the child?

For once, I shall be divulging some rare moments which makes me want to stay on in this job. The first was my Secondary 5 Malay student. His Mathematics is totally horrendous. He can't even solve a basic algebra question. We both had a good laugh when we saw his Maths Prelim results. I found it amusing because I've not seen anyone score so low for a Maths paper. He laughed probably because he was used to seeing this kind of result. He told me, "No hope already lah. Sure get F9 for 'O' level." This was my reply to him, "Don't worry, it's quite hard to get F9. There are definitely people who are worse than you." He looked up at me with a sense of hope. "Really? I thought I'm the worst already,' he queried. From then on, he became more motivated during my Maths periods and started asking me how to solve questions. His previous teacher told me that he spent most of his time joking around with his friend during her maths period.

The next touching scene was with one of the students from the class of Devils. It was announced to the class that I was supposed to be their new English teacher. But due to 'unforeseen circumstances', I didn't have to take over them. So their current English teacher remained. One day, while I was walking past that class, one of the students asked me, "Cher, how come you never teach our class? You say you supposed to teach us what." So I explained to them that there was a last minute change on the administrative side and asked why were they so concerned anyway. His answer, "Nothing lah, we prefer you actually." I'm not sure whether it was a frank answer, but he sure made my day. The real reason must be because I was less lenient with them as I once got them to play some IQ game in the middle of a comprehension exercise.

This has been a rather long entry but all I've been trying to do is to defend myself, that I'm not as materialistic, spoilt, snobbish or high-maintenance as you all think. I'm sick of hearing such accusations and I'm simply too tired to explain myself to each and everyone of you.

Tennis Session..

2005-11-05T12:03:00.000-08:00

Had a great tennis workout yesterday with Mr Lim and his friends. I thought my skills had become rusty due to the lack of practice. The last time I played tennis must have been in April or March with my econs friends.

The weather was perfect. No sun and slight breezy conditions. There was no need for me to wear my cap. My worries were unduly as I somehow managed to hit the ball with ease but not without some moments of embarrassment when I totally mis-timed the ball and the ball flew out of the court. At the end of it, I had a good workout and was told by Mr Lim's friends to join them in their future tennis sessions.

Mr Lim was impressed by my tremendous tennis prowess. Haha. He said he didn't have to give me chance when hitting the ball to me. Somehow my 'talent' was showcased when I played with his friends. I shan't indulge in self-praise here. To be more humble, I'll attribute my skills to the racket and the 'tennis lessons' I attented while watching my tennis idols over the past decade.

The new racket(Rog's) is good but it's a bit too heavy for me. I shall be sticking to my old racket. Mr Lim's friend commented that Mr Lim and I look alike. Quite true, especially our eyes, but certainly not our size!

In other news, I finally ventured out to the 'hawker centre' opposite my school yesterday with my colleagues. It turned out to be a food court, air-conditioned! I shall now make it a point to eat there for the last 10 days of schools. Time really crawls when there is nothing to do. Ok, I shall cease to complain here. There are people out there who are either unemployed or getting paid peanuts while slogging for long hours.

Stumbled upon my colleague's name on the internet while I was surfing for some information on my ex-schoolmate. I hate to say this but I was shocked to find out that she was from one of the top five JCs and she did very well for her 'A' Levels. Immediately, I felt inferior to her. However, I console myself it's the end result that counts. She didn't manage to get an Honours degree despite spending 4 years in NUS. Now who cares which JC one is from. And when one enters the workforce, it's the work attitude that really makes a difference from one employee to another.

Ok, enough of crapping. Damn it, the sun is out. I was dumb enough to cancel my lunch appointment just because of the rain. Anyway, I shall be collecting my David Tao's tickets later. Can't wait to get hold of them!

Shopping Spree..

2005-10-30T12:37:00.000-08:00

After months of whinning about irresponsible people, I finally found an extremely responsible colleague, J. Though J is not my mentor, I'm assisting her as a co-form teacher of the class of angels. Initially, I was extremely terrified of her. She has this really fierce look on her face and does not smile at all when she's handling her duties. But after a while, she began to open up to me and vice versa. She was not so terrifying after all. I managed to learn a lot from her for the past 1.5 months just being around her even though it's a mere 15 minutes per day. Things that I learnt: how to be fierce when necessary, how to get the class to listen to the teacher when the students are in a hyper-active mood, how to handle difficult students, and most importantly, how to be firm and yet caring towards the class. I not only picked up tips on how to handle students. I also observed how she deals with irritating and irresponsible colleagues. What I admire most about her is her work attitude. She performs her work with no complaints and makes sure she does her work properly. But sometimes, she can get overly kancheong that I've to tell her to relax as I would help her and not put on a disappearing act. And on the last day of school, we actually found out that we can't stand the same colleague, who always has the tendency to eat snake. Whatever it is, J has been a great inspiration to me. I'm glad to be given the opportunity to work with her.

Now that school is out for the kids, I'm effectively on a holiday mood even though I still have to report back to school till mid-November. Since I'm paid, I'm not complaining. To celebrate the end of my teaching stint for this year, I rewarded myself with the purchase of Rog's racket (exactly the same model this time) and the most expensive tickets to David Tao's concert. Really pleased with my buys. For the cost of $232, it came with Rog's racket, an N-code Wilson T-shirt, an N-code Wilson cap, 3 Wilson tennis balls, 1 gigantic Wilson tennis bag, free stringing and 2 cans of drinks. As for David Tao's concert, despite paying for the most expensive tickets, I didn't manage to get hold of very front row seats. Reason? I only knew of the existence of his concert a few days ago when the tickets have been going on sale since 10th October. I'm pretty sure I read the newspapers faithfully everyday. I'm not sure why the media did so little in publicizing his concert. I only knew of it when I accidentally tuned into 93.3FM and heard David Tao talking about this upcoming concert.

I have absolutely no regrets 'splurging' my money this way. After all, it's not every day that such deals come along. Furthermore, how often does one's favourite singer stages a concert in one's country? The last concert I watched was 3 years ago, staged by Lee Hom. It's about a time I witnessed another concert.

Final Week..

2005-10-24T17:26:00.000-07:00

For those who have been following closely to my blog for the past few months, you must be having the feeling that I loathe my job so much that I would quit as soon as a new job offer arises. I won't blame you as I've been doing nothing but complaining about my job here. I concentrate so much on the negative aspects that I divulge totally nothing regarding the positive side of teaching.

Now for a bit of reflection and flash-back. The first week of school was honeymoon for me as all I did was to observe the lessons of two teachers with contrasting styles. Or should I put it this way: I got to observe two totally different classes. One was a class of lovable and obedient angels while the other seemed more like a class which consisted mainly of devils and crooks. I officially started teaching the class of devils first. It was the most unbearable 1.5hours of my life. When I stepped out of the class, I was totally shaken. I had nightmares that night. My face was so pale that even Granny noticed it. I hated the feeling of not being in control. I didn't even want to turn up in school the next day. But of course, I'm no quitter. Life proceeded as normal.

I voiced out my concerns regarding that particular class when the vice-principal asked me how were things getting along. I was so thankful when she told me that I would be the co-form teacher of the class of angels instead of the class of devils. I need not teach that dreaded class anymore! I was so grateful that I thanked God for the first time in my life. I only had to concentrate on the class of angels and take over a few graduating classes for Mathematics. It was then that I felt that life wasn't so bad after all.

But the first few lessons with the class of angels wasn't so smooth-sailing after all. I went in with the expectation of demanding 100% attention from my students. When a few students started talking amongst themselves, I blew up at them. I even made them stay back. For subsequent lessons, I went in the classroom with a black face. I did not tolerate nonsense and told them off when they were treating me as invisible. It was only when a student commented in her journal that she wished that 'a particular teacher would not keep scolding them for no reason' that I realised that I was indeed too harsh on them. I began to relax and soon cracked jokes with them during lessons. I admit that uptil now, I still can't get absolute silence from them when I'm teaching for more than 20 minutes. But I soon realise that these are 13 year-old kids. It is understandable that their attention-span is very short. So I try to talk less and instead get them to be more involved in activities and group work. It worked wonders.

My affection for this class of angels grew even stronger when I was sent to invigilate the class of devils for one whole week. I didn't get to see my form class for 7 days. I missed them terribly. Their innocence, their obedience, their absent-mindedness and everything about them. I then decided to buy chocolates for them as a belated children's day present and for performing the best amongst all the Express classes for their Comprehension exam.

This Wednesday, I would be conducting my last lesson with them for the year, or maybe for the rest of my life depending on where I would be next year. I would surely miss them. I'm not sure if the feeling is mutual. I bet some of them would be very glad while the majority would be feeling neutral. After all, I'm just yet another teacher in their short schooling lives.

Freaking Pissed..

2005-10-17T18:53:00.000-07:00

I've learnt not to put in too much emotion in my job. It's just not worth the effort. These students don't see the importance of education. A handful of them come to school to make a nuisance of themselves, cause disturbance to others, be freaking rude to their teachers, don't bother about their marks, be attention-seekers and do whatever they like besides behaving and respecting their teachers. Sometimes when I step back and put myself in their shoes, yes, I didn't really care about my studies from sec. 1 to 3. But at least I bothered to do my homework and whatever I was told to do. No one in my school walked around the class when they didn't feel like listening. No one turned around and started laughing loudly as if the teacher was invisible when the teacher was teaching. The worst behaviour was just chit-chatting with our partners.

