well well..jeremy lim's brother is now under my tutelage WAHAHA. too bad i had to break his heart on valentine's day by telling him that he's an exact replica of him. jeremy is officially mad and has started to run a cause contrary to mine, to undermine the foundations of the institutions i will be building! i will still mark him wrong. hah. i could imagine how insulted he felt. hahahaha. he seemed to be so. valentiNE DAY(read:NE DAY) was kinda okay...learning journey to URA and Supreme Court. ura was boring since i went in recent years. while supreme court was kinda like an eye-opener. im sure it was built to impress la..23 court rooms and 9 floors of architectural indulgence..view from the 'ufo' is quite impressive. but nth much happened for today. i realised teaching in secondary school is very very very tiring. so much to do. and u come home, all u want to do is not have ur lunch, not to play the comp, not to read ur books, but to get a bath and sleep. and i know when i do, i sleep real deep. weird thing is, when i really sleep at night, i can't. i go to school, with eyes half blood-shot. even my contact lens dry up by themselves nowadays and do all sorts of funny things. i dun wanna be the evil teacher always. i know they deserve much more fun from me, but right now, its kind of impossible with the problems they give me. discipline comes first. prove you can, and u get rewarded with all sorts. apparently some wun bother though. will see how since i've just started having lessons with them. but i dun want to keep it this way having to scream at them for silly things they do, or for simple things they fail to do. just realised i'm to stay for a month. again, i'm put in another phase in my life, having to work with ppl several years younger. just 3 or 4 years. totally different experience i will gain..im becoming the workaholic, skipping lunch and surviving on milo and biscuits from the pantry. oh well. might as well harden myself before i go ns. not physically. i wun bother with that. so hoping to get my pes c right now. 
"plak!";
x 8:54 pm
bye zhizhi
here's wishing you all the best and hoping you'll come back prettier and smarter than ever!
bye hong zhi, see you in six weeks :)
hence, i'll so so so miss my ex. so will janice. so will jun han. and lots more girlfriends and secret admirers.
afterall, everyone loves zhizhi!
my best phone chatting partner up till now ;) really will miss your company.
"plak!";
x 12:44 am
i never got a blackjack today :(
if not for her, my life would be pretty perfect.
but it dun mean that i'm gonna be an unfilial son as she unreasonably claims. talking to si min really helped me discover my blind spots. even the rest of my family probably pities my plight, but its okay. i should just take it in my stride. even though i'm indignant, cos i'm here where i am only because of my own efforts, and that my parents can easily brag about their success story, me, to my relatives, arousing jealousy in a few. still, si min's right. my mum did have a great part to play in my early upbringing. when i grew up, she didn't want to stress me out. still, i did her proud, coming out tops in primary school, even though she never cared about whether i studied or not. so it was my choice. and given my family background, i would have, by default, taken the default, commonly repeated path which many like me would have gone, which is, use the choice and abuse it and enjoy your freedoms, and suffer in the end..but i didn't. my dad never prodded me in my studies too. both of them were educated up to sec 2. they dun understand that their son wasn't supposed to be how he's like today. in fact, they are plain lucky. i should have been in a lousy primary school class, went to a lousy ah beng neighbourhood school, which is like, almost all the schools in my area, went to poly with luck, or ite lor. and along the way getting to know undesirable ppl. i really think i should have become like that. but if not for my mum, with her upbringing during my early years, i dun think i'd have been so disciplined all these years to persevere. although no one has ever motivated me. they probably think all students end up in jc, and those in poly do so cos they choose to. they take me for granted. even my mum casually recommended aj to my sis cos 'her bro also from aj' though she doesn't have the necessary points. maybe one day she should find out for herself how things work. i really deserve to be an ah beng, with my bullshit financial situation, uneducated parentage, ordinary relatives from
both sides. and i've my face to prove it. still, its really weird. perhaps its just like the gambling session at mrs toh's house today. i just kept winning. luck or what, i dun know. i myself can't believe it. but when i lost, i quit and declared a game over. i hope my results this coming friday would be the next in my winning streak. scared stiff.
anyway, i just counted. i won 36 bucks with the only 2 dollar note in my wallet. played about 25 matches. i won about 18 games, no blackjack. drew about 4. hien leng (5 under 21) once. kena blackjack by banker once or twice, lost normally about twice. all the while, no blackjack, but i just kept winning. even when mr toh wanted to 'go all out' he never won. i feel bad, depriving young caden of his milk powder money :( but well, the toh couple were so cocky eh. and the ppl who put their money with me and won 10 over each should treat me la.
class gathering at eugene's place tmr. i already stashed my profits for the day. and i'm going out tmr with the same notes i originally had today. 1 $10, 1 $5, 1 $2. eugene's mum is a very very tough banker to beat. if i lose that $2, i'm not gonna play anymore, just like what i told myself today.
life's like a gamble, and i've had my share today. winning 4/5 of the time, nah it dun happen usually. i promised myself not to indulge in4d, toto or score or whatever as an adult, when i was of sec school age. and i rarely break my promises. u might have thought i'm a god of gambling today, but yeah, it ends today. maybe it does run in the family. hah. and with my 30 over bucks, i'm getting chocolates for friends. just like the same thing i did when i won 50 bucks the same old-fashioned way with my dad's sworn brothers 2 years ago. yes, in 1 hour i got a half day's worth of pay, but no, that's not the way to go.
