The One with the wisdom tooth extraction

I have been feeling enormous pain when I eat.  After month of procrastination, I decided to visit a dentist to see what's wrong.  I havent visit a dentist for years.  And I have this irrational fear of a going to the clinic.  Sitting inside the dentist chair  My worst fears were confirmed when the dentist that I have to extract my wisdom tooth.  The tooth is already decaying badly and that's why it is causing so much pain.  Pain clouded my rationality and i decided to have a minor operation.  That tun out to be a really harrrowing experience.  The drilling, the cutting, the cracking of the tooth that typify the 1 hour ordeal was really a mind opener for me.  I have never felt pain like this ( other than the time when I dislocated my right arm then again it is a different type of pain)

 Now with a bloated left cheek and difficulty eating, i guess this is the best opportunity for me to go on my liquid diet plan..

The One with the White Side ( Short Notes)

I have gone totally to the white side...

My Pee Cee has died on me and I have lavished on this...

Behold the new member of the family the Imac.

Muahahaha... I am really off my bonkers with all the edited pictures and speech bubbles

The One with the Chinese New Year reflections

Before we know it, it is already the end of January and the chinese new year, the year of the ox in another 12 hours time.

I looked back at my years of blog entries and felt a sense of nostalgia. I first started the blog in 2004 as part of my attempts to bond with my sec 3 IJ form class students. Since then it was a channel for me to reach out to them and shared with them my thoughts on certain things that was happening in the school, in the classroom and of course on some of the colleagues. After I left IJ in end 2005, the blog continued to serve as a way of maintianing contact with some of my ex-students who were keen/interested/curious to know about my being and things that I was doing. There were many a time that i wanted to shut down the blog as it has not really serve the purpose that I wanted to do in the first place but now it is more of a cesspot of grievances and grudges and unhappiness. It is almost like a negative online tome of grievances with my name capitalised on the front cover. A online tome that had even me resisting going in to look. There were the occasional entries about happy things, but I realised over the years there were more of the negatives than the postives. From the 90 posts in 2006, to 20 in 2007 and finally in 2008, the entries had been insipid and uninspiring to read. Have I really gotten caught up with all the cloud of unhappiness that there is nothing postive I can write about? Am I so unhappy about the things that I have now that I am now cynical to all the things that I have?

My wife stared at me yesterday - nothing surprisingly, though, but she was looking at my hair and proceeded to brush her fingers through my hair and then a slight tug. She looked at the strand of hair and commented,"OMG, a strand of wihite hair" - much to my horrors, and that (meaning the hair) was not all, there were more hair ( white ones I mean). Signs that i am really getting old. My wife joked that a couple of reports, and my constant worries over my work had resulted to me turning to comfort food ( ie spoilling my plans for a trimmer me in 2009) and my hairs turning white. SIGH.. maybe it is about time to really ponder about "acting my age" :P

(to be continued)

The One with the new appointment

I attended yesterday KP meeting, seeing some familiar and some unfamiliar faces, as we prepared the avalanche of things coming: School Opening Ceremony, EV for Autonomous Status, Preparation for the first day of school and so on and so for. For the uninitated , th last week of the school holidays is usually dedicated to the series of meetings and trainings so as to put the next year in place.

The swop of appointment was confirmed yesterday, I have relinquished my post as Subject Head History and take on a new appointment come February 2009. Perhaps after 3 years of toiling in this appointment, I have not really distinguish myself in the appointment which I have hope would catapult me to greater success. However I hope the swap would allow me to showcase what I am good at and allowed me to have a good all rounded perspective of the various leadership position that are open up for me. I look forward to the new challenges in 2009 and hope that 2009 would be as good or even better for me as 2008.

The One about the Christmas

So, christmas came and went.  As I laze infront of my hifi, listenign to the nonchalant tunes of Scott Hamiliton, I was quite surprised how time flies these cuples of days.  It seems not so long ago when I was eagerly anticipating my Perth Trip, and now I am back and tomorrow, I will be back in school for the mandatory key personnel meeting for the preparation of the new academic year.