People tell me that I must try to empathize with them. They come from broken homes or complicated family backgrounds. I always feel that that's not an excuse to be a nuisance in school. There are other ways of grabbing attention. These people choose the laziest way to do so, which is to intentionally annoy the teacher and not learn. Why can't they do otherwise? Work hard, be respectful towards their teachers, be morally-upright citizens, contribute positively to the society and at least secure a decent future for themselves. And come on, how many percentage of them actually come from broken homes? Being poor is also not an excuse for not studying and anyway, how poor can these people be when they have handphones? Whatever it is, I feel that being poor should spur one to study even harder so that one won't be forever poor. It's a vicious cycle if they continue lamenting on their poor fate without taking any action. Now I finally understand why the gulf between the rich and the poor is widening each year in our society.

While I was invigilating and I look at these students, I really feel very worried for our future generations. Thirty minutes past the exam, you are bound to have students sleeping, toying with their pens, drawing pictures, attempting to cheat etc. I really don't know what to say. All I can do is to shake my head.

Of course there are bound to be good students in neighbourhood schools. I think one negative trait about me is that I tend to concentrate more with the bad students and overlook the good ones. And I do admit that my attitude needs checking if I want to be a teacher as I have the tendency to look down on certain groups of people.

What I learnt today: No point putting in too much heart into my job. The higher one's expectations and concerns, the more disappointed and demoralised one gets.

Moral Values..

2005-10-13T16:23:00.000-07:00

Judging from a particular friend, I'm utterly convinced that exam-smart students are basically morons when they are told to do anything but sitting for exams. It was such a simple task but she couldn't do it properly (I shall not elaborate here). Just for her own convenience, she even wanted me to do something against the law. She brushed it off as something insignificant and that no one would bother checking. She didn't think that if it was being checked, I would certainly get into serious trouble. I got so exasperated talking to her that I ended up shouting. I've never spoken so fiercely or raised my voice to any of my friends before. Till now, I'm not apologetic for my behaviour. I'm wondering what kind of person she is and I am indeed upset that she'll ask me to do such a thing. Everyone in my family was so shocked by my voice-raising that they didn't ask who I was talking to and the reason for being so agitated. Mr Lim did catch a gist of what I said before I left to the garden so as not to disturb his tv watching. He told me that had he not been so engrossed with his Changjin, he would have grabbed the phone and gave her a piece of his mind.

To me, having integrity is the most important aspect in a human being. You can argue that I'm just being kiasi : afraid of being caught by the police and having to pay off a fine or being thrown behind bars. Imagine Mr Lim, a future lawyer, having a sister who has a criminal record. But that's besides the point. I absolutely can't tolerate people who always plan to cheat just to stinge on a few dollars or pathetic cents. A person whom I respect a lot always reminded me that if a person becomes too stingy, somehow or other, it would lead to greed and the tendency to cheat, or rather tan1 xiao3 pian2 yi2. I'm beginning to see a lot of truth and wisdom in her words.

So to my friends out there, please do not ever suggest anything to me that involves deceit or cheating just to help me save peanuts. I'll get very insulted and it just goes to reflect what kind of moral values you have.

Selfish Friend..

2005-10-11T18:41:00.000-07:00

Recently, I've been feeling disappointed with the people around me. It's not as if I've very high expectations of them. All I expect of people is responsibility on their part and unselfishness. Since working, many of my blog entries have been written about the irresponsibility of adults and students. These people fail to do their own work properly and hence, they cause inconvenience to the others working below or with them. I get highly irritated when people perform slipshod work and pass it down to me. I end up picking up the mess and wasting my precious time in the process. And I absolutely loathe it when it makes it seem as though I'm the person who did the sloppy piece of work no matter how hard I try to conceal the mistakes. Even after reporting to my boss, I still get upset as I'm a perfectionist and I can't stand having errors littered all over and being so freaking untidy.

The reality that most people are irresponsible has finally sunk in and I'm beginning to get immuned to this kind of thrash in our society. Now, I can't tolerate friends who are downright selfish.

From a few minor matters in the past, I got to realise this particular friend of mine always puts her interests above others. I got thoroughly pissed with her once that I told her off but she thought I was only joking. This time round, I felt that she was really too much. To cut the long story short, she wanted me to help her friend (who knows little English) submit some forms to an organization. Firstly, when she passed me the forms, they were in such a pathetic state that I thought they belonged to the dustbin. Secondly, the documents attached with the forms were all not properly arranged. Thirdly, the forms were so incomplete that I swear even a primary school kid would have noticed it. The worst part was the forms were not even signed! I felt that she should have told her friend about the forms when she first received them from her. I forgive her friend for the incompleteness of the forms as her friend probably doesn't even know what the form is asking for. But my particular friend, after 20 years of English education in Singapore, would surely be able to spot such simple mistakes and the glaring blanks. I feel that as a responsible and unselfish person, if she really wants to help someone, she should do it with her heart. Common sense would tell her that a form which is not even signed will obviously be rejected!

That's not all. When I told her that the organization promptly rejected her forms, she kept asking me "Oh no, then how? Must get her to go down and sign?" This pissed me even more. It was as if she expected everything to be smooth-sailing even with half-filled forms. I informed her that the forms were with me as the organization refused to process incomplete forms. Uptil now, there's no reply from her as to what she wants to do with the forms. A responsible human being would have reacted quickly and arranged for the forms to be signed. But no. All she knew what to say was "Then how?" Does she expect me to post the forms to her friend when she should just send it to the organization itself instead of asking me and getting me disgraced in the process for such incomplete forms? Whatever it is, I bet she must be thinking: "I help my friend pass the forms already, I've done my job. It's not my problem if the organization accepts it or not." Initially when I showed Mr Lim the forms, he was utterly disgusted. He asked me repeatedly whether the person who passed the forms to me was actually my friend and told me not to bother about her. But I thought that I should help her as she's my friend and just try my luck. I guess I should have just heed the advice of Mr Lim.

My initial suspicions about her were confirmed through this incident. I finally got to see the true colours of this friend. All I can say is that I'm thorougly disappointed with her. Uptil now, I'm still quite disgusted with her selfishness and behaviour. I know I'm childish but after this incident, I don't feel like having to have anything to do with her anymore. I already can't tolerate irresponsible and selfish people, what more an irresponsible and selfish friend.

A Premonition..

2005-10-07T22:39:00.000-07:00

I had a premonition that something bad was going to happen when I received my invigilation schedule a few weeks back. The class that I was going to invigilate was notorious. Having sat in for their lessons, I knew that this class was not easy to handle. In fact, just the thought of having to relief or teach that class gives me nightmares.

During their exams this morning, I caught two students, a Malay boy (M) and a Chinese boy (C), cheating right under my nose. While I was attending to another boy, M and C thought I was oblivious to the situation. C passed something to M. When I confronted the receiver, M, he was in constant denial. I almost engaged in a shouting match with him, but I decided that it would just put me at the losing end and would also distract the other students who were concentrating hard on their exam. I knew that just soley based on my words and what I saw, he could go on denying and saying that my eyes were playing tricks on me even though his claims were totally ridiculous. Instead, I looked for concrete evidence and found them first on C, and then on M. C knew that he was doomed the moment I asked to see his answer script. I didn't bother confronting him, neither did he make any attempt to plead his innocence. M was the troublemaker. He even had the audacity to ask me back for the 'cheating item' and told me not to stand next to him as I was distracting him. That was the final straw. I reported the incident to the HODs and the students' parents were informed. Both of them would be getting zero marks for that paper.

That was not the end to the matter. C admitted to cheating within five minutes but M finally admitted to playing a part only after close to 5 hours of interrogation and after probably realising that I had evidence against him. Or perhaps he decided to confess after going for his prayers.

I sincerely hope this incident would have taught C a valuable lesson: to choose his friends wisely. When asked why he was willing to help M, he answered that M was his best friend. Ya, some sort of best friend he had. His best friend left him in the lurch when trouble came. His best friend claimed that he had no part in the cheating scam even though they had planned to do so before the exam started. His best friend treated him like a dumb fool. His best friend only bothered about himself without giving a hoots about his friend who actually 'assisted' him in his exam.

The attitude of M is totally shocking. I've never expected a 14-year-old to be so bold. Denying his misdeed is bad enough. What so appalling was him asking for the cheating item back and wanting to copy down his friend's answers right in front of me. That's not all. When the HODs questioned him, he acted as if he was innocent and that I was picking on him. I've only done relief teaching for his class once. I do not even know his name. Why in the world would I want to frame him?

M certainly didn't know who he was dealing with here. He thought that being inexperienced, I would be distracted by another student. and that I would be totally engrossed with helping that student till I won't be aware of my surroundings. He didn't expected me to be a police cum detective. I was watching closely over him since the first minute of the exam. Whatever it is, having evidence to prove his guilt was much more important than what I witnessed. This is especially so when their over-protective parents come into the picture.

I don't really give a damn if these students don't respect me. I want them to get the message across that I may be new in this line but I'm not one to be trifled with.

As for next week, I'll be driving the decade old car. My heart will ache badly should my favourite car suffer any scratches.

Child Innocence..

2005-10-02T12:48:00.000-07:00

The purpose of this entry is not to mock fun of this child's English. It's to marvel on how sentimental a child of such a tender age can be. By the way, I think she writes much better than some children who are twice her age.

An extract from a 6 year old girl's (daughter of one of the shop tenants at Hock Kee House) diary..

Today, I am very sad because Hock Kee House, my father's shop are going to crash down. This shop was opened at 16 years ago. Before I was born, my father had this shop already. I very miss this shop. Very very miss. I wish the shop is forever mine. I love this shop forever. I will remember this shop at no.3 Paya Lebar Road, Hock Kee House. Goodbye, Hock Kee House. (Diary entry comes with an illustration of Hock Kee House and her family, with tears rolling down her eyes)

Irresponsible People..

2005-09-26T21:58:00.000-07:00

I've never felt so out of control and helpless in my life. Almost sprouted out vulgarities but managed to hold my tongue in the nick of time. I was fuming mad and controlling my anger well till I could tolerate no more of the nonsense and I exploded. I have no recollection on what exactly I said. I intended to lash out some real insulting words but I remembered I still wanted to remain in this job.