"plak!";
x 10:07 pm
cross country 2007
cross country rocked! its been months since i last ran any distance, and this time i never stopped at all! i was happily the teacher leading the race..until the last few hundred metres this teacher overtook me and dashed my hopes of number one! but its okay, its a teacher from the same house. i ended second. alright. i found out he's an ocs graduate. officer leh. so he deserves to win. but not that teachers win anything. but its good to know u were one of the first to complete.
wore the full students' outfit. house tee and cat high shorts. the teachers couldn't recognise me. and some students were teasing and kidding with me, not knowing who they were talking to. hahaha..but im nice k. some kid even asked where i got my nasi lemak from. duh, look, i am old. much older than you puny sec 1!
its kinda funny how everyone thought i was just the average student today. haha. some uniformed group ppl stationed along the way were shocked 'huh mr ong?!!' it was kinda funny and i just returned my usual smirk. but that mr tan who got first and me sure looked so much like students that ms fernandez did not notice, and happily announced to the whole school that ms vanessa chia was first. haha. she's third k! but she seriously ran with all speed and consistency, first lady teacher to come in. bravo!! :)
the life of a teacher isn't as routine and as boring as i thought, though i think i want it livelier a bit more. but staff lunch was omg..nice! sashimi..with fat generous portions of salmon, tuna(eugh lol) and the last one...swordfish or something..heavenly. and cos wine wasn't included free, so i took some cute delicatessen stuff called wine glass. its abit bigger than a shot bottle, but its filled with jelly mixed with wine. the first one made my throat warm, the second was great and the third got me all sweaty. LOL! and poor mr heng suffered the effects of my drunkardness later, when he got suaned by me and kwang han on the subject of a prospective girlfriend and his extensive knowledge of hotel rooms. we're so full of crap, we're even worse than some students we teach!
then went out with si min and we talked about 8 hours. haha. best friend :)
"plak!";
x 12:45 am
record set: stayed 10 hours in cat high today(if only there's overtime.)
it is a matter of two in a collection of seven yet it feels as though the weight of the world has been bearing down on me for an eternity though dusk has yet to chase away the most unwelcome of afternoons
LOL im going crazy
today is madness. suddenly getting all the common test papers and i don't know a single thing! and i've to start marking some, recording marks, going through the papers which i've never set my eyes upon..it feels so mad. and seeing the assignments coming in like a super acidic lava which is damn viscous and damn slowly when i've given them the damned long holiday to prepare and they still give me nonsense those @^$#&* back from holidays and feeling so slack and they give me the worst behaviour ever while i've all the time constraints in my head..in fact most teachers are battling against the inevitable passage of time while the disruptions threaten to wreck the momentum..let's take a look at the upcoming rest of the week:
thursday. cat high did verywell, thrashing our batch(no one saw it coming, not any of us), and getting the whole school a half day on thursday. and they go to school for just 2 lessons. WHAT. then the teachers are all going for staff lunch at marina mandarin. i'm invited too. haha.
friday. cross country at turf city. no macritchie cos there are roadside repairs i heard. i'm running in teachers' race!!! AHHHHH so happy...and best thing of all is that PE teachers dun run in this race...they run the whole show! WOOT!
i saw something interesting in 3-9..a prefect rubbing his shoulders on another guy. i promptly called him out as volunteer to whatever antics i had then. but seriously....freaking me out! previous time was sitting on laps..what else shall i see next? kissing on their cheeks? whacking each other's butts? i dun wanna guess. i dun wanna think. i dun wanna see anymore.
and 3-9 was being..weird. said they were gonna nominate me for some award. thinking it was a teachers' day award i said ' nah , wun be here by then.' and i wanted to know what so i asked if it was the 'most kiam pah face teacher award'. at the end of the lesson, the monitor came to me with an official looking form, demanding my full name. it was a form i never dared take when i was a student. its the national award for teachers. i just told him it wun happen la. but well, its like AWWWWWWW. haha.
and i wore the cat high teacher's tie today! wow..
"plak!";
x 7:21 pm
so excitingly boring
the only year in which new year was spent without gambling. such a boring one. dun get me wrong, its just that i love playing blackjack during new year. as though it completes it. but this year, everything feels like nothing. so empty. there isn't the mood, despite it being such a draggy weekend. lucky i'm going visiting mrs toh and eugene(primary school friends). can't think of anywhere else..oh well but even without my 'investments', i got close to 300 from my ang bao money. started spending it already..i bet it'd be gone before i enter ns..i'll make it all good buys though. but right now, i'm using my salary to buy clothes for work. haha..
i went to my uncle's new house in punggol. which is actually across the road from bel's house. cool la. my mother's been bragging to my relatives i'm a relief teacher. i mean, i dun need the attention -_-" i rather ppl didn't know..its awkward when ppl start referring to me as teacher instead of using my name! my, lame! and the thing with my paternal relatives. i didn't see them last year. so its been 2 years la. so i called my aunt. who stared at me without expression. she only realised i'm her nephew when she saw my dad who was with my family a distance away. then everyone would comment on how handsome i've become. i know la, i used to be damn ugly can. but now also as ugly la..then one aunt said i'm so rude and dao cos i didn't reply her. i mean, she kept telling me i'm very handsome now. like what u want me to say? YES INDEED?!!! i guess i could have thanked her. but people who never get praised wun know how to reply what. haha. but i just dun need the attention la.
my uncle living in pasir ris offered to put me up when i got back from tekong. cool. but weird la. i still will go out with my friends and go back to my room to get my stufff all that isn't it? hmmm...but i guess i wun have much choices too. my cousin is already primary 4. the last time i saw him he was just looking just 6 of age. time really really flies. seeing him so grown up now, i'm kinda jittery.
so tired. have to return common test soon, but i haven't even started marking. and they better hand in their portfolio tmr! i've given them a cny extension already! meanwhile i'll prepare on my next lesson for geography. there's been tonnes of breaks here and there, its getting tough to finish the assigned chapters on time. and this friday, there's cross country, its less than 4.8 km. i think 3 km? i dun know. but i hope i can be invited to go! though i've kinda lost my phillippe house t-shirt :( and hopefully, thrash all the teachers in teachers' mass run. WOOTS. but i haven't been running for so long. oh well, good thing is the teachers probably wun be that enthu about running. i might be running my own race. with no one to talk to. to encourage. to keep up with. just me and myself. towards the finishing line. if i get the first prize. hehe. but oh well, i dun think a relief teacher like me can be eligible to get the prize. HAHA. afterall, if a 'youngling' like me gets nowhere near the first few teachers, it must be quite sad. pls pls pls lemme go for the cross country and let me win win win!!!!!! do aj proud once more!!!! (shit hz made me realise there are PE teachers. but oh well, let me be first for non-PE teachers then pls pls pls) then i can go to mrs toh's house on saturday and make her proud ahahhaa...seems that i'm always living in my dream though. but dreams are fulfilled if you work for them. gonna chiong!