I woke at an earthly hour at 6 this morning and act as Santa Claus, placing all the presents bought under the christmas tree.  I am not a Christian but after sharing with my daughter about the wonder of christmas, I think she would prefer to see her presents under the Christmas tree rather than receiving it from daddy or mummy.  You should see her face of misbelief and excitement when she saw that there were indeed presents under the tree.   My girl got a movie binoculars, those where they show images a la slide projector.  My boy got a toy car with donald the duck sitting in it, which made funny noises as it move.  My wife got a nice Braun Buffel handbag which was a little extravagant on m part.  As for me, I got a gift from my insincere wife who bought me along to buy the gift and also use the vouchers that I have gotten from Tangs to buy the gift for me.   YAh it is the thoughtless gift of a wallet which steered away from being over extravagant and practical.  Pretty much the type of gift I would expect from my wifey.

Anyway after a heavy lunch of a turkey, pork knuckle and a couple of red wine, I had a heavy seafood dinner with a couple of red wine in between...

I think I am going to be so fat and drunk

But then again, that is also the spirit of christmas, porking out and enjoyign the company of family.

I enjoyed the last few hours of X mas peacefully and in silent contemplation...

Merry Christmas everyone!!

The one with the end of the year reflections

It seems pretty masochistic, but I am actually looking forward to the start of the new academic year.

I realize I haven’t had this feeling for a very long time, since I joined the school. 2006 was a year of trepidations as I just joined the school. 2007 was also not much better as I was unhappy over a lot of thing that was going on in school. 2008 was slightly better, understanding how the school functions and finally getting the hang of things. In fact 2008 was supposed a year to look forward to as I was actually planning to take the escape route to move on to green pastures. 2008 come and go, and my dream of leaving the school did not materialize. Instead of feeling bitter about things to come, I was actually quite excited to be back. Perhap it was the whole thing about familiarity; maybe I have already build up some bonds and friendship with colleagues, maybe I have some bonds and attachment to the kids I am teaching. Or just maybe I actually enjoyed what I do now in the school…

The past few weeks since returning for my trip to Perth have been spent mostly in school, clearing up some backlog, preparing reports and of course getting psyched up for the new year. The challenges I am going to face next year is not something new, I will again be a form teacher of a graduating class, a sec 5 class again. The past few days had been busy with the students admission and meeting with parents. In fact this class seems so much more challenging than the previous one I had 2 years back. With the experience, I believe I can do a better job with this batch.

2009, here I come!

The thing about the performer streak

About a month back, the school ahd its own version of a Singapore Idol thingy where students are allowed to showcase their talents and perform in the school hall. the performance was entitled "The Big Bang" and what a bang it was for the teachers as we were told to put a performance by department. This was quite like the CHIJ Youth Day where teachers perform to the delight of the students. Anyway I happen to see this clip on youtube and decide it is worth trying something like this as part of the department performance. And here the fruit of our labour..
Enjoy!

The thing about the  Mountain

so my big plans about scaling the mountain did not materialise :p

for the uninitiated, the july and early august period is an unsettling time for the teachers and the management.  This is when the annual opening posting starts and teachers are free to job hop in the big merry go round.  This is also the time, where negotiation between the schools management and the teachers take place, either to keep/"enslave" them for a long period in the promise of better job conditions, promotion, more /less responsibilities.  It is also a reality check for the teachers to see how highly the school valued you.  If you could see the management getting overly upset, using all sort of hard and soft persuasion and going into withdrawal syndrome because of your impending departure, congrats you must have done something really worthwhile in the lives of the students or in the lives of the management.

to be totally honest, i did venture to some interviews with a couple of schools.  It was more of a chance to hone my interview skills and to check if I would be able to do it in a brand new environment.  However the sad thing is that I am not able to leave as an appointment holder.  To cut the long story short, every teacher had a certain potential coming into the profession, it decrease with age and increase with the sweat and toil, and your ability to adjust and cope with the challenges that were given to the teacher.  sadly i dont have a high potential, at least not high enough to leave as a head of department.  Shocking isnt it? Not about why i have a low potential but how did i know about the school evaluation of me.. well that is the beauty of technology..

In fact i am not bitter about how things turn out, for I dont need others to determine my self worth. :)  What will not kill me, will make me stronger. :)

I guess I am kind of an optimist in this fashion.  Maybe...

The one about the June Holidays

The thing about being a teacher is that like all students, the post holiday blues set in and people get a bit grumpy about things.

For a teacher teaching in a secondary school in singapore, it is quite a luxury to have a week free from the daily routine of going back to school to clear stuff and to prepare for the next term. Things get worse when you are teaching a graduating class where they come back for the first 2 weeks of the June holidays for lessons. and then there is a whole schedule of meeting lined at the last week of the holidays. As I go through one meeting after another, it is a cruel reminder that the term is starting soon.