I'm thoroughly pissed with inefficient, irresponsible and incompetent people. I hate it when the whole organization and administration seem to be totally chaotic with no proper system of handling matters. Ever since working, I realised most grown-ups have no sense of responsibility in them. And mind you, these are mostly graduates, who have undergone close to 2 decades of education, and do not even possess one of the basic values of a human being. I feel sad for the future of my own country if we are going to be filled with this kind of citizens.

Before today, I was still pondering whether I should move on or just remain and be contented with my current position. Having undergone1 hour of 'torture', I realised that for the state of my health and intellectual level, I'm very sure I would need this switch. Tomorrow shall be the day I take action. After months of serious thinking, it feels great when a decision has been make. I've to be thankful to one of the timely changes to the education system which greatly aided and re-confirmed the route which I'm going to choose. I've no regrets now. Finally, this whole job 'burden' has been lifted off me.

Other Blogs..

2005-09-22T18:03:00.000-07:00

Have been stumbling across the blogs of ex-classmates, ex-schoolmates and acquaintances. Being the kaypoh I'm well-known for, I get really intrigued with catching up with their lives. The latest blog that I came across? One of my ex-college mate, who's the girlfriend of my ex-crush. Not surprisingly, they are still together as evident by the numerous photos of them together splattered all over her blog. Not sure if it's a twist of fate, I always bump into them at least once a year since we graduated. When our paths crossed, we merely looked at each other without any acknowledgement, and just walked past each other as if we were mere strangers.

The first few times when I saw them together, which was donkey years ago, my reaction was, "Damn it, so long already still together. Walk so close together some more." That was because he was still very charming and suave. The first time when I caught him alone without the girl was in NUS a couple of years ago. He was a freshman then. His attractiveness seemed to have disappeared all of a sudden. In my eyes, he was reduced to 'one of the year 1 students'. Anyway, he had put on weight and no longer seemed perfect. Perhaps its the extra 2 years of education that I had ahead of him that made him look immature.

Whatever it is, he and his girlfriend had just celebrated their 6th year anniversary together. Of course I'm no longer jealous of them and no longer secretly or openly hoping that they would break up :)

It seems that love cannot be measured by time. I've come across a fair share of relationships of friends and family members that were sustained for many years. The end result was rather similar: break-up. As one grows older, one realises that one's partner should not be just someone whom one enjoys the company of. Encountering the sweetness of romance and enjoying the numerous activities and moments shared together is one matter. Having to live together with him/her and his/her family for the rest of their lives is another.

I've always believed that a couple should have the same ideals and focus in life. A particular ex-classmate of mine had just broken up with her boyfriend of close to eight years. Everyone of us had thought she would be the first amongst us to tie the knot, with the exception of me. Of course I didn't voice out my opinion back then. I've always felt that the gulf in their education and maturity levels would be fatally exposed when they entered the labour force. The higher one's education level, the more one would hope to achieve in life. True enough, now, their different expectations and aims in lives forced my friend to come back to reality. Of course, this is not to say that relationships with people of different education levels would not last. It all boils down to each individual's character and outlook in life. If two people are not moving together towards a certain goal, there's no point in continuing the relationship. Putting an end to it is painful, but it's best done as soon as possible if the future together looks bleak. Rather than waste time on something that won't lead anywhere, moving on seems to be a more sensible option, as what my friend bravely did. I truely admire her courage.

On another matter, after months of waiting, my graduation photos are finally ready for collection. Can't wait too see them :)

Rog Delivers..

2005-09-13T19:01:00.000-07:00

Rog's victory has definitely lifted my spirits considerably. Not to mention the 'life-saviour' I received yesterday. Was so overjoyed that I totally forgot about my current task. The feeling was as if a life buoy was thrown to me while I was drowing into the sea. Sounds exaggerating but that was entirely how I felt. I hope I would not let the opportunity slip this time round. My fate lies in my own hands now.

Inner Thoughts..

2005-09-10T11:09:00.000-07:00

At times, I feel as if I'm living in a cage. I dare not oppose authority. With that, I dare not venture beyond the familiar route. I'm not allowed to pursue whatever I want. I'm told to do what's the best for me even though it's something that I dislike.

It's all something to do with the 'face' problem. The stigma of being labelled 'unemployed' for a period of time is too much for her to bear. To her, sitting at home and waiting is a pure waste of time. Her lack of confidence in me at times really pulls me down as well. To her, all outside jobs are the same with the exception of doctors, lawyers, accountants and of course, teachers. The exceptions are known as something high class called 'professions'. I can't stand her class-consciousness at times. Yes, money talks. My happiness doesn't matter. Her rationale: Every job has a sucky part, just have to bear with it. But she fails to understand that the sucky part of the job for me is the main focus of the job. My main argument is why should I stick to something I have a disdain for when I have other choices.

I don't give a damn about what she says now. It's my life she's talking about here, not hers. I regretted the decision she made for me 13 years ago. Uptil now, I'm still rather sore about it. Maybe life would have been much more different for me now if I've stuck to my decision. But it's pointless blaming her and mulling over it now. I'm not going to repeat the mistake this time round.

US Open..

2005-09-08T12:51:00.000-07:00

With the extraction of my wisdom tooth last Saturday, my whole week was spent rotting at home. The only exception was going to the mechanic to collect my car. I'm not complaining since there's a whole load of television programmes to keep me entertained.

The second week of all tennis Grand Slams is always what I look forward to. There are lots of excitement, nerve-wrecking and dramatic moments, twists and turns and most importantly, brilliant tennis to watch out for. Most of the matches at this stage go down to the wire. It makes me glued to the television set, and even refusing to visit the loo just in case I change the luck of the particular person I'm rooting for.

Three out of four of the women's quarter-final matches of the US Open had been stretched to 3 sets. Matches like these all boils down to the mental toughness of the players; who can hang on, who dares to go for the outright winner, and who doesn't crack down under pressure. Whatever it is, tennis matches now resemble boxing matches. The players strike the ball with such power, venom and accuracy, trading blow by blow to each other. I managed to witness the athleticsm of Kim Clijsters against Venus Williams. Her speed around the court is simply amazing. Her determination to chase down every ball with her trademark splits wore down Venus. This is not to say that Clijsters plays like her former fiance, Lleyton Hewitt. Clijsters has a formidable forehand which resembles that of Steffi Graf. The ease at which she strikes her forehand is joyous to watch. I'm looking forward to her semi-finals against the glamour girl of tennis, Maria Sharapova.

My one week holiday is coming to an abrupt end. One more term to go. I'm just waiting for phone calls from unknown numbers. What a pathetic life I lead.

Teacher's Day..

2005-08-30T16:30:00.000-07:00

Had my 1st Teacher's Day today as a teacher. Was pleasantly surprised to receive a few gifts despite only teaching for a couple of weeks. The most ironic fact was that the presents were given by those that I least expected. At least there are students out there who appreciate me.

Got to know more about a few young colleagues during staff lunch. I got diverse views about the job. One still thoroughly enjoys it while some are burnt out already. A few adviced me to think twice before signing the bond. Frankly speaking, at times, I enjoy the job while other times, I dread entering the classroom. I think it depends on which subject and which class I'm going to teach. But it's hard to find a job which one would like all the time. Most of the time, I get very frustrated when the pupils don't listen to me. I hate the feeling of not being able to control the class which makes me feel very incompetent. This is the main reason why I dislike the job. On the other hand, deep down, I know that there would be downsides in other jobs as well. Sigh, I dislike it when I can't make a decision about my life.

I tell myself to hang on to this job till the contract ends and not be a quitter. I console myself that I shouldn't get stressed out so easily. Compared to Dad, my job pales in significance. My task is simply to teach groups of 40 students while Dad's job is multiple times more complex than mine. He has thousands of people to manage, numerous meetings to chair, countless matters to deal with, bosses to report to, datelines to meet, press conferences to attend to and at times, acting as an English-Chinese translator to the media. With this in mind, I try not to voice out my unhappiness about my job to Dad, preferring to relate more positive experiences to him. I'm sure he has more burning problems to be bogged down with. He would probably think my problem is just a minor issue, which I think, it's true.

Right now, I'll heed the advice of my HOD: Just take it one day at a time. School holiday tomorrow. A very timely break for me :)

First Month..

2005-08-25T19:00:00.000-07:00

Today marks the one month anniversary of my career. It has really been an eye-opener, getting to see all kinds of adults and students. As time goes by, I slowly get to witness the negative traits of my fellow colleagues. On the other hand, I'm beginning to see the positive traits that my students possess. I hope I'm not speaking too soon.

I've seen a fair share of a certain male colleague behaving like a wimp, pushing the blame on me, as a result making me the scapegoat and being reprimanded for no reason. Although he did apologise after that, I've learnt to stay clear of him unless there is an absolute need to communicate with him.

Irresponsibilty is the most common sight, surprisingly, not only for students. Some of them are too lazy to clean up after making a mess of the staff common table. Nobody bothers to go downstairs to get printing paper when the paper has run out in the photocopying machine. The most common solution is to get paper from the printer or use one sided paper. And that certain male colleague mentioned above just could not be bothered to print the correct number of copies of worksheets for his students. His excuse: they can always share. He apparently jammed up the photocopying machine but had no guts to inform the photocopying lady, who fumed in anger when she found out what happened. I could have had my revenge and let the photocopying lady know who the culprit was but I didn't want to be in the same 'league' as him.

I hate to say this but I realise that the older generation in my job tends to be more dedicated, responsible and most importantly, possess more civic consciousness. Perhaps the former comes with years of experience. But I feel that the latter two comes from one's upbringing, which sadly mirrors the type of people that Singapore is going to have for the next decades.