"plak!";
x 8:12 pm
Nao Chora Menina (Don't Cry, Little Girl)
Não chora, menina, não chora mais
Um dia você vai saber
Na vida existe sempre a razão
E mesmo a tristeza tem valor
O que fez a lágrimas no seu rosto
É o carinho do seu coração
E a menina que sabe o que é o carinho
Vai ser mais linda, linda mulher
Uma estrela aparaceu
Sorrindo pra você, menina
E a menina que sabe o que é o carinho
Vais ser mais linda, linda mulher
From Final Fantasy VI, adapted from Kids Run Through the City Corner, which is the current background theme of my blog. i guess ppl are sick of the violent-sounding almond beauty. hope u guys can appreciate the simple, melancholic tunes from the rest of the FF series along with me..
"plak!";
x 8:49 pm
nova annum
how often does one get to see his primary school classmate. very often, on most days, i never can hope to get a glimpse. and yet, i saw 2 of them on friday. jun hao and i went to the kfc at admiralty place with mr yap, who treated us. halfway through, i saw eugene outside! apparently, jun hao forgot to ask if he wanted to come. haha. we all went home and they came to my house at night. where we intended to go to ann's house. and so we went mac for dinner with ann and her bf. and we saw debbie! by then ann left first. so we walked debbie home! its so unexpected. and asked that she come to eugene's house next sunday! i'm so glad, i'm still in contact with my primary school friends. there's a certain special feeling when i am with them. maybe cos, we never got to see each other going through the painful,ugly process of having to grow up.
on the other hand, contact with my cat high friends is..as functional as can be. its almost non-existent. sad isn't it.
mrs toh is having a party for us 3305 next week. i hate to tell her, but i already know the turnout will be pathetic, especially amongst the guys. im quite sick of hearing lame excuses. im fine with having just girls for company. i'll turn up, no matter what. its the least i could do. its just the most sincere way of thanking a teacher. i'll always remember the tonnes of attention my teachers in aj have lavished upon me. i hope i could see them at mrs toh's house next week..and have a great talk to them. its a pity i only saw myself a student and didn't really get to know them. perhaps now i could. after all, i'm also in the same profession now. for a month that is.
ns is going to cause me to suffer from depression. u get cooped up. u miss your friends who dun miss you. you dun miss ur family which misses u. and financially speaking, here's why.
ns pay for a month = $300
relief teaching pay for a week = $65x5= $325
and which one is more productive and generates positive externalities? sian bo.
"plak!";
x 12:03 am
you ppl are not straight while i am so i'm the odd one out?!
3-1 is a QUEER CLASS.
its like the second or third time i've seen a guy sitting on the other's lap. in my lesson.
i had to tell them it was wrong. and that it was indeed queer.
and they had to tell me there was nothing wrong! that they were just 'best' friends.
FINE. then i had to tell them, you people are weird, with all the indications of a twisted sexuality abound. of course, i did not use the homophobic tone, but a more neutral, informing tone.
and this guy(who is like THE gay of the class) tells me...YOU'RE THE WEIRD ONE HERE!
AHHHHHHH they are not straight not so straight!!!
oh well. but one look, and all of them seem to be most straight actually. and this guy was driving me nuts, with his signature "TATA!" everything he said was TATA in a girly kind of tone. i mean, the fact that he was saying tata in the first place at everything tells you that, again it is a queer thing to do.
just as i have been crazy over a few attractive teachers in aj, i think its happening again. hahahhaahahahhahahaha.
"plak!";
x 5:26 pm
madness
4/5 NA Just the right amount of cynism. And hand flailing. says:
FINE. VENDETTA HERRICK!
4/5 NA Just the right amount of cynism. And hand flailing. says:
I'll now teach my brother
4/5 NA Just the right amount of cynism. And hand flailing. says:
the
4/5 NA Just the right amount of cynism. And hand flailing. says:
AMERICAN SPELLS
4/5 NA Just the right amount of cynism. And hand flailing. says:
*SPELLINGS
4/5 NA Just the right amount of cynism. And hand flailing. says:
AAAHAHAHAHAHAHA
4/5 NA Just the right amount of cynism. And hand flailing. says:
YOU WONT KNOW WHETHER TO MARK RIGHT OR WRONG!
ahhhh so stressed! says:
ahahha
ahhhh so stressed! says:
you're not just cynical
ahhhh so stressed! says:
but paranoid
ahhhh so stressed! says:
all because i said....
ahhhh so stressed! says:
YOUR FAIRSKINNED BROTHER DANIEL LOOKS AND TALKS AND BEHAVES EXACTLY THE SAME WAY AS YOU
ahhhh so stressed! says:
AND I THOUGHT I HAD SEEN JEREMY IN THE CLASS"plak!";
x 10:25 pm
i see in them what we used to be
excursion with my 3-2 boys tmr! it is ValentiNE DAY. in other words, NE Day on valentine's. haha. they cheered when i told them i'm going with them tmr. that made me happy. already, i've formed impressions of each class. good a good mixture there.
3-1. rowdy and unmotivated. ready to slack. but deep down, they are smart. i think they prefer to be left alone, though i will need to work on discipline still.
3-2. quiet. passive. unresponsive. generally cooperative. however, i still do not know their proficiency in english or geog.
3-9. lively. chirpy. as crazy as i can get. i'm having lots of fun there. pace of lessons expected to go faster than the rest due to enthusiasm. i seem to amuse them always.
i expect to have lots more fun catching up with my teachers...hehe...and one of my students is the brother of my previous classmate..small world there. getting used to the pace. but i guess i behave like a workaholic at work, it freaks ppl out at times. lol..