The morning assemblies, the mad rush for class, and running from class to class, deadline, markings, dealing with recaltricant students and of course the long and un-wirklife harmonius lifestyle again.... But then, it would have been foolhardy to merely want to enjoy with putting in effort now that the family of four need this bread and butter job. Sometimes it is quite an irony when teaching is supposed to be a calling from a higher being, to do what no man dare to do and yet the sad thing is that my perception had been a "live-a-day, eat-a-day, survive-a-day" mentality. Maybe it is the blues settling in...

The "mountain" is ripe for climbing... :P

The One about Pedra Branca



The reason behind why Singapore wanted Pedra Branca... other than the strategic location to guard our waters...

I hope I dont get sued like chee for something done tongue in cheek...

:P

Things in my head

In the midst of the marking frenzy, i felt that there is a need to catch a breather in an attempt to regain my sanity.

things are getting unthinkably draining here. maybe it is just the mid year fatigue that I have failed to get used for the 8 plus years of my teaching career. I am sick of the uncertainities that is happening and would really want to get my options settled.

the thing about being up there making decisions is a draining process, if it is not about making the right decision, it is about why a decision is to be made, and finally how to translate a decision into a series of action and the course of action to be taken. Seriously i am a bit tired with this. Maybe it is just me , but there are alot of things that I dont see eye to eye up till now. Perhaps it is just about the tipping point that will move things to try something new.

I am thankful that i turned my back on remaining in familiar ground 3 years back and moving to a new environment for it gave me the courage to try again. A aprt of me had been dead as a result of this, the sense of belonging. Maybe with the benefit of hindsight, this had been a good training ground for me but there is still something that up till now i have been having difficulties reconciling.. people called it pride but it is about ownership and the sense of "pride" of your own work. Sadly these feeling of achievement had been strongly lacking for the past few years. It had become more of a job and a task to be completed.

The thing about being there at the middle is that you are judged by people and at the same time you must judge others. A bad judgement of those who you are supposed to judgement translate to your capabilities as a leader which in turn will affect the way people judged you. In a no win situation, the exasperating thing is to do the role of the bad guy. Maybe it is just me but I hate the idea of doing the judging. This is my 3rd year doing this, and I am still uncomfortable with that. The worst is when things is about "who" rather than "what", that is when this job become tougher. I am tired about this more than anything. Give me the judging of a student, give me the judging of a class anytime.

it is time to make a decision about things. Let hope God will answer my prayers for a solution. :)

The one with the first month celebration preparation

before i knew it , the one week holidays had come and go. As i busied myself typing and tidying all the loose ends of stuff before the mad rush tomorrow, my wife reminded me that we need to prepare for xuan xuan's first month celebration. Not that I did not have a good rest, althogh I have been spending time at home, but helping to look after the number 2 in the family dont really quantify as a restful week.

In about 2 weeks time, my baby boy is going to be one month old. after much deliberation and consideration, we finally decided to call him "Ng Jing Xuan Varick" 黄靖轩 After also much deliberation, we decided to use the original spelling of the name Varick instead of variant such as Verrick and Verick and Veric. The name Varick stand for a defender who defend and hopefully he will live up to the name literally.

For the really uninitiated, it is customary that 1st month celebration for babies are celebrated with apblomb, to tell the world that the baby is strong and healthy, to tell the world that the mum can go out, and start bingeing on Macdonalds and wearing her slinky dresses and strappy heels. But then again I digress. As a result, I decide to arrange for 2 sessions, a buffet lunch in the afternoon for our colleagues and friends and a buffet dinner for our relatives. This promised to be a long day for us in 2 weeks time. After looking at the myriad of menus of food and stuff, I was confounded with an equally perplexing task of arranging timeslot ( yes you read this correctly) a la school's meet the parents session ( in this case meet the baby session) so that I will not have a situation when I have too many guests and unable to entertain them at the same time. However my missus also reminded me to be "extra careful' when arranging some of the ex colleagues and the present colleagues. This is just in case that I may, or they may accidentally blurt out things which was not meant to be heard by the public ear.

I think this whole thing is more stressful that whether to have teriyaki chicken wings or pizza bauguettes. Back to the drawing board.