An incident happened while I was in class today. It touched me a great deal when I saw my students helping a particular classmate of theirs to cool down and get a grip of herself. While assisting her, they didn't mind getting their uniforms stained by the marker she was holding or getting scratched by her. Frankly speaking, if it weren't for them, I would be at a loss. It then struck me that although their actions were rather childish, their minds were not. And through this incident, I got to differentiate between the caring ones and those who were only concerned with going home early.

I think there's a lot of learning to be done for me if I were to treat this as a career, rather than just a job.

Random Thoughts..

2005-08-20T18:48:00.000-07:00

My job hasn't been smooth sailing or as enjoyable as I expected. All the passion about nurturing our next generation has almost evaporated only after a month in this line. My ideals about making a difference in the lives of the teenagers seem too over-realistic all of sudden.

I guess it has to do with me being a perfectionist. I get bogged down whenever things are not done properly. I hate it when not all 40 pieces of work are handed in. I dislike having to 'chase' students to hand in work. To me, responsibility need not be taught. It should be something instilled into a child since young. As a student, I always adopted the attitude that "if I don't hand in my work, or if I don't study, it's my own business. I'm responsible for my own future." I don't recall any of my teachers constantly going after my classmates to hand in their work or my parents nagging at me to do my homework. If you don't hand in your work, it's your own freaking problem. I can never understand how and why responsibility needs to be taught.

The worst part about this job is classroom management. Some students can't seem to even shut up for 5 minutes when I'm teaching. I detest it when I'm not shown any respect at all. I got so demoralised on the first day when I officially started teaching that I couldn't sleep well that night. People tell me to just ignore the noisy ones. But I feel so irresponsible if I don't teach the whole class effectively. It's impossible to teach well in a noisy environment. I guess it's partly my fault. I'm just not fierce or firm enough.

At the moment, I'm just living day by day, with no sense of purpose and direction, only looking forward to my pay cheque every month, but not thoroughly enjoying my job. I realise I do not like children as much as I thought. Now whenever I see groups of roudy teenagers on the streets, I find them a pain in the neck. I think I'm not suited for teaching, which requires one to be an educator, parent, administrative officer, social worker and police officer (dealing with gangsters). I don't mind the 1st three roles, but certainly not the last two.

I'm back to engaging in my past favourite hobby: flipping through the Recruit Section. At the meantime, I shall go back to my marking and preparation of lesssons for the little emperors and empresses.

Working Life..

2005-08-05T23:07:00.000-07:00

My life for the past week and the next 2.5 months would be as follows: Wake up at 6am and be in bed by 10.30pm on weekdays. I shan't be going into the details of what I do in between those times as I don't wish to indulge in the favourite hobby of the people in my profession: Complaining. All I want to say is that getting a bunch of 13-14 year old kids to shut up and listen to you is no easy task. My perception of a certain group of people has been reinforced through this 1.5 weeks. Shouting doesn't work. So does staring. Maybe I should start taking drastic measures once I officially take over the classes. Whatever it is, I hate discipling kids. At times, I wish they could stop being so talkative and disruptive. Ok, I shall quit whinning.

At least the week ended on a positive note. Managed to build rapport with some of my sec 1 students through my first CCA meeting. While testing out the grand piano with my current favourite song (Guang Liang's tong hua), the kids who were surrounding the piano actually sang along. I was really pleasantly surprised. It's quite a satisying feeling when there are people who appreciate my music and request for repeated playings. There was even one student who asked me to teach her how to play! It got me to realise that not all of them are so disobedient after all. Anyway, the ironic thing is that their current music teacher knows nothing about pop music. When the students approached him to play a song, he told them he only knew how to play Classical music. Immediately, the kids weren't interested already. I don't blame them. What would a neighbourhood school student know about Beethoven's music?

Exhausted. Bedtime.

Unblemished Record..

2005-07-31T18:40:00.000-07:00

My 4 year unblemished driving record came to an end yesterday when I was involved in an accident. I was totally shell-shocked when this stupid van came speeding down onto my left and scratched the part of my car above my left front wheel. It happened at the merging lane. I'm not 100% fault free as I didn't signal. But that doesn't mean the van driver is not responsible as he was definitely above the speed limit. I didn't get to see the extent of the damage till I reached my destination as Mr Lim was the one who got out of the car to settle matters with the van driver. The damage wasn't as bad as I thought. It was slightly dented but there were quite a bit of scratches. I was relieved upon seeing it. But after getting back on to the car, my heart ached and my eyes got watery. I felt so guilty for damaging my car. I've always treated my car as a human being and I was terribly upset upon seeing it get hurt. I felt so sorry for my car. For the rest of the day, I behaved like a zombie.

What I found amusing was the different kind of reactions I got from my parents and brother. Mr Lim told me that accidents happened all the time and told me to stop brooding over it. My dad was like, "Aiyah, small matter, no scratches on the door right? Then never mind." My mum said that too initially, but after a while, she couldn't resist asking what actually happened and whose fault was it. "See! Never signal lah, always laugh at me when I signal. Make sure you learn your lesson. Must signal at least 30 seconds to give people ample notice. Those kind of vans, you think they care even if they had seen you? They will juz squeeze their way through."

Whatever it is, I am going to fork out for the repair damages the moment my first pay cheque comes in. By the way, the van driver actually demanded $200 from Mr Lim upon getting down his van. Of course Mr Lim wasn't going to let him get a single cent. His van was barely damaged as his back bumper scratched against my car. Anyway even if it was, I'm quite certain it doesn't need $200 for repairs. My repairs would cough out to be less than $200, so his is defintely nowhere near mine.

My only consolation is that I took close to 4 years to get my car damaged while Mr Lim took 4 days. But still, the fact is that I single-handedly damaged my beloved car. There's no way I can get rid of this guilt even after paying for the damages. And I would be constantly reminded of it the next few days as I'm only going to get it repaired this Friday. I can't afford to have my car lying in the mechanic for a day because I would need it to get to my workplace.

Oh, forgot to mention an uncanny coincidence. The car plate number of the van coincides the first 4 digits of my IC number. Perhaps I should go buy 4D after all it's my first major car accident. Hopefully the win would help liften up my spirits.

Neighbourhood Schools..

2005-07-23T23:57:00.000-07:00

I've to admit I do not have a good impression of students from neighbourhood schools. Perhaps it has something to do with stereotyping and the fact that I do not have close friends from neighbourhood schools (with the exception of one, but she only entered one because she didn't sit for PSLE). The information I gather about these students are from newspapers and 'horror' stories from Barbara. With regards to newspaper articles, it's mostly about them getting involved in gang fights or crimes. As for Barbara, she complains about them being roudy, inattentive and disrespectful. This is not to say that ALL of them behave this way. A handful of them behaving like that is enough to create a bad impression of them in my head.

I hate to say this but I feel that I behave like an elitist. This is most evident when I entered a neighbourhood JC. Coming from an autonomous secondary school, I felt superior as most of my classmates came from neighbourhood schools. In fact, I suffered from a 'culture shock' when I first stepped in there. Mostly spoke Mandarin and their standard of English was quite atrocious. Not many people faithfully did their tutorials. In other words, their work attitude was terrible. This was especially so in my JC2 class (which only took 3 A Level subjects). It was quite easy to top the class, especially for GP and Mathematics C. I seldom bothered to mix around as I couldn't communicate with many of them. These people are nice but somehow, there seems to be a gulf between us in terms of mentality, attitude and thinking. And I always laughed at the way they addressed whichever tutor. Instead of "Miss Tan" or whatever, they would shout out "Cher!" (teaCHER). To sum it all, I found the behaviour of most neighbourhood students (those in my class) odd. To be fair to them, I'm just too prim and proper. So I guess it ain't their fault.

So it wasn't surprising when being asked which kind of schools I prefer to teach in, without any hesitation, I answered "branded schools". I immediately regretted my frank answer. But now that I step back and think about it, the reason why I said it was because I don't know what to expect of a neighbourhood secondary school. The greatest fear for most situations is not knowing what to expect. It's just like interviews or sometimes exams. Most people get worried because they are unsure of what would be asked or tested. It's the same for me. Hearing and reading about neighbourhood students is one matter. Witnessing them behaving in a classroom is another. Thus, in reality, I have no idea what a neighbourhood school is like. By stereotyping, as from what I encounter whenever I pass by a neighbourhood school, I reckon most of them to be ah bengs and ah lians . As I'm far from an ah lian, I'm in fact a little wary on how to deal with them. All I hope for now is that my impression of them would not be reinforced when I step in the classroom this Wednesday.

Sleepless Night..

2005-07-21T12:35:00.000-07:00

My attempts to sleep early these few night have failed miserably. I go to bed around 11pm in the hope of just dozing off and waking up early. However, I either end up listening to this CD that I bought on an impulse or read some magazine/book, which just makes things worse by delaying my sleeping time and waking up time. Surprisingly I did none of the above last night. I lay on bed, shut my eyes, hugged my teddy bear tight, and subconsiously started analyzing the so-called 'relationship matters' revolving the people around me..

Starting with the gals.

1) Female A is a weirdo. Her potential partner is rich, quite good-looking, possesss above average intelligence and willing to sacrifice anything for Female A. Female A enjoys the times spent together with Guy. However, Female A refuses to admit that she's dating Guy. Female A thinks that there will be no future between she and Guy. Reason? Female A strictly adheres to her 'no kids' principle. Guy probably can't accept that. So, Female A maintains, "We are just friends.", even though their behaviour together mirrors just like any other dating couple.