"plak!";
x 9:18 pm
almost got caught for my hair/would have failed the hair check LOL
found it weird that derek and i and sharing mr ng's workload of geog and english. when i got home the hod told me it was actually unacceptable. either had to leave. and for the other, to take up both. derek had been working hard, teaching english and staying back till night at times. but i guess he can't take geog, though he offered to try teaching it. only cos he didn't take it in upper sec, and mr ng's main concerns are in geog not english. oh well. i feel so bad. im sure the teachers feel as bad. and they feel bad that i'm feeling bad cos of their arrangements. now i've double the workload. finally found the hod for humanities after a drawn out game of hide and seek. she's a nice lady, i think she's empathetic, as arts ppl should be. lol.
teachers i've talked to today:
mr edwin heng. couldn't remember me much. asked if i was okay. tmr onwards, he's gonna be my second boss. cos he's in charge of english.
mr danny tan. couldn't remember my name, but could recall who i was eventually. thought of me as very quiet. the 'sitting in a corner' kind of student. i assured him i've changed a bit. still as interesting and funny. was singing 'to the left, to the left' repeatedly. haha. i felt like replying with 'you must have enough of me, you must have enough of me'. (its a song,by beyonce i think)
mr yong kwang hei. surprised to see me. couldn't remember me much, though he found me familiar. again, same impression as i left on mr danny tan. i told him i was wearing specs and probably fatter. haha. the fatter part seems to help most teachers to remember me. if not..its kinda depressing. probably i was way too low profile. haha.
mrs elaine goh. called me when i got home to tell me on the dilemma they faced regarding employment. very sincerely explained what other tasks i might need to take on since im 'young and good at IT', the latter of which is an assumption, to which i replied 'i'm not good at it, but i might be intuitive towards it'. either way, she's happy, cos she's my boss.
teachers i've not talked to, but want, or need to:
mrs alice long!!!! my form teacher. i saw her from afar. but she might have known i'm back to teach after today. i'll try to hunt for her. been so long. i know that talking to her will settle a few of my doubts about myself.
mrs oh(ms chan wee ming) my direct boss. will assign me orders and tasks. so far only seen her once, and probably she didn't know i'm under her.
mr suah yee leng. the teacher who helped me get A2 for chinese. he's nice to talk cock with. since he's probably more entertaining than i am.
can't think of anymore already. there's this american guy in the school. i feel he's kinda weird. probably cos he's not that ingrained with the system's workings yet. there's some temperature taking exercise going on. and guang han, fellow ex student and colleague asked if we needed to take charge of that. then that guy went asking back 'i like my temperature', 'i would be the last one to be struck down with fever', 'it'll never get me', that sort of thing. kinda weird. probably has a complex character akin to douglas macarthur. by the way i'm about to finish his military biography. and his accent is quite rare i think. never heard it before. so it wun be fun to try faking an accent to talk to him. he'll think i'm weirder. haha.
got to know 2 of my classes. let them ask questions for the whole period. never did teach. i'll start proper tmr. but here's a few memorable ones i remember. i was more of a comedian at times.
student,"do you have a girlfriend?"
me,"no, broke up."
some other guy,"oh i know why.."
guy,"do u watch porn?"
me,"u mean u watch porn? damn that's disappointing." -looks away-
me,"and what are u doing in that threesome anyway?(gives wtf face)"
class,"*laughs out real loud*"
me,"and why are you playing with his hands? you gay?"
class,"*almost uncontrollable laughter*"
(of course, u have to put things in context)
then i tease him later again, when i asked them to introduce themselves.
that guy again,"i'm ____ and i like to pon cca"
me,"WHAT?!-exasperation- you like to be in PORN CCA?"
class really laughs their ass off. i heard some ppl say nice one. haha. all for trying to fool with me in the first place. just like mr ng adapted to different classes, so did i. the other class kept asking me about army stuff. haha. and one of the lines i heard most repeated today was
"i LOVE geography!" sometimes i pretend to be pleased, but usually i will reply with "what excellent bootlicking skills you have" or " that's the answer i wanted to hear". but once i went,"ah, how nice it is to see a student appreciating the wonders of geography bla bla crap crap"..but thing is, i let them know i'm 18. haha. i wonder if that's a gross mistake. i only hoped it would allow them to understand me better. and facilitate my work. of course, i have heard several warnings about what i have done... seriously my 2 classes cannot believe i was low profile, quiet and guai kia. some spokesman sounded outraged and shouted across "but we still dun believe you are guai kia!" so i asked.."so u mean i'm a pai kia(gangster)?!"
the whole class agreed in unison.
there was a hair check today. some students happily told me i would have failed it. haha. indeed.
i'm taking a class for learning journey on wednesday!!!WHEEEEEEEE!!!!!
"plak!";
x 5:06 pm
paying the price for vanity
BITCH!!!!!! didn't tell me the solution i was getting was not a multipurpose one!!!
its hydrogen-peroxide based. and upon contact..
my eye burned.
and it gotten so red, and it seems like im crying.
was supposed to have been neutralised by a tablet or neutralising solution, ahhhh bitch u didn't tell me!!! it hurts and i'm not going out to jam, to university talks like this!! at last i'll be sleeping early. it hurts so much. so much that i called si min to 'cry' about it. lol a pun! thanks a lot best friend, it felt better talking to you. in a way :)
"plak!";
x 8:16 pm
old boy
im off to cat high from monday onwards, taking 3 sec 3 classes for pure geog. timetable seems pretty slack, with average of 2 lessons a day. 100 mins. the rest of the time will be occupied by other work the teachers will unload on me. derek's teaching them english. as in derek my ex-classmate. cool. so they are getting derek and herrick. i still have to take project work.
mentally preparing myself now. cat high is not going to be the same as admiralty primary. it already doesn't feel as warm there, and i haven't seen a teacher who was truely glad to see me. denis leong knows i existed, but can't be bothered to talk to me. and a couple of other teachers..sigh. but i guess i still have mrs alice long and mr danny tan to talk to, when i see them. they should make me more comfortable.