The one with the baby

according to the script, Varick was born on 28 february 2008 after much anticipation.  I was wide awake and had a hard time trying to get to sleep on the night before.  Woke up at 4am and had difficulties falling asleep again.  Maybe it is the 2nd time jitters of being a dad again.  Decided to watch the movie "indiana Jones and the last crusade" a movie shot eons ago, with a dash of adventure and appropriately depicted the relationship between the Snr Jones and the younger Indiana Jones.  Having a boy is going to change the way I manage the family and of course him. Well I guess that is part of the challenge for me in 2008.

Anyway, both boy and mum are fine after the operation and Varick ( Veric or Verrick, we havent really made up our mind which variant to use) was born at 1056 am and I was busy smsing everyone I know to spread the good news.  I thank all the avalanche of good news from all my good friends, ex colleagues, family members and colleagues. 

Anyway enough of all the blogging.  I think the most important thing is to show all how the little guy look like...As a result of me been more awake than I was when Vernice was born, I was able to take a video of him and of course do some dummy-proof editing on my macbook,  Thus decided to "show-off" my skills and do a edited video of him been born at the operating table.  Not for the faint-hearted. Without further ado, I introduce to all of you - Varick Ng

For those who have given the video a skip, I have included pictures of my baby boy.  See if the little fellow looks like papa or mama :P

This is Vernice, the jie jie holding to Varick

The cute baby.. see the curly hair
Pix was taken before the cleaning, wondering why he is frothing in his mouth
Mummy and Varick
Daddy with Varick

Enjoy! will post more when i have the time

The One with the O Level Results

Yeah I have tons to things to blog... and i can finally find the opportunity to do so... I am in an unusually bubbly mood since the start of the year. and that had been my new year resolution- to be optimissitic... daunting task but I believe in my usual optimisstic tone it should be doable.

The O levels results was released on Thursday and I was surprised that I had a sleepless night the night before. Actually for those who know me, it is really an overstatement, I had a fitful sleep and woke up looking like the "thing" will smith kill during "I am legend". Well behind the shagged look and the bloodshot eyes, I was worried for my sec 5 class, worried if they will be able to clear the hurdle and move to the next lap of their tertiary education. My sentiments were shared by my co form teacher a young malay teacher who is taking a graduating class for the first time. As a Kp I got to know about the result as early as 8 am. Counting the L1B4 and glancing through the summary report, the management heaved a sign of relief as we managed to do just as well as we did last year sans a couple of drop in percentage passes and distinctions. My Sec 5 survived except 1, all except 1 made it to poly, and about 8 managed to get a grade good enough to go to a JC. I was happy for them except for the poor student who had wasted his year in Sec 5. ITE is now his only choice for an education. I remember the teachers and even the Prinicpal tried so hard to get him to focus and study for exams. His ability was not there and yet his attitude was lacking until it was a case of too late. But like him, the school and I we had to move on to focus on the issue at hand, the next batch of sec 4 taking the exams at the end of the year.

I was pleasantly surprised with our humanities results. The results was an improvement from last year whether it is distinctions or percentage passes. It also showed to me that I had a great department to work in. The history unit had also done well and our MSG was actually better than the georgaphy unit for the combined humanities... it also proved to me that I have improved in my management of the department. In my days in IJ my best results for hist humanities had been a impressive 47% distinction and 100% passes with my 15 girls form IK 2005 batch. There an then I thought my best results had passed me. I never expected that in YTSS I was able to help the top band class achieve a 57% distinctions and 100% passes. And what had made this even more impressive was the fact that this was a full class of 33 students as compared to the 15 i had in 2005. I was shocked and pleased... I guess it also tell me, that where I go, I can do it. :)

Let see what 2008 had to offer...

:)

The One about the New Year

in 2 hours time, we ill say goodbye to 2007 and say hello to 2008! How time flies... this is also the time that all students and teachers alike dread, the morning rush, the last minute rushing of the holiday homework which was supposedly to be done like a month plus ago. In fact I am surprised that I am not really suffering from the "back-to-school" syndrome... maybe it is just because I was not really on a break this 2 months. While my colleagues who came back from holidays struggle to get back the momentum of work.. I am but preparing for my first day of school.. sadistically excited about going through another year again.