2) Female B is rich, pretty and in her own words, "bimbotic". Female B has set her sights on getting married at the age of 25, which leaves her slightly less than 2 years to do so. Problem? Female B has no bf. Female B has been going out on dates set by her colleagues and close friends but to no avail. Recently, she has finally found a target who meets her strict criteria. Another problem though. The target is attached.

3) Female C spends all her time watching dramas and movies revolving a rich, cute guy and a poor girl. She dreams of having a Prince Charming but makes no attempt to take any action in finding. Perhaps she believes in fate: One fine day while waiting at her bus-stop, her Prince Charming would drive past and pick her up in his SLK. The real reason I suspect she is not worried is because her family back home has already arranged a matchmaking session with her Prince Charming.

4) Female D has to seek approval from her Pastor on whether she can go steady with a certain Guy. Needless to say, the Guy has to be a Christian. If the Pastor says No, just too bad for them. According to Female D, "everything is in God's hands".

5) Female E has sold her soul to God. Enough said.

6) Female F knows what she wants, but just can't find her Mr Right. Female F won't commit to a relationship unless she's 90% confident about the future between the two of them. Female F has been contemplating whether to lower her expectations, or to be left on the shelf.

Moving on to the guys.

1) Male A changes gf at every new stage of his life. Male A behaves as if nothing had happened after each breakup or quarrel. His behaviour makes me wonder whether he has ever been serious in each of his failed relationship.

2) Male B seems to be the exact opposite of Male A. He gets upset and sleepless nights after each quarrel with his gf. Despite the vast differences in ideals and lifestyles between he and his gf, he still treasures the relationship a lot and wants a future to hold for them.

3) Male C has set his target but just don't know how to make the first move.

4) Male D has the future layed out for himself and his family. However, he doesn't have a gf. No worries for him though. Calling himself a love expert, he has been 'shopping' around and would only make the move when he has found the 'perfect one' that fits.

5) Male E seems unable to let go of the past. He has many female friends and acts like a total bua ya but being a devoted guy, he's still waiting for his ex. At the meantime, he looks out for chio bus (regardless of race) to satisfy his lust.

6) Male F has a phobia of commitment and marriage. He is satisfied with his current lifestyle. Having a female companion is enough. A marriage is just an unnecessary formality to him.

It's weird that I actually did such a thorough job analyzing the people around me while I was sleeping. The world is actually filled with so many different characters. I guess that's what makes life so interesting.

NUS Days..

2005-07-16T18:08:00.000-07:00

Me and Qiuxuan

Photo taken by ourselves in the AS7 Computer Lab while researching for information for our Health Economics Project. I must admit it's the most relaxing project I've done in NUS.

Financial Economics Buddies

Outside AS6 Photocopying room 'discussing' past year exam papers after our last Financial Economics lecture. 'Discussing' seems inappropriate. We ended up copying Jennifer's answers, as usual :)

Cheat Sheet

My disgusting handwriting, more often regarded as Indian scripts. Trying to squeeze a whole semester's work into a piece of A4 sheet requires much technique.

Nostalgic mood. I miss schooling, especially in NUS. Those were the least stressful times in my formal education. Only needed to concentrate on studying. 4 day week. What more can one ask for? Commencement on 14th July 2005 marked the end of my whole education chapter. Would be entering the labour force soon. I'm sad that 19 years of schooling have come to an end.

Moving On..

2005-07-13T11:55:00.000-07:00

Upon hearing the news, I was shell-shocked. It took a while for the news to sink in. It has been a long time since I felt this way.

I dislike losing. Since young, I took defeats very hard. I would sulk the whole day or even cry whenever I lose, especially in individual games or whatever 'competitions' between my friends or relatives. But as I grew older, I learnt that there would be a winner and a loser in every competition. I began to learn how to lose graciously and admit that I lost because I was not as good as my opponent.

Things are different this time. Up to now, I still can't believe I lost to someone of such calibre. I'm not sure I would have been any happier if I had won, but I just hate the feeling of losing. The reason why I'm so sore is that I believe I did nothing wrong this time round. False hopes were given to me. I thought I was high and mighty. Maybe that's the reason why I lost: I was too over-confident of myself. As usual, I over-estimated my own abilities. So, I was brought tumbling down to earth when I learnt of my defeat.

I managed to get over the loss a day after hearing the news. But recently, I've been reminded of it again and the disappointment hit me once more and even harder this time round. The sore feeling did not go away quickly and I doubt it would go away anytime soon.

The perfect solution now would be avoidance. Also, things that remind me of the defeat have either been gotten rid of or shelved away out of my sight. It actually took me a while to get rid of that inexpensive thing but once I threw it, I felt a sense of relief. It then struck me that things wouldn't have worked out well even if I had won.

It's time to move on.

Dog Matters..

2005-07-07T16:22:00.000-07:00

As if stripping wasn't bad enough, in his latest album, my former idol Alex To even went to the extent of singing some dog barking song. I wouldn't even call it a song. Noise would be more appropriate. After hearing 10 seconds of that 'song', I had to switch the radio station. If not, that irritating 'melody' would come to haunt me when I'm trying to sleep at night. It saddens me that Alex To has to degrade to such a standard. At the meantime, I'll just have to be contended with his decade old CDs.

I can't understand how some married couples can derive pleasure from substituting children with dogs/cats. Rearing pets carries less responsibility. If you are in a foul mood, you can shout at the poor animal or simply ignore it. Should you be in high spirits, you can bring the pet for a stroll and buy clothes/accessories to doll it up (which I find it superbly ridiculous). Taking care of a pet costs less than a child. A dog doesn't need to receive an education. Neither do you need to make sure your dog grows up to be an upright animal. However, does a dog have feelings? Does a dog have any thoughts? Or rather, can a dog express itself verbally? In what way does an animal replace a child? Is it because the animal is incapable of speech and arguing back at you? Or is it because the animal would meekly obey you? Tell it to sit and it will most probably sit. Tell a child to sit and he'll most probably ignore you. Yes, I agree that most dogs would bark in joy when the owner comes back. However, the human touch seems to be lacking here. Furthermore not all dogs recognize its owners. Just read in today's newspapers that a dog attacked it's owner's child. That damn dog had been terrorizing other smaller dogs and people in the neighbourhood. The poor child was screaming in pain when the dog attacked him. That damn dog doesn't even recognise a person it has been living with for years. Whatever it is, it just disgusts me when married couples say they prefer having pets than children. Otherwise, I'm absolutely fine with married couples who do not wish to have children. It's their own wish.

I feel some dog owners ought to be educated. A few dog owners in my neighbourhood do not bother picking up their dog's shit outside other people's compound once their dogs have performed their nature's call. It's definitely not a nice sight when I come home and get greeted by stinking fly-infested shit. Letting their dog shit right outside my house is bad enough. Not picking up the mess is worse. There are other more 'considerate' dog owners who would pick up the mess. However they dispose it into my rubbish bin! For goodness sake, I don't own the dog. Dog owners should jolly well throw their dog shit into their own rubbish bin. Imagine my poor maid who opens our rubbish bin cover and be overwhelmed with dog shit and that stench. It amazes me that such selfish people actually exist. Where have all the years of moral education learnt in schools gone to? Very soon, I'll have to install a video camera outside my gate to catch the culprits. I'll not hesitate to give the dog owners a piece of my mind when I find out who they are. I hate inconsiderate people.

My Cousins..

2005-07-06T00:30:00.000-07:00

We cousins used to be very close. Weekly meetings were held without fail at each of our houses. We played almost everything together. Board games (Risk, Cluedo, Monopoly), sports (badminton, swimming), childish games (hide-and-seek, catching, 5 stones, barbie dolls, lego) and card games (UNO, Donkey) were the most common activities we engaged in. However, the weekly meet-ups were slowly reduced to monthly meetings due to something called exams. A certain aunt felt that studies were more important than maintaining bonds.

Things got worse when we entered secondary schools. As each of us began a new chapter and started building our social lives within our own network, the need to meet-up between us cousins was greatly diminished. Within a few years, we were practically reduced to meer strangers who met up only during the first 2 days of CNY. The first day of every subsequent CNY was not so bad. After all, having not caught up with one another for such a long period of time, there were bound to be matters to talk about. However, by the second day, we would run out of things to say. Some cousins won't even bother turning up while others disappear to their gf's/bf's place leaving behind the younger ones (which obviously includes me) being bored to tears.

Now that almost all of us have graduated, the meetings have suddenly came back. That same aunt who initially reduced the meeting-up sessions has been the organizer so far. Things are no longer so awkward now that we've grown older and that some of us are going to share the same profession in the near future. But having been apart and not constantly keeping up-to-date with one another's lives, I find it hard to maintain the ties that we once shared. Each of us is so different now. We each lead our own lives. We each have our own priorities in life. We no longer have as many common interests. We are no longer the small kids who will get together just to play games and have fun. Some of us would rather not meet-up as there are other more exicting things lined up in our agenda.

I feel that my aunt's actions have come a bit too late. Re-building bonds between a group of dissimilar adults would definitely be an arduous task.

Wimbledon Champion..

2005-07-04T12:36:00.000-07:00

Wimbledon Champion, Roger Federer.

Rog produced a flawless display of tennis and showed everyone why he's the undisputable King of Grass when he dismantled the 2nd seeded Roddick in 3 straight sets. All my pre-match nerves were quickly erased the moment the 1st ball was struck. The first set was gone within 21 minutes with 2 breaks of serves by Rog. The set was clinched with an on-rushing Roddick being passed by a clinical crosscourt backhand that just clipped the sideline. It all seemed too easy for Rog that I worried he would doze off to his 'sleep mode' when he didn't even need to break a sweat.