and im finally gonna wear the teachers' edition of the catholic high school tie!! its like some fantasy come true. haha. no longer a dull standard issue student tie, but the glossy, fine quality dark emerald tie! but its rented, courtesy of mr paul ng. he has to go for reservice, in the form of an advanced battlefield tactics course. and when he comes back, its my turn :S
now i'm wondering how i want my students to treat me as. should i be like charlene? i don't know, but i know i've to find some level which i'm comfortable with. i still have a couple of choir juniors who i dun know, but it'll be impossible to go around telling students i'm older than their mom already. i'll just be honest. tell them im not much older. a recent graduate. and that they call me mr ong in class, and call me by name outside. oh yes, that should be the bare minimum.
and ask that they call me out for class outings?! haha, funny idea, but why not. they are 15 and i'm 19 this year. haha. all the better if they're going to play lan.
shopping spree today. with 160 i bought quite some stuff, including new leather shoes, which i really like. and a new short sleeved shirt i could wear to work/teach, socks and others. im happy since i paid over 120 with my own pay for my shoes. 2 days of pay. but who cares. the money i earn now is to be spent anyway. hah. and leather shoes last an awfully long period of time. i hope mine does :)
bye admiralty primary. and my lovely kids.
"plak!";
x 9:47 pm
to serve 2 alma maters. priceless. admiralty primary. cat high. the best i could ever ask for
i was wrong. children do lie. and that was a very big lie he dared to make. utterly disappointed and upset.
mr willy tan spoke to me today just as i was about to leave the school. hah. interesting vice principal. he thought that i had several plans in mind after getting my results. like, i told him, i've the army first. being a guy he should know better. then he asked, 'so u want to go to the U?'
'yeah why not?' 'how about alternatives, such as teaching...?' wahhhh. he asked if i wanted to go straight into teaching. freaky. that was my perfect back up plan lah!!! basket. then he went into...' do u know of the recent issues with male relief teachers?' 'erm not quite(but i'd a feeling it was THAT)' 'oh. there have been incidents of students having affairs with their students....' *gasp* 'erm, alright, i'll keep that in mind...' now that i think of it, he probably saw me as the perfect target for this little snippet of 'advice'. i'm the youngest guy in school. and the students probably see me as quite attractive? ahahah..but i wun go cheat children's feelings...i'm not eugene chan. i dun go for xiao mei mei. then he just had to grin and tell me this when we ended our conversation ' oh by the way, i'm from aj too. aj pioneer batch'
u can't be kidding me!
my boss is my senior! oh my god. now i'm freaked when i remember my students saying i look like their vice principal. and the realisation that i just had a damn frank talk with my employer who's my 'schoolmate'.
this guy totally bluffed me and their classmates were so nice to report on the chio teacher. who came in promptly and scolded him. she totally ignored me T_T. hahaha..then some girls were like, teacher u never do your job, so she's here. i got damn angry. cos that guy lied to me, not that i didn't do my job. and they accused me of being a racist cos i kept flirting with the chinese girls. like hello...they were the best students i ever had and can't i spend time talking to them? i was even teaching them english, maths and chinese. there were guys too..i just had to scold that guy in front of the class, just to let them know what wrong he did. betraying a teacher's trust. never. ever. do that. and i caught up with his form teacher after school..told him what happened. got him scolded even more. but i heard this from him 'u bluff the student, u bluff the teachers, u bluff even the relief teacher! how do u expect people to ever trust you?' then he was made to apologise to me. seriously, i really couldn't take it. i just slammed my file onto the glass. with my bare palms and that class suddenly turned quiet. everywhere i went, it seemed as though the students ducked for cover. i was damn angry. i didn't even talk to my ex-students anymore. some even dared to ask if i were angry. duh? 'nono, i'm not angry..hehehe' and then they got scared.
malay mat-to-be, "teacher, are you an ah beng? you got an ah beng chain. and your face is so ah beng. you walk so ah beng. i think you are an ah beng. are you an ah beng, 'cher?"
alright, but my tour of duty around admiralty primary is coming to a close. mr paul ng finally called me up. i'm going to cat high tmr to settle admin stuff and all. and i should be starting work in cat high next week? i'll miss all my students. and i'm gonna see this happening soon...
mr lee hak boon walks into general office, noticing a new teacher. "ah ello, are you a new teacher? might you be a cat high old boy?'
and he'd probably start bragging about my batch again. the batch that gave cat high a new surge of glory. and the batch that so inflated expectations of the future sec 4s. GG! i'm probably gonna run into mr danny tan. mr edwin heng. and mr denis leong. my choir teacher. i hope i have more teachers than that to talk to. 3 weeks. its gonna be fun. dun worry. i'm straight. but mr ng's students are probably cursing at me or their luck right now, cos its not an attractive young lady who's going to take them. ahaha. but rather a guy, who happens to be an old boy. but the most fun question would be to let them guess which cca i was from. they probably would start with the uniformed groups, sports..and never come close. hehe.
sigh. no more pretty teachers to look at. bye chio bus. and my beloved form teachers. what a short-lived reunion i must say. but i'll be back for cny. cos i can display my fan club in front of my friends!!! ahahaha...what a dumb idea.
"plak!";
x 2:42 pm
freaking bored to tears ;'(
bored again.
relief teaching really is the best job around!
1. u get to see how you were like. and u know u miss those times.
2. u get to catch up with ur own teachers, and maybe ex-classmates who teach there too.
3. u get to educate a new generation of younglings.
4. u get to try canteen food which, although would still suck, would probably taste better than ur previous school's food.
5. u get a whole bunch of people obsessed with you. haha, maybe not that serious.