A colleague in school decided to say good bye to the teaching profession today. I dont blame her for the short notice... Things had in fact not been going well for her. She was perceived by the management of not performing up to expectations and the management felt the need to help her. But of course through the process of constant and vigilant monitoring, more and more inadeuacies were "discovered" and bigger and bigger issues were magnified. In fact when one come under the microscope of the management, it is almost impossible that any speck of error can be swept literally under the carpet. I agreed wholly that there is a need for teachers to be almost saintly and error-free but there is always a point of time that we err as we are but children of god. But as it always say, "with greta pay come great responsibilities". While the government tried to increase pay to commensurate the amount of work that we are doing ( which i think is more for the keeping of talented teachers who were disillusioned with the profession.. seriously what make them think that by increasing our pay will help... we are already doing far beyond what we are paid to do... I believe more teachers would prefer to have either 1) lesser work to justify the present salaries we are getting... or 2) higher salaries to commemnsurate the work that we are doing now) but sad to say , with more pay, they expected all of us to do more work... and with more work that is when we all get

As I sit down in front of my laptop, I decided that it would be a good time to pen down my thoughts for 2007 before the year come to a close. Let's hope the new year will be a good one...

My new (erm old) hobby

Since Vernice came on board and literally became the third party in our family and bed, the bed had been pretty much a place to sleep ( wink wink... it must be the late night and the excess caffeine)

Since my little princess came to our family, mrs ng had been trying very hard to be a good mother, to the extent that she forgot her other duties like careerwoman, daughter, daughter in law and of course a wife.  But forgive my chauvinistic comments and let me get to the crux of today topic.

I have always been a music fanatic, and although i am not musically inclined, I am proud to say that i have always pride myself with my taste for music and of course my constant exposure to different genre of music - classical, opera, techno, acid jazz, pop, rock etc.  And as i started to explore more music stuff, i see the need to have a proper system to play my music that i like. and behold.... i invested on a new sound system, and put it in my spare room as my little sanctuary.  It is a place where I spend my relaxation time away from the stress of work and nothing beat playing a cd and hear sheer musical poetry coming from the speakers.  It is a divine feeling and i have never regretted this path of no return.  Although i must say that it has been an expensive hobby which I never thought I would put in so much time, money and effort in it.  But then again, the satisfaction of seeing all the musical components, from the cd player/ turntable, to the pre amplifier, to the power amplifier and finally to the speakers, connected by the choice of speakers cables, interconnects and of course the power cables and hearing the music is a great feeling.  I have only been fiddling with hifi for about a year and it has been a great learning curve for me.  And i agree that this had given me new zest ( sadly not in my work).

Enough said... a tour of my humble system :)

I managed to convert the small unused room to accommodate my system.  Luckily for me, mrs ng had been supportive.  She rather have me in the room than gallivanting outside :P

This is a super audio cd player which weight almost 12 kg!  It is a japanese made marantz player and i really got this for a bargain from a fellow hifi enthusiast who wanted to upgrade to a better system.

This turntable is a vintage one and i had a hard time looking for it.  This is almost 20 years old but it still spin like a brand new one.  Like old records, vintage turntables and music are still the older the better.

The equipment above are ( from top left, clockwise) the pre amplifier, the phono amplifier and the power amplifier.  For the uninitiated, the phono amplifier is the one that convert the signals from the turntable, the pre amplifier is the one to convert the signal from the cd player which is transmitted to the power amplifier and then to the speakers.  That how the sound is produced.

With the maid coming into the picture, I had to give up my room for her quarters.  Better enjoy the room while it last.

The One about another new "addition to the family"

For the next few days, my wife and myself will be embarking on a search journey- to find a FDW for the family.

For the uninitiated the FDW stands for Foreign Domestic Worker or commonly known as the maid. I am afraid that with my number 2 coming into the picture, both of us, with our hectic lifestyles and working schedule can no longer just depend on my mum to look after Vernice, "Varick"* ( yah, I know this is just at the moment thingy) and of course our very own Trafford.