The second set was a much closer affair. I was proven right when Rog was broken in the 3rd game with a string of uncharacteristic unforced errors. To the neutral tennis fans, finally a match was on. Rog failed to break in the next game and Roddick led 3-1. I was getting nervous now. But Rog stepped up a gear and produced winner after winner to break back. I was feeling more relaxed now. Although he wasted 2 set points on the Roddick serve at 5-4, Rog didn't look frustrated at all. He was still so calm and composed while I lamented the loss of them. I wondered whether the 2 set points would come back to haunt him. The inevitable tie-break came and Rog quickly moved to a 3-0 lead. However, his concentration let him down once more and the lead was cut to 3-2 with points being on serve. Sensing danger, Rog stamped his authority with breathtaking shots that left the spectators gasping for air. Roddick was clearly frustrated when he smashed his racket while trailing 5-2. Soon, the set was over with Rog winning 7-2 on the tie-break.

The weather gods seems to pity Roddick and decided to give him a timely break. Rain drops fell onto the Centre Court and play was suspended for approximately 15 minutes. Would there be a revival for Roddick? After all, last year, Rog was greatly helped by the rain as he was totally outplayed in the 1st set. Play resumed and Roddick produced his first double fault of the match. Were my worries unfounded? Anyway, Roddick came out a totally different player. His trademark booming forehands which troubled Rog last year started coming. But Rog was well-prepared and broke Roddick for a 4-3 lead. By then Rog was just concentrating on holding his own serve and not applying any sort of pressure on the Roddick serve. Serving for the set has always proven to be difficult for Rog. These fears were quickly dismissed when Rog served 2 outrageous aces. The second was even on a second serve. At 30-0, Rog put in a good serve which Roddick somehow manage to retrieve. However, with an open court to play, Rog dumped a simple backhand into the net and showed that he's human after all. At match point, Rog served an unreturnable serve to Roddick's backhand. After 1h 41min, it was game, set, match. Rog sunk to his knees and finally let his emotions run. Tears flowed from his eyes. Everyone in the stadium gave him a standing ovation, and so did all the long-suffering Rog fans watching from their living rooms.

Grandma's Worries..

2005-07-02T12:42:00.000-07:00

Recent conversations with my Grandma and my good friend struck me that I'm no longer getting young. After celebrating my good friend's birthday a few days back, I just realised I'm reaching a grand age of 23 at the end of the year.

Grandma has been especially worried about my singlehood status for the past few months. Whenever I step out of the house, she would no doubt ask who I'm going out with. If I mention my usual female friend's name, she'll just leave it as it is. But if I keep telling her that I'm going out with a female, she'll get concerned and start questioning me in Hainanese, "Why your friends all girls? You got no guy friends huh? You too stuck-up is it?"

At times, when I decided to be completely honest with her, I realised I made a grave mistake.

Grandma : Where did you go just now?
Me : Went out.
Grandma : With who?
Me : Friend.
Grandma: Guy or Girl?
Me : Guy.
Grandma : How old is he? How do you know him? How many siblings does he have? What are his parents working as? How tall is he? Working already or not? Work as what? Earn how much? What's he like? Nice or not? Where he stay? What kind of housing? etc.............

After answering her barrage of questions to my utmost ability, she would go,

Grandma : So, you like him or not?
Me : Ok loh, just friends, nothing else.
Grandma: That's it? Really not interested at all?
Me : Hmm, ya, no sparks but can talk lah.
Grandma: Aiyah, why like that? Anyway, next time don't go out with him already then.
Me : Huh?
Grandma: Ya, if you go out with him again, he may get the wrong impression and think you are interested in him. Don't waste his time and your time also.

I don't know whether to be amused or exasperated with her. To people of her generation, a guy going out with the same girl twice is equivalent to marriage. The word 'platonic' probably doesn't exist in her dictionary. There's absolutely no point in explaining to her that good friends can be of the opposite sex.

Anyway, that's not all. Brother's friends, neighbours and her san gu liu po's grandsons all become her potentional grandson-in-law. And I get damn embarrassed when she starts boasting to her friends how great her granddaughter is in her vain attempts to marry me off. Her favourite phrase, "Whoever marries my granddaughter would be the luckiest man on earth." I feel like puking whenever she says that. Her granddaughter here can't cook or sew, doesn't wash the dishes or clean the house, only knows how to eat, sleep and watch tv. In what way would my husband be fortunate if he marries me?

Whatever it is, I've learnt my lesson. I'm never ever going to tell her that I'm going out with Tom, Dick or Harry. I wouldn't want to be in for an interrogation. As for her matchmaking tactics, there's no stopping her unless the day comes when I introduce my potential husband to her, which I suspect, would be a long time to come.

Two Issues..

2005-06-26T18:41:00.000-07:00

A 4 set win for Rog and he's through to the 2nd week of the Championships. Things are not shaping as nicely as expected, but then again, a smooth sailing passage is not the best preparation. Some sort of struggle would be good for him, especially the mental aspect of his game. 2 double faults in a game to hand the break to the opponent is a real gift, which I hope would not be repeated in the next few rounds.

2 issues which I had been discussing with my friends over the past few weeks have sprouted over the newspapers yesterday and today. The first was regarding matchmaking agencies. Having graduated from NUS, I would automatically become a member of SDU, which stands for Social Development Union, or rather, Singles Desperate Union. A close friend of mine who had graduated last year is vehemently against joining their activities. I was even admonished by her to speak softer in this rather quiet eating place when I mentioned the 3 dreaded alphabets. In her perception, and probably the vast majority, people who take part in the activities organized by SDU are average or even ugly looking, uncool, nerdy, desperate, unwanted and socially inept. If not, why would they need to seek help in finding a life partner?

In a way to counter this, many hip and trendy matchmaking agencies have sprung out. For an annual fee one forks out, one gets a certain number of dates a year. Members are mostly young professionals ranging from lawyers, doctors and bankers. So does it mean to say you pay for what you get? If I'm not wrong, membership for SDU is free for the 1st year only. Subsequently you have to pay some amount, which I suspect will still be less than matchmaking agencies like Lunch Actually and Two To Tango. "You pay peanuts, you get monkeys" and "she3 me4 qian3, she3 me4 huo4"". I wonder if these 2 sayings really apply to matchmaking agencies as well. But fairly speaking, at least SDU has been making efforts to revamp its image. Activities such as karaoke, mahjong and even tennis sessions are included now. Sounds pretty enticing to me.

The 2nd issue is that of guys holding their gfs'/wife's handbag. I'm totally aghast by that. In fact, I find it an amusing sight. It just shows that the guy has no backbone. It doesn't matter if the handbag is flowery, pinkish or whatever pattern. How heavy can a handbag be? Please girls, don't act like a damn spoilt brat. Holding a hundred grams of weight for a few hours is not such a demanding chore. And guys, you holding your beloved's bag is not a sign of your gentlemanly and caring behaviour. It just shows what a weakling and hen-pecked person you are. There are many other ways to display your love for your beloved. Being caring would be letting your partner rest when he/she is sick and not demanding that the poor sick fellow goes window-shopping/dining out everyday with you. Being loving would be not making unreasonable demands and not being bossy. Being considerate and attentive would mean not letting your poor partner hold on to the phone while you start gossiping on the other line or watch tv for more than 5 minutes. It's the little things like these that really matter. Holding a ladies bag is just a showy way of portraying being caring.

Sania Mirza..

2005-06-23T17:02:00.000-07:00

After watching the repeat telecast of last night's match between Sania Mirza and US Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova, I realise I have nothing against the rising Indian star. She's a talent to watch out for. But I'm totally annoyed with the Indian commentator Vijay Arbitraj (not even sure if it's the correct spelling, I don't give a damn). I can understand he's extremely excited about the prospect of his fellow Indian tennis player beating the Russian. However he seems to forget he is paid to be a COMMENTATOR, and not some crazy fan like me, who can curse and scream at the opponent whenever I wish. Here are some examples of why he irritates me.

When Kuznetsova hits a ball into the net, Vijay goes, "Yes!!!!"
When Kuznetsova overhits the ball, Vijay goes, "It's long!!!"
When Kuznetsova produces a good serve and Mirza mis-times the ball, Vijay goes, "That's what nerves can do to you." Hello, it was a superb serve. Mirza just couldn't get her body out of the way in time. What has it got to do with nerves?
When Mirza hits a cross-court forehand winner, Vijay exclaims, "What a glorious winner!" Yawn... If you've been watching tennis long enough, you see those kind of shots being hit 1 out of 10 times. What's the big deal?
During the 2nd set tie-break, Vijay keeps cheering for his woman, "Come on, Mirza, you've got to push it to the 3rd set." And when Mirza finally won the 2nd set, Vijay screamed as if Mirza had won The Championship.

I couldn't bear to watch the 3rd set anymore even though I knew Mirza lost. Vijay doesn't give credit to Kuznetsova whenever she plays well. He goes on and on about how good Mirza is. I admit at times, her tennis is wonderful to watch. But it's a bit too much when he describes her as if she's the goddess of tennis. Come on, even Sharapova or Serena doesn't get such treatment from him. Moreover she's certainly not the female version of Rog. What irks me more is that the other commentator, Alan Wilkins, is being influenced by Vijay. Ok, to be fair, at least he cheers for Kuznetsova when she hits a winner. However, like Vijay, it's so obvious that he's supporting Mirza. They are flouting the so called rules of being a sports commentator. I understand that everyone has a favourite player. But can they at least minimize their bias during the match and stop giving a one sided view on what's happening during the match? If they can't contain their excitement or control their emotions, then jolly well do not commentate that match. Or is it because other commentators like John McEnroe and Boris Becker can't even be bothered to watch Mirza that they have to get Vijay to do the commentory? I wish that Vijay can just shut up at times. His evil and cynical laughter is giving me creeps.

I'm sorry that Mirza has to meet a seeded player so early during the tournament and bow out on the 3rd day of The Championships. But I'm just glad that Vijay can finally shut his big mouth about what a nice person and exciting player she is. I'm sick of her and he has to shoulder all the blame.