6. u get paid 11.80 an hour. under ideal conditions.
i took a p4 and p6 class today. the p4 class seems like kinda 2nd best class. could tell they were usually quiet...but cos i came they all went mad. oh well. it always happens. had lots of fun i guess. i'm not paid to read anyway. so i went around to see how they were doing. i identified how i was like. that kind who upon getting the worksheet rushed into doing it, while at the same time blabbering nonsense with my group mates. so in a sense, it was work and play. while taking them for pe, i was not concerned about my class, but kept observing this p3 class which i took for chinese class on the 1st day i went there. they were having relay games. the whole bunch of them listened attentively to their teacher describing what they were to play. and when they rose up and the first pupils started running, the rest of them were bouncing around so happily cheering their mates. it was so cute. to imagine how it looked like, think 'king of fighters/street fighters'. all were doing unique cheering acts. a girl held her right hand up as though holding a torch, while some guy jogged on the spot, another held his hand out, another waved her hands about...everything! so cute. too bad the only time we really played such things was when i was in p1 and p2. i remember having to have those caterpillar races. it was very annoying, and the whole row would always end up collapsing and breaking apart. but its funny in a way. the thing was that no one row would be moving fast, and everyone would be like suffering. haha. but that was 13 years ago. i haven't seen anyone else playing it ever since.
while i had talked to my p5/6 form teacher, mdm jameela before, she had a dilemma. whether to call me herrick ,or mr ong. that is, to see me as her student or colleague. alright, dun be silly, i'm always your student. haha. then after sometime, i found my p4 form teacher. she's a sweet lady, but probably not too attached to us at that time. but she does still talk to me whenever she sees me, though i know she doesn't remember me. haha. thing is, she looked 35 back then and now she looks 35 still. i wonder. and about 3 weeks later, i plucked up the courage to look for my last form teacher i had in admiralty primary. my p3 form teacher. it was kinda awkward, but i guess, what i did made her day. me fumbling and being a bit nervous "er..mm..hi ma..dam fad..ilah..DO YOU FIND ME FAMILIAR?" lol...i'm bad at asking questions..i always ask them in a retarded way. poor lady, i talked to her for like 5 minutes and still i didn't tell her who i was. i only told her i was her first batch of students, in class 3E. obviously she doesn't remember who i am. she said its 10 years ago, and that i'm probably damn old already. hahahah. not quite. i'm like the youngest staff in school hello? she's still as interesting as ever. cruel me had talked to her for 5 minutes and still she didn't have a clue as to who i was. so what if i told her my name, she still couldn't recall. haha. and she said because of me, she's probably not gonna sleep until she digs up the class photo and find out who exactly i am. but i made her proud. her first form class. first batch. coming back to tell her, look cos of u, i'm here before you. woots. i think she probably didn't expect this to happen. but its so cool. if i were to be a teacher i would have wanted the same thing to happen to me! but she thanked me for acknowledging her as my p3 teacher, as though many people wouldn't? hmmm..she sounded touched. i shall talk to her more if i get called back anytime soon. and soon, when this chio teacher who's at most 23 came over to talk to her, she started to show off her 'fine specimen' already. her first specimen. 'look, can you believe this? my student from my first batch!!' she sounded as though she couldn't believe it herself. hehe. i'm feeling so content. that teacher was asking how old i was. too bad, none of us answered. probably old enough to be ur boyfriend. hah. jie di lian that is. way too cool. i'm happy that i did go to her today. so that's it. while most of the teachers have left, all my form teachers are still there. this is way too cool. i love all of them! mdm fadilah, mrs karine nim, mdm jameela! hugs to all of you!
but back at work, it ain't easy. it gets easy if the teacher i'm covering gave me stuff to give them to do. or best still, if they have homework they were supposed to do. i really abhor the idea of going to class with nothing for them to do. in a way its not very responsible of the teacher to take leave and leave their class to slack. that's when i really die. but alright, i gave them worksheets to do today..taught them a bit. teaching is fun. now i think i understand, partially at least why teachers love to stay back in school for their students. i dun think its easy to explain. but maybe 'joy of teaching' might be sufficient to understand. when u teach, u really interact with the students on a one to one basis, and that's when it gets really fun. like today, i was taking the most notorious p6 class. their teacher left them with different work to do. so this guy wanted to do chinese corrections. as a relief teacher supposed to be taking english subjects, i kept on insisting that i help him in his corrections. i was feeling high. then they were like, something is amiss, i dun think this guy's chinese is good..haha..then started to ask what i got for psle chinese. A or B. seemed that they would've looked down on me if i said B. but though i got A i told them i got F. silly kids...started to laugh..the ones who were not easily tricked simply chided them ' stupid ah, if he get F then he standing here' those kids are funny. but in that class, i saw stuff that made me realise how lucky i am. to see things that i hardly saw, really caused me to be sad for some of them. though they might be the delinquents of the class. sigh. xin suan. wu nai.
as a relief teacher, my time is quite fully utilised. having a break of just 30 min for the whole day is typical. but still, enough to get canteen food, though teachers can no longer cut queue. haha. not that i'm the kind. the canteen vendors...half of them are new. some probably continued by different people. the food is really quite good, though prices are steep. some stalls probably see a teacher coming so they hike their prices. but well, doesn't matter much. i've been over-charged in aj too. over-charged for disgusting fodder. yucks. shudders. but for the sharp increase in price between teachers and students, i get really ALOT of food. being a guy, its not customary to say u want lesser of the food. but that's what i did. its really alot. but thankfully its decent. the drinks stall auntie knows that i'm a student there before, but only cos i told her. she would never have suspected. her daughter used to help her sell drinks. probably forced to. quite a pretty girl older than us by a few years. now she's teaching chinese too.