However this search, initially on the internet, had exposed us to much horror stories of 1) horrible maids, 2) horrible employers, and 3 ) horrible maid agencies. It had instead brought out more stressed in a less stressful holiday period, the exact opposite that the FDW should be doing. Staring through the computer screen, as i was sieving through the tons of information, accolades, abuses and the biodata of the maids and the agencies, i was overwhelmed by the stacks and stacks of details which required me to sit back and reevealuate the whole entire situation. There are the procedures (official and unofficial) of what to look out for in a maid agency, there ar the things to do, the criteria to look out for, things to ask etc etc.The list is really long and exhasting (not exhaustive)

I do understand that relationship between people are fated in some ways or another, and thus it all depended on how it work out when we meet, but these stuff had undoubtably make me do a second take on the maid issue. Well as the famus saying goes, come what may... hopefully I have not done too much bad things to suffer from bad maid karma. :P

School and Crazy Telemarketers

i got my macbook back today :)  It felt so handicapped without the flexibility of online world.

i went back to school today for my CCA - basketball.  I must say that I am slowly getting closer to my girls.  Maybe it is because for the past few sessions, they have been seeing me :P  I guess it gave a whole new meaning to "frequency breeds familiarity".  Spend the whole morning tidying my already very tidy table.  I just hope I have the perseverance to keep it up when the mad rush starts in a few weeks time.

anyway with the festive season coming and the fattening of the pockets with the end of the year bonus, it is no wonder the telemarketers are working overtime with the well rehearsed sales speeches to get one to subscribe to a new credit card and/or credit line.  For the past 3 weeks or so, I have received like a zillion calls from people who had this great promotion of a new card, which is like the 2345,3748 th card that I got from that particular bank.  If it is not irritaing enough, apparently they do not keep track of the people they had called and kenna scolded and in a few weeks time, they are again back in their ever chirpy tone asking you to subscribe to a new card which you had said no to a few week ago.  As part of the retribution of rejecting one bank, the other banks "conspired" to call you one after another. And I had to waste valuable time just saying "no" to them.

If not for the telemarketer, it would be this stupid chinese woman scam who tell you that you have won 1st/2nd/3rd (delete whichever not applicable) prize and you are to collect it.  I had some fun of my own a couple of days back when i was getting some books from kinokuniya when this particular chinese lady called.  Seeing an "unknown number" on my hp, i pick it up.  Below is an extract of the conversation. (For the anglophiles, I have translated the whole conversation into english)

Me:  Harlow ( in my most bored tone)

Lady: (in a chipmunky excited voice) hello, is that mr ng wei kwang?

Me:  Yes speaking

Lady:  Mr Ng, I am calling regarding the survey you did the last time.

Me: Huh?

Lady:  Mr Ng, you have won 3rd prize! they are calling out your number here at the genting convention centre.  Where are you?

Me: I am here! I am here!  I am walking to the podium now.

Lady : (silence)

Me: Yes Yes YEs I have won!  I am walking over now, did you see me, I am waving to you, yes, me in the blue polo shirt I am coming over now, wait wait wait

Dead tone on the other side.

Anyway after that silly bout of fun, I found out that there were other mean ways to deal with them.  Actually i was inspired by this youtube video.  It is really great.. Enjoy it!

 

Randoms thoughts

3 months plus is a long time for not blogging...
well just to add an entry before this blog really goes into cyber obscurity...

This had been a very quiet and uneventful holiday for me. While all of my colleagues are overseas to recharge their batteries to prepare for the next year of mad rush, I am stuck in Singapore preparing for my long overdue dissertation. Not that i anm really in the mood to do so... but I got to start sometime if I dont want my masters to expire...
:P

Anyway just some random updates

1) the arrival of a new born babe
My no. 2 will be coming soon.. sooner than I thought. 28 February 2008, mark that on the calendar as I anticipate his arrival. Anirresponsible parent I am, and of course showing favouritism, I have not thought of the name for him. Actually I had a girl name for my number 2, but I was half expecting a boy. Wanted to have a sister for vernice and called her veralyn and guess I got to keep that name in hiatus. To continue with the V tradition, I am thinking of calling him "Varick" not that there are any good boy names that's start with V - Vernon being out for peculiar morbid singaporeanish reasons. I initiatlly wanted to call him "Eljiah" but received some not very favourable feedback from the non-catholic friends who claimed that it sound a bit "indianised". Guess "voldermort" would also not go well with the harry potter fans. Well back to the drawing board and wait for a bright idea to strike..

2) the move to the light side
as part of my self imposed detention in singapore during this holiday, i decided to spend the money supposedly to go overseas to get a new gadget for myself - toys if you need to know. I was contemplating on 1) x box 360, PS 3 or even a wii but i guess getting all these stuff who really make it even more difficult for me to settle down to do my research. Tempted by Steve Job ingenious convert ads, I got myself a macbook. Yes I am a converted apple junkie. the mac os is so intuitive and easy to use, at least i am not confronted with the bloody blue screen every now and then. Paid 2 grand for this sleek white baby and immediately plonked in another half a grand on accesories to make it look even cooler. Well so far for 3 week plus, it had been great until last night when the stupid keyboard goes bonkers and i had to end it for repair. guess machines are just as unpredictable after all, whether they are white or black...