Asian Players..

2005-06-22T23:00:00.000-07:00

ESPN StarSports' obsession with showing 'live' telecast of Asian players is driving me nuts. On Day 1 of Wimbledon, the first 2.5 hours was dedicated to a match between the hottest female Indian player, Mirza and a Japanese player named Asagoe. I wonder why they do not have the cow sense to switch telecast to the centre court or court 1 once play has started there. Yes, I know there are 1 billion Indians out there rooting for their country woman. But please spare a thought for other neutral tennis spectators/fans out there. I, for one, am certaintly not entertained by watching these 2 Asian players slog it out on court 17. I'm surprised they even have a camera there!And today, instead of showing the big match between Marat Safin and Mark Philippousis, what were they showing?? Lee XX versus Juan Carlos Ferrero and S Perry versus Tamarine Tanasugarn. They would show whichever match which contains an Asian in them. I'm not even asking them to telecast Rog's match even though he's playing now. At least exercise some common sense in deciding which match contains more excitement and is worth watching.

Recently met up with my cousin who has been studying abroad for the past 4 years. I must admit the overseas stint did him good. He carries himself much better now and has become more sociable, mature and humourous. I was highly amused by his comments on NTU guys, which I shan't mention here. Would probably be meeting him and his brother this weekend.

Also heard from a 7 year net-friend of mine through email. Chatted with him quite often through IRC during my JC days but subsequently lost touch with him when he served NS and went to London for his undergraduate studies, as he was hardly on MSN. Only received an occassional Merry Xmas sms/email from him when he came back to Spore. I've always admired him given his background and it sometimes make me terribly ashamed of myself as I'm much more fortunate than him. Whatever it is, I'm glad he's doing well and it was really nice to hear from him again.

Blogging Matters..

2005-06-14T17:55:00.000-07:00

It seems pretty ironic. During the school semester, where I have tonnes of work to do and piles of readings to digest, I would somehow find lots of things to blog on. Be it Rog's ups and downs, my anger towards certain people, my driving experiences etc. Now that school has ended and I'm techinically speaking on vacation, with so much time to spare, I have nothing to contribute to my blog. I came up with numerous explanations for this weird syndrome.

Unlike some people who treat their blog as a diary which they record practically all their daily activities, I'm not one with such a habit. If I've to do so, I think my blog entries would be the same on alternate days due to my boring and routine lifestyle.

A second reason would be that I tend to write when I'm frustrated, angry and upset over some matters or someone (which I definitely would not mention the name in case that someone happens to stumble upon my blog or happen to be one of my friends). I've no intention of making enemies with anyone. Even if I'm really pissed with someone, I'll just give a vague description of what angers me and make sure I leave no clue on who the person is. So since I'm basically enjoying myself just before I start work, I've nothing to be upset about and hence, nothing to write in here.

Happy events are not included in my blog. The only joyful things that I record would be Rog winning tournaments. To me, happy, sweet and satisfying moments need not be recorded down. They would be forever registered in my memory. And seriously, when one is in high spirits, one need not tell the whole world about it. I treat my blog as an avenue for frustration, which explains my lack of entries in sharing wonderful moments that I had with anyone.

Personal thoughts and feelings are seldom penned here. That's the difference between a blog and a diary. A blog is one where everyone has access to whereas the old-fashion handwritten diary is for my own personal reference. I've no intention of letting anyone know who I'm really disappointed with and with regards to what matter, who I dislike or like and what I'm feeling at whichever moment of time. I've to admit I'm no saint. I do bitch about people at times but this is not the right place to do so. My best pals and my good old diary share the 'honour' of listening to my whinings and complaints.

I'm currently watching the last episode of this more than a decade old Hong Kong TVB drama classic. It brings back lots of nostalgic moments. The new offers excitement and refreshing moments. However, in my opinion, the new can never replace the old. I'm not only talking about tv dramas, but also blogging and most importantly, people.

Rog Truimphs..

2005-06-12T22:27:00.000-07:00

Rog beat Safin in a warm-up tournament for Wimbledon to claim his third consecutive title in Halle, Germany. A hat-trick of Wimbledon truimphs for Rog would be good. A barren year of Grand Slams is hard to imagine.

Oh, and Roddick just won too. A fantastic weekend for Mrs Federer and Mrs Roddick :)

Thought Provoking..

2005-06-10T10:30:00.000-07:00

Lessons in Living

Learn to laugh. A good laugh is better than medicine.

Learn to attend to your own business. Few men can handle their own well.

Learn to say kind things. Nobody ever resents them.

Learn to stop grumbling. If you can't see any good in the world, keep the bad to yourself.

Learn to hide aches with a smile. Nobody else is interested anyway.

Learn to keep troubles to yourself. Nobody wants to take them from you.

Source: Tecman

Facing Reality..

2005-06-08T17:46:00.000-07:00

Since Rog's loss to Nadal at Roland Garros, I've refused to read any tennis websites. The loss is too bitter to swallow. Nadal isn't as good as most people make him out to be. How far can one go with a double-handed backhand? Nadal didn't beat Rog in that match. Rog simply succumb to pressure and failed to even put shots in during crucial moments. I hate players who are not aggressive, simply put, they only hit winners when they are forced to. If not, during normal rallies, they are just contended with placing the ball in at 3/4 court. They are the kind of players who make few unforced errors. They can just hit the ball all day without getting tired.

Furthermore how unlucky can Rog get? The semi-final loss to Safin at Australian Open was played on Safin's birthday. Again, the semi-final loss to Nadal at French Open was played on Nadal's birthday. Rog, I know you are nice but that doesn't mean you have to deliver such a huge birthday present to your opponent. Or do the gods simply favour birthday boys? I hope Rog's next semi-final opponent (hopefully if Rog gets there) doesn't fall on the opponent's birthday. Rog is probably suffering from some birthday curse.

Anyhow, I wish Nadal would join the growing list of active male players in being one slam wonders. Just to name a few, they are Michael Chang, Albert Costa, Carlos Moya and Juan Carlos Ferrero (don't think he has the potential to win anymore due to his multiple injuries). Notice the similarities? They are all French Open champions and with the exception of Michael Chang, they are of Spanish nationality. I won't congratulate Rafael Nadal of his truimph. Call me a sore loser but I feel Rog wasn't outplayed by Nadal, unlike the Australian Open match against Safin. With Wimbledon starting in less than a fortnight, let's see how Nadal would adjust to the grass surface. No more long rallies for him. Hope he gets bundled out early by those wildcard big servers. And I don't think he deserves to be sharing the top spot with Rog at the ATP champions race. After all, 4 of his tournamnent victories came on clay. Clay-court king would be more appropriate. Whatever it is, I hate Nadal.

Tough Call..

2005-06-06T22:58:00.000-07:00

For the past fortnight, I received no phone calls from unfamiliar numbers. The call that I've been waiting for finally came today. Of all times, it had to come after I signed my job contract, went for the medical check-up and took a photo for some card. Sigh. Why didn't they call earlier? Anyway, I'm now consoling myself that I may not land the job even though I've been granted an audition/interview. And I suspect the pay is much lower than the one I'm offered. Furthermore, it would require irregular working hours. I'm a person who loves routine and can't sleep late. Whatever it is, I've only myself to blame for signing the contract so early. If only I wasn't so anxious to get things done so quickly.

It's hard to decide between one's interest and economic returns. I wonder why all the industries that I'm interested in working for all provide very low monetary returns and shitty working hours. I've always stressed that interest is important in a job. Otherwise, the job would turn up to be a chore and one would be dreading to go to work everyday. However, one has to be practical too. After all, I've studied close to 2 decades. It would not be justifiable to settle for a job which offers such meagre pay. Moreover, I don't think I'm the kind of person who can survive by living simply. This is not to say that I'm a spendthrift. However I do indulge in some form of exorbitant shopping spree when I need to. Looks like I've to forgo my interest for higher pay. I hope I made the right decision this time.

Bangalore Experience..

2005-06-03T17:15:00.000-07:00

Upon touching down Bangalore, India, Dad and his colleague took a taxi to their hotel. Traffic was crawling. Drivers blaring horns at one another, drivers switching lanes at their own risks, drivers not following traffic rules (not sure if they were even of existence there). In short, the roads were chaotic.

While they were travelling, a motorcyclist in front of their taxi suddenly braked. The taxi driver managed to stop in time to avoiding hitting the motorcyclist but another motorcyclist behind the taxi was a fraction too late. To avoid confusion, the motorcyclist in front of the taxi shall be called MF and the motorcyclist behind would be named MB. MF rode off while the taxi driver came down to check the extent of the damage to his vehicle and to confront MB. After a couple of minutes of heated discussion between the pair of Indian men, the taxi driver got back onto the car and drove off. Dad and his colleague thought that the matter had been resolved. But Dad's colleague realised that the taxi driver was heading onto the wrong road. So he informed the driver. The taxi driver told both of them to sit tight as he was trying to chase after MF! Apparently, during the discussion with MB, both of them came to the conclusion that the fault lies with MF, not MB. Both the taxi driver and MB were trying to hunt down MF.

After a kilometre or so, they managed to track down MF and cornered him to prevent him from escaping. Apparently, he tried dodging away from them once. The taxi driver, MF and MB confronted one another and started arguing. Obviously Dad and his colleague didn't understand Tamil and didn't know what was happening. Soon, a crowd appeared on the roadside. A few even joined in the discussion to decide who was at fault! A while later, the taxi driver took out his handphone to make a call while the argument continued between MB, MF and the people on the streets. After making the call, the taxi driver politely apologised to my Dad and his colleague about the delay and let them know that another taxi would be on his way to pick them up and fetch them to their destination. Dad told him that they weren't in a hurry. The taxi driver replied, "Sir, I think it would take a few hours to settle this matter." I couldn't stop laughing when I heard that. I thought this kind of thing only happens in Tamil movies or drama serials. To think that Dad was actually caught in the midst of a real drama. Anyway, a few minutes later, another cab came and drove them away while the saga continued.