nowadays it can be quite a disturbing though ultimately pleasant experience to have a whole class waving at you shouting your name and smiling so jovially. i really pity the teacher who was taking the class at that time. she probably was trying to keep them quiet already,and i always had to pass by, spoiling things for her. haha. unintentional though. and it gets creepy when there's a guy who keeps telling you how handsome and cool you are. i always pretend not to hear it. only when i can't stand it, then i'll counter-praise in the hopes that he gets flattered and keep quiet and not telling me how he thinks of my looks. but it doesn't work!! :( it sounds to him like i've accepted his compliment and he continues. dots. and that day this bunch told me i look like some 'bobo' from the ch8 7pm drama. like i'd know who? so i asked around. and i roughly know who. so i thought okay, fine, they're trying to say i look like a tv star. okay. case closed. but when i was leaving the school, i saw that bunch again. and they asked, so do u know who bobo is now? in my mind i probably was thinking 'spare me' cos i've enough of the handsome crap for the whole day. i'm not saying they are crap to say that, but its just sounds like incessant prayers in your ears. so i confessed to them, ya i roughly know who but i dun remember. they didn't seem to mind, as long as i still looked like that tv guy to them. after turning around the corner, the girl still stood up to say bye from the corridor. i dun doubt children's sincerity. that's what i love about them. their courage to say what they feel. to express what they must. well, this fan club thing is kinda fun. thing is, i dun know what to say to them, but probably the best thing to do is to react to what they say to you. yup. if not, a simply hi would suffice. they know you like them. it shows. even today, they were making such a din that the only way was to call the teacher next door in to give a scolding, which is 100% success rate. but i couldn't bear to. that would be so cruel. as for the p6 class. u can say they are the epitome of guai lan. the ah lians there were guessing if i'm gay. or ah gua. then there's this girl who goes around whacking every guy. serious, man-beater. but she's quite cute. so i told her, i'm gay, so please dun whack me, cos i know you always whack guys. apparently jokes about being gay and whatever are the best way to engage a class. and this ah lian asked if i'm ah gua. i said ya, then she kept making fun of me. they are fun-loving ya..i dun think i was that audacious before. but before i left the gate i saw her there. and when i saw her, i turned back and said ' you call me ah gua right? ' ahahaha. so fun.
but at the end of the day. every cent the ministry pays you is worth it. as in, if not, no one would bother about them, i guess. u work 5.5 hours minimum, getting paid 65 bucks. so that's 11.81 per hour. better than to toil under lame roadshows getting paid 6 dollars an hour. dots. justin keeps having weird ideas on me. i'm not some guy u can cheat, so forget about it. not going to work for meagre pay and long hours and dun make it sound so rosy. i know its not. so i'm not getting any other job for the rest of the month. A levels results should be coming soon. apparently, i get a pay rise right?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?! YAY! promotion! haha. probably $10 more each day. while signing my form, i saw my pay was 65. then i saw another relief teacher's. its got a 1, and 2 fat zeroes. damn jealous la. how i wished that were mine. even if i worked a relief teacher for the rest of my life, it'd be enough to cover expenses. alright. no more poverty for my family. now i'm convinced i wun have to be like my parents. low education, can only do the low-skill jobs with lots of physical intensity. for the low shitty pay. i wish my dad's boss would give him more. he's a bloody scrooge. totally profit-maximising asshole. his workers never get pay rises. he keeps the old workers simply cos they're cheap and they need his money. okay, enough of ranting. the though of ns is depressing. the pay component though. 4 days of teaching(assume u are the teacher who gets 100 a day) already gives you more than a recruit's pay for a goddamned month! i'd happily teach and not waste my time in the army. and which is more productive? but the army is dumb...it doesn't work. and if it has to work, it wouldn't work. they lubricate the moving parts, but they dun realise their parts are not precise and totally understocked.
sigh. im very bored. so long-winded. tired. go to sleep.
"plak!";
x 12:14 am
how does this piss you off sis?
"she asked: wat does anomaly mean?
he replies with: u think im stupid?
she was merely trying to find out wat does it mean . she has no intention of showing off her vocabulary . she understood wat the phrase 'i find bliss in ignorance' means . she is sick & tired of her family . he makes her exceptionally pissed . she wishes that he gets into ns now ."
now i'm wondering how i pissed off my sister with my reply.
1. she usually gets to know a new word in school and comes home trying to see if i know. so i thought she just got to find out a new word and knowing its meaning, comes and asks if i know. i've been replying in similar ways previously.
2. her tone is usually of the 'heheh, you know or not' kind. how would i know that today is the 'can u tell me if you know' tone. they all sound the same. maybe i should stop being so careful analysing nuances in people's speech, because not everyone speaks with them.
3. why should u be exceptionally pissed with me when u should be pissed with ur mum.
4. not saying anything about your flaws does not mean you do not have any flaws, sister.
5. stop being emo, and bugging me with the 'this guy so handsome' crap. u obviously know i'm straight, and its impossible to convert me into a gay. stop wanting me to fall in love with guys along with you. its sick.
6. i was about to fall into my nap already and sorry if i sounded mean and rude. OKAY? and u had to come ask me. like duh, of course i'd have sounded harsh.
7. i think this is the reason why: i'm from the first class in my primary school, went to cat high, then jc, and i feel like i'm damn smart. i'm probably the smartest in the family. wow. but. you are in neighbourhood school, and anything that i say will only corroborate your concrete view that i'm out to make everyone else especially you feel dumb. right? that's how you feel? no, that's not how i feel.
8. u need to know more. bliss in ignorance gets you nowhere. even in poly. not knowing, is simply throwing yourself into a hell pit but in the most comfortable coffin.
9. stop being so angsty and directing everything at family. there are only 4 of us. i dun see u making an effort to do things either so stop it. i'm sure you must know(if u dun i'm telling u now) in times of crisis, your family is the first that you have to look to. without a doubt.
10. i'm only making such a list because i feel i'm underappreciated. you probably dun know that i do things for you. that the way i am is to prod you into the right direction. i wonder if my mum's finally right. 'hao xin mei hao bao' what's the point of me doing things for you only for you to whine to the world what i've done everytime i do something that pisses you off? and i still don't know why?
and about ns, you should be glad i've never used that 'can i have the comp cos i'm going in soon' argument. that'll be so crappy. but dun force me. u used to get me whacked for whichever thing that u did. even recently i got scolded for something i didn't do. i dun see why my sister should be complaining. i'm quite a good brother. that's why i dun get why u can complain, and i'm hurt. no, the world's never a fantasy. snap out of it. think about it, and ask who's the snob. who goes and buys your lunch, dinner, and even groceries wtf? its me, a guy. everytime that's what i do. you? almost never? like ice cream is just downstairs and you ask me to buy for you when i come home? if u wanna bitch, i surely will have more to bitch about you. i'm usually reserved and don't show my emotions. dun make me go into screaming convulsions. you're my sis, for goodness sake. my only one sibling, of the same generation, who i can talk to about similar things. sigh. oh yeah, i wanna get into army too. so u can have ur comp whole day and stop disrupting me in my grand conquests in the world. i'd rather not play if i have to get disrupted everytime i play with the same request. and then i hope you'd think. for i know, you do, but probably not in the way i want you to. maybe it's because of my jc experience that i'm like this, but u should stop thinking poly is any much better. it all works out to be the same.