3) My outlook to life
with my baby, spending more time with tem had become a bigger priority, in fact since the no.2 came about, i have been seriously evaluating my priorities on my career. I know people wanted opportunities to move up the ladder of success, but my priorities seesm to have shifted. Maybe I have gotten sick of all those politicking, bitchslapping stuff and wanted to have more time for myself and my family. Recently I have witnessed the change of people when power started to "corrupt" them. It is sad to see that young people who got overwhelmed by power and the way they behaved as a result of the power they think they possess. i remember when I left IJ, a colleague gave me a advice that never to let power corrupt me and up till now, I still hold this mantra close to my heart. Maybe seeing it from a third person view allowed me to have a better perspective of things.

I will try to blog more often now hopefully before the avalanche of work come piling in again.

The One about the students nowadays

Overheard a conversation between 2 very senior teachers in the school regarding students' sense of gratitude. As you already know in a couple of day time, the students will be showing their appreciation to the teachers in a one day one off event known as teachers' day. In the spirit of the school, where they focussed so much on helping the students and teaching the students the right values ( read right values in the eyes of the managment) it was no surprise that the conversation came about.
Apparently every year around this time, all the students will be given a piece of paper for them to write down their vote for the most caring teacher. they are to write down why that particular teacher deserved the award, by stating specifically what the teacher have done. For example,hypothetically, Student A feel that Teacher X is a good teacher, A must write down why he/she feel this way such X is a very caring teacher, on 27 July, he consoled me when I did badly for my test and encourage me to work harder. For this I am eternally grateful. Interestingly for all the things and effort that the teachers had done tohelp the sec 4s and 5s, there had been a shortage of entries from the sec 4 and 5 cohort. This apparently upset the people on the top who described this as act of "lacking in gratitude" and in fact the students will be given a speaking to the next morning.
What is so interesting about this episode. in my view, there are a couple of interesting facts that surface:
1) What we have done for the students had not really impacted/impressed them. All the teachers in the school work very hard for the students, this I can testify, which is interesting. is it because their perception of what is good for them is different from what we feel that is good for them?

2) Are our students ingrates? just because they didnt take this special day to thank the teachers, jsut because they did not write any good things about the teachers, just because of the whole multitude of issues in place? I find it interesting. i do admit that teachers do like the bit of acknowledgement that we have done something to a student's life and outlook, but seriously this whole paper chase thingy can be quite ridiculous at times. Are we doing it for the sake of doing it? Why cant we let the students do what they want to do. Why do we need to interfere in their free expressions of showing thanks to a teacher? All of us in the teaching profession know that teaching is like putting money in a unit trust - in the short space of time, we will not be able to see the rewards. infact it is more important to see the reward in the long term that we have actually put in the effort for.

I know what I am saying may ruffle a few feathers, and I know people will be talking about my cynical approach but then, we are dealing with a new generation of students who ahve different approaches and view towards life. Is it relevant to place the 1980s way of running and teaching values to the new millenium. I think that is a food for thought.

I saw this article which i believe was placed by a teacher in the class notice board, and i found it really relevant.

BILL GATES' SPEECH TO MT. WHITNEY HIGH SCHOOL in Visalia, California.
Love him or hate him, he sure hits the nail on the head with this!

To anyone with kids of any age, here's some advice. Bill Gates recently gave a speech at a High School about 11 things they did not and will not learn in school. He talks about how feel-good, politically correct teachings created a generation of kids with no concept of reality and how this concept set them up for failure in the real world.

Rule 1: Life is not fair -- get used to it!

Rule 2: The world won't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3: You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping -- they called it opportunity.

Rule 6: If you mess up, it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you are. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.
Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

Rule 10: Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.

After googling this on the web, i found out that The text itself a pared-down version of an op-ed op-ed piece that appeared in the San Diego Union-Tribune on September 19, 1996. It was written by Charles J. Sykes, best known as the author of "Dumbing Down Our Kids: Why American Children Feel Good about Themselves, but Can’t Read, Write, or Add." D