The above is just one of the numerous stories that Dad narrated to me from his overseas trip. I love it when Dad comes back from his business trips. I derive lots of entertainment from his countless and interesting encounters with the locals which I certainly would not experience even when I went on my packaged tour holidays. And he never fails to get me a T-shirt from each city he visits if I've never been to that country. But this time, for some reason which I shan't mention, he didn't do so. Instead, he brought back a whole box of my favourite fruit: mango :) However, I'm not sure if a certain Mr Lim has the courage to consume them, due to his rather weak tummy.

Familiar Route..

2005-06-02T18:01:00.000-07:00

It just occured to me that my days in NUS are finally over. While driving to somewhere near NUS today, I realised it would be the last time that I would be travelling on this 25 minute drive familiar route. I'll miss cruising down the ECP, decelerating near the speed camera, road-racing with strangers, performing dangerous overtaking manoeuvres, speeding, crawling during peak hours, forcing my way in changing lanes, flashing headlights at road hoggers, overshooting my expressway exit and many others. I'll also miss rushing from one place to another within the Arts faculty, but I certainly won't miss shuttling from one faculty to another. After all, most of the cross-faculty modules hurt me badly and the worst part was taking them as graded. Anyway, I hate squeezing the damn shuttle bus.

It seems not long ago that I just started my undergraduate studies. 4 years zoomed by so quickly. The first 3 years were rather uneventful. Due to my rather mediocre grades, I was unsure whether to continue pursuing my honours degree or just graduate with a Bachelor of Arts degree. In the end, I chose the former. I still wanted to study and enjoy life rather than slog it out in the working world. Anyway, I wasn't prepared to enter the workforce as yet. But the real juvenile reason why I didn't want to graduate back then was because I wanted to graduate together with my brother and my 3 other cousins. I'm glad I made that choice. The 4th year has been very rewarding, not only academically. Due to Wanpei's wide social network, I made many new friends from the econs honours class, some of whom I've not even seen in my past 3 years in NUS. They consist of jokers, extremely helpful study companions, 'kiasu' people, promising singers, Murtabak companion, fellow Rog and soccer fans, tennis buddies, mahjong kahkis etc. Not surprisingly, due to my rather anti-social nature, the number of friends I made last year is more than the number of friends I made in my previous 21 years of existence.

While disposing all my econs notes, a tinge of sadness hit me. No more stuggling with tutorial assignments, no more tests and exams, and most importantly, no more studying and trying to attain high grades. Truthfully, I think I'll miss the familiarity and routine of being an undergraduate rather than the actual studying itself. Whatever it is, I'll be joining the labour force in slightly less than 2 months time. At the meantime, I'll just enjoy as much as I can. The first 2 things I would have to do is to clear up my room and do up my Finland photos. I can hear Barbara nagging at me from a distance already. Sigh.

High Spirits..

2005-05-31T11:17:00.000-07:00

I sensed a glimmer of hope when I received an sms from Duckass this morning that Safin lost. While lying on bed, I was frantically doing my math at 830am on the possible permutations that I would attain this semester and whether they were enough to pull up my rather pathetic CAP. I needed 4 B+ which is chicken feet for many but not for me. After 5 minutes, I decided to stop thinking and go back to sleep but it was quite an impossible task. Finally decided to listen to my current 3 favourite Sammi Cheng songs which would hopefully make time go by faster. Soon, it was 8.55am. I was still too early. Decided to check today's schedule of play for Rog and read up on Safin's upset loss. The time has arrived. 9am sharp. Was very very surprised when i saw my results. I actually got an A for marcoeconomics! For the first time ever, Barbara was at home while I checked my results. Perhaps she's my lucky charm but definitely not for Rog. Whatever it is, this is the first time I feel that my efforts have really paid off. Falling sick during the exam period is not such a bad thing after all. Maybe the gods pitied me :)

Job Offer..

2005-05-27T14:57:00.000-07:00

The past 3 weeks have been spent figuring out what is it that I really want to do for the rest of my life. With an economics degree, one would automatically link it to a banking job. I did apply for them but the only reason was that banks offer a high pay. But seriously, I can't imagine myself selling financial products or slogging long hours in the office doing something that I've absolute no interest in.

I've always thought that I would enjoy administrative work as I'm no extrovert and I can survive doing paper work and not facing anyone for the whole day. Afterall, I'm a meticulous person who remembers even the most minute detail. But after going for an interview with a certain ex- statutory board, I realise that I may enjoy the work for perhaps a few months but certainly not the rest of my life. Do I really want to be supervising the cleaners in washing the toilets every 3 hours? Or ensuring that the office does not run out of printing paper? I don't think I would attain any job satistaction in doing such stuff. When I asked about the job prospects, I was really appreciative of the interviewer's frank answer. He showed me a chart showing the various positions above me. Sitting way on top of the chart was the interviewer himself. Sandwiched in between the position that I applied for and him was approximately a few thousand people. Moreover, that was only one deparment. It's not that I belittle my own abilities but seriously, what are the chances of gaining promotion? And I have no qualms that the higher managerial positions would be left for their own scholars.

Next job, insurance agent, or more nicely put, financial planner. I got called up by a certain job agency offering the position of Management Trainee. When I asked her for the company name, she reluctantly told me that it was for Prudential. I probed her further whether it has something to do with selling insurance, she refused to divulge any more information and told me that the manager would explain more when I came down for the interview. So I decided to go for it. The interviewer must have been thinking that the person sitting in front of her was insane. The first thing I told her was that I've no interest in selling insurance and that I do not really enjoy talking to strangers. I'm not the kind of outgoing person that the company wants. It's against my conscience to be persuading someone to take up some form of insurance/financial investment which I myself am totally cynical about. After 20 minutes, she finally realised that I was not suited for the job. I told her that career prospects is very important to me, and of course, I care about money. I almost wanted to laugh when she asked me how many siblings I have and whether my family was reliant on me for financial support. I felt that she was so shallow. Hello, not only the less well-off cares about money. I wouldn't want to be earning some stagnant and meagre sum of money for the rest of my life. Anyway, it wasn't really a wasted trip as she told me she would pass my resume to another department which suited my personality.

Music teacher. The music audition that I went for was a complete disaster which took me a few days to get over. In fact, I haven't touched the piano yet since that fateful day. I felt totally humiliated there. Why do you want to teach music? Coz I like music, I want to inspire children to pick up music. How? Get them interested in pop songs. Play the piano for them and get them to sing. I knew I was doomed the moment I answered that. Seriously, I didn't expect it to be an interview. I thought it was just an audition as stated in the letter. Anyway, it didn't help that the rest of the interviewees know so much about classical music while I absolutely remember nothing about it. Seriously, what's the use of classical music? It's only learnt by approximately 10% of the population, out of which only half of them are really interested. Even MM Lee has admitted his mistake in underestimating the powers of pop culture. Don't try to act high class when you are not. Just go to the 'the durian' and have a look. How many locals actually go there to listen to 'Symphony XXX'? Even if they do, it's most probably sponsored by their companies and not paid out from their own wallets. Anyway, do I really care what kind of musical instruments a certain race use to produce their so called music?

Whatever it is, the job hunt is really a an exciting but tiring chore. Looking out for jobs in the newspaper and internet, sending in resumes, changing cover letters, preparing for interviews, going for interviews etc. I've not been doing all those for the past few days as I've gotten a job offer already. I was initially disappointed that I wasn't offered a permanent position but after thinking through, I found it to be a blessing in disguise. Uptil now, I know my first interest has never been teaching. Yes, I do enjoy making a difference in the lives of children and I get a sense of satisfaction when my students are able to understand and apply the concepts that I've taught. But if given a choice, I would rather work in a sports related job and I'm even willing to take a lower pay than what I've been offered now. Between interest and pay, I would definitely choose the former. However, if I've no alternative but to accept a job that I've no interest in, it had better be of a reasonable pay. Right now, I'm waiting for a call that I suspect would never come. I know my chances are diminishing as the days slip by. Perhaps my resume has already been dumped into the thrash box. Hiaz. Ironically, those that you are really seriously interested in working for never calls, but those that you applied to maximize your chances or those that you didn't even apply for call. That's the real agony of the job hunt.

Dumped Out..

2005-05-24T15:46:00.000-07:00

Defending French Open champion Anastasia Myskina crashed out of this year's tournament with a horrid display of tennis. Plagued with personal problems, a lack of match practice, a loss of confidence and a shoulder injury, the Russian produced a whopping 69 unforced errors in a 3 set battle with a lowly ranked Spanish opponent, Maria Sanchez Lorenzo, better known as Felicia Lopez's girlfriend. Myskina looked out of sorts as she often sprayed her shots wide or dumped her normally reliant forehands into the net. The loss came as no surprise to many as the first ever Russian female Grand Slam champion has been undergoing a slump ever since her win here twelve months ago. This can be attributed to her mother's illness, which has put the Moscow-native through an emotional turmoil throughout this difficult period of time. With the loss, Myskina created history by being the first ever defending champion in the open era to lose in the opening round.

I personally feel for Myskina. Her achievements included single-handedly assisting her country to the Hopman Cup last year, where she won her 2 singles matches and the doubles match. She has always been one of my favourite female tennis players despite being less well known and popular compared to her fellow Russian, Sharapova. From all her fans and myself, I wish her mum a speedy recovery and hope that Myskina can once again regain the form that helped her lift the crown just a year ago.