"plak!";
x 6:01 pm
i'm sorry to you and for myself
i'm so sorry for everything. i must apologise so badly. to whom, i wouldn't know. i just want to apologise. let's say for everyone i've hurt in my 18 years of existence. recently, i think i might have become ego. but i dun think that's the reason why, it seems that i've lost myself. i need to find back who i am by putting out in words what i've done and what i'm associated with. bear with me. its not easy, especially with whatever pots and pans fate throws at me. amnesia is a double-edged sword. not that i have a choice.
its weird
how i can be so different with different people
how i can talk so much in person but never through any other medium with one
how i can chat so much online but never in person with another
how i can ignore people online but look forward to meeting them in person
how i can love people but hate myself
how i can tell people of my own matters i dun care about but rarely being interested in others'
how i can not think and talk and the same time
how i can think and never talk at other times
how i can wish for things to occupy and tire me out while i want my own time to play
how i can have my own time to play but not know how/what to play
how i can be concerned for others but not concerned for myself
how i can let people trust me though i don't trust them
how i can keep secrets though i wonder why they fall onto my ears in the first place
how i can fulfill the promises i make most of the time, be they meaningful, or meaningless
how i can regard some with my heartfelt empathy but some with chilling indifference
how i can bore people while entertaining myself
how i can teach my neighbour but probably never going to acknowledge i was her teacher
how i can talk heart-to-heart with close friends, really precious ones, yet not to my parents
how i can go in circles and no one ever understands
how i can go straight to the point and still no one understands
how i can feel without knowing
how i can know without feeling
how i can achieve with nothing
how i can wish for certain things no one else would wish for
how i can not believe in a god yet in fate
how i can believe i am in control of my life but in reality i'm losing it to no one but myself
how i can laugh yet feel bitterness and sorrow inside me
how i can make people guilty for the slightest bit of concern they have for me
how i can get annoyed at what disgusting things couples do when i used to do them myself
how i can look people in the eye and have them return it in the most pleasant of ways
how i can remember nothing while wanting to know everything
how i can not be aware of the most obvious
how i can be seen as skilled by one in a craft yet seen as mediocre by another
i realised its about 33 of them. coincidentally, that's my class. but it was coincidental. i've learnt to stop attaching significance to coincidences. that probably is capable of half the disappointments anyone can face.a whole random list of mostly weaknesses. even though i acknowledge them, i do know that i may never come close to perfection. for every flaw you mend, another pops up. i want to alter the status quo, but i guess there's many other things stopping me from attempting so.
i think i'm slipping into it again. took me a good 2 months to snap out of it. even then, so what if i stop. it has to come back some day. it will. there's so medicine but time. but even bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics if you aren't careful. so the best therapy might still be to pour it out onto another. talking seems to be the best therapy. everyone has a certain degree of masculinism/feminism regardless of gender..but i think i'm more imbalanced in my mind. it doesn't bother me. and i dun think its weird, how i find girls interesting to talk to,no matter who. but to guys, even if they were interesting, they probably aren't interesting to talk to. adeline might be right. i can be a good sister. haha. jokes aside, being in the company of guys is simply bo liao at times. its like i don't care. i can fall asleep talking to guys. i'm such a lousy guy friend. i have no love for guys at all. that's extreme, but that's good. i'm far from being gay. i wonder how the cat high choir is now. maybe its 20% gay, with another 30% undeclared? back then i must have been leading a secret crusade(more like hatred) against homosexuals. apparently it failed. haha. its late. i'm waiting in anticipation for mr ng to call me. i wanna go back to cat high and root out the non-aligned beings!! and most importantly, teach geography and enjoy the canteen food =P
why am i so solemn? but haven't i always been like that..that's when i belong to myself.but i want to belong to someone else
"plak!";
x 1:39 am
what do u want.
4 girls and 2 guys at sentosa makes for excellent volleyball games! too bad our arms suffered the brunt of it.. volleyball is fun when u scare the hell out of people, but it isn't when people start GANGING UP on you and scare the hell out of you..3 v 3 volleyball is fun, so much fun, nevertheless. most of it was about picking up the ball. haha. but yun hui is the most pro. renny and regina are traitors to whichever team they are in. did lots of other crap, and ended up in ps..the last activity was to accompany adeline bel and regina to this fashion. LOL. but i can come up with rather constructive comments. so much so, that adeline didn't buy a single article in the end..then adeline concluded that i'm like a sister to her. haha.
a list of material wants that which materialised not-too-long after my previous material wants were acquired:
1. 1 gigabyte of ram; my comp's too laggy with my current 256. though the chief beneficiary will be my sis cos i'll be in army soon. she better contribute half.
2. a pair of new leather shoes, i've one too small;another's got a smooth flat sole
3. x number of shirts. i've quite alot of shirts for a guy methinks, but i still feel its never enough. maybe adeline is right. i'm like a girl. haha.
4. y number of jeans and pants. they're all too old, with faulty zips, shrunken too much(or i've grown too much), and basically cos its not enough for me. haha.
5. i want to treat my friends to things when i have my first army pay! and i owe hong zhi a treat for the..let's say many things she's done for me =)
6. socks. they're never enough. either white, or white. i want other colours.
and for non-material wants:
1. for my mum to be more at peace with people around her.
2. for my sis to stop being so simple-minded at times. its worrying. REALLY.
3. happy friendships which never end hopefully..
as for needs:
friends to keep me company.
"plak!";
x 3:47 pm