Blood is thicker than water... [ Posted on July 29, 2007 @ 12:32 pm ] [ mood | determined ] [ music | The Cranberries' 'Ode To My Family' ] Yes, yes, yes...  It has been a while since I've posted an entry and I know that my BFF has been wondering what has happened to her 'adik'.  So Yatt, here's a summation of my less than mundane life... Since the last entry on my school-based stalker, I have been super busy and additionally stressed out at work.  School drains my energy so it is a miracle that I am still able to display a chirpy and cheerful facade in school when what I desire most is to burn the school down so that I need not go to work.  Now that the GCE 'O' Level Oral Exams and the Preliminary Exams are around the corner, I have had little sleep and rest as it has been a mad rush preparing the graduating students for these exams and the actual GCE 'O' Level Exams in October.  All these sacrifices would have been worth it if the students are also hard at work preparing for their exams.  However, at the moment, it appears as though I am the one who is working hard preparing for an examination which I myself have sat for many moons ago.  There have been many a time when I am filled with disillusionment at the attitude of my students who do not even seem the slightest bit concerned about the impending exams.   I have frequently stopped to ponder why I waste my precious time worrying and feeling fearful when my charges do not even give a damn about their future.  But my greatest flaw is that I am unable to disengage myself from work.  And so I continue to plan engaging lessons, to motivate the students and to worry about their future at the expense of my own health.  So it came as no surprise that I caught the flu bug since I hardly made time to re-charge my weakened batteries.  It took me nearly two weeks to recover from the flu and the bouts of fever.  Although I am decidedly better, I am still nursing a bad cough and an irritated larynx.  The coughing fit is so bad that I sound hoarse and can even pass for one of those trannies who peddle the streets of Changi Village on a Friday night.   To add to my personal woes, dad's been hospitalised since 23rd July 2007, with an unknown ailment.  He has not been well since March and has lost nearly 12kg in a span of four months.  None of us, and that includes his team of doctors, know what is wrong with him as the battery of tests - scans, scopes, blood tests, and even an MRI - have given him the all clear sign.  The whole family is exhausted as we have had to shuttle up and down to CGH after a long day at work, every day, to visit him, but we soldier on with as little grumble as possible because secretly we are all fearful of losing him.   I am embarrassed to say this but I must confess that I have not been a perfect daughter and as the eldest child in the family, I have not been a role model to my younger siblings.  Yes, I am doing well at work and am therefore capable of contributing to the family income for I am eternally grateful to my parents and my siblings for the sacrifices they made several years ago when they paid for my studies at the University of Melbourne.  Hence, where money in concerned, I am not a Scrooge and am willing to spend it on my parents, siblings and my adorable 7-month-old niece.  However, I realised that I am in reality spending money on them when I should instead be spending quality time with my family, particularly so with my parents.  While I am aware that I am getting older, I have somehow amazingly ignored the fact that my parents are also getting on in years.  I am so involved with my job and I spend 12 hours in school from Mondays to Fridays that by the time I reach home, all I long to do is sleep.  And that is what I do.  I get home, have my dinner, shower, pray and am asleep before 11pm, on most nights, waking up at 3am or thereabouts to do my work.  I do not make time to communicate with my family even during the weekends as I will be holed up in my bedroom marking, setting test papers, planning lessons or catching up on my sleep.  My parents do not complain because they are aware that I am exhausted but I cannot continue doing this, can I?  I do not want to wake up one day, only to find that one of them has passed on and then regretting this lack of communication for the rest of my life.  I love my parents dearly so I must make a concerted effort to talk to them more often than what I am currently doing.  I realised that I seldom even take the opportunity to indulge in small talk with my dad when he sends me to school every morning as I would either be too busy jotting down a list of things I must do at work or scanning resource materials as I mentally prepare my lessons for the day.  While it is obvious to my family that I am busy with work, I am certain that they too have issues and worries and fears that they want to share with me but they avoid doing so to add to my own set of worries.  Dad, would in particular, love to have someone to talk to seeing that he is now retired and is home alone with the maid during the day while the rest of us are at work.  Yet, all I do when I am at home or when I am in the car is to be engrossed with school-related matters.  Gosh!!!  What a self-centred daughter!!!  Although, my dad's ailment has come as a rude shock but it is also a blessing as it has woken me up from my obsession with work.  I do not know what the latest diagnosis will be, whether dad will recover fully from this mystery ailment or whether his hospital stay will be a regular feature in our lives but all I know is that I am not ready to see him pass on as there are tons of things that I have yet to share with him or with mum, for that matter and I intend to do just that, now. Another reason why I must spend more time with my parents is that I hope to emulate the bond that my favourite cousins have with their parents.  In spite of my busy schedule, illness, and worrying about my dad's health, I have also during the past week, been helping my cousins prepare a surprise 30th wedding anniversary celebration for Singapore's legendary soccer great, the 'Gelek' King and his wife.  My cousins do not have a perfect relationship with their parents and it is an open secret that my female cousin in particular is always at logger heads with her mother.  However, in spite of the quarrels, theirs is a fulfilling relationship as they share all their ups and downs as a family.  Secrets are nearly non-existent and they are truly a close-knit family.  While my siblings and I do not get into melodramatic rows with our parents and we appear to be a calm and level-headed family, however, we do not communicate at a deeper level and do not always share all our worries and fears with one another, preferring instead to deal with our own set of problems on an individual basis to avoid troubling the rest of the family.  This has to change and as the eldest child in the family, I must be the one to set the tone... Comment

- Why do couples conceive and have children, only to leave them in the care of the teachers? - [ Posted on July 10, 2007 @ 6:09 pm ] [ mood | enraged ] One of the draw backs of being a teacher is that I am averse to the idea of having my own children considering that I get to see how much the young has degenerated.  I am profoundly fearful of finding out that in spite of a morally sound upbringing, these non-existent children of mine will one day turn into delinquents, having mixed with the wrong crowd.   Having been part of the school's Discipline Committee, I am privy to many of the major offence cases.  It is already problematic enough having to counsel / punish the offenders who may be resistant to all sorts of help offered by the school, but the depressing part is having to deal with the parents.  Most of them live in a time warp, believing their child to be the adorable 3-year old that he / she once was and refusing to admit to the fact that their child is no longer innocent and clueless.  Some parents on the other hand, do nothing but cry and lament over their wayward son / daughter.  They will then feign ignorance at the best method to handle the child and will plead to the Discipline Committee / school management to look after him / her on their behalf instead.  Typically, I would always try to be as sympathetic and as understanding as possible particularly when I am aware of the myriad of family problems and emotional baggage that the offender may have.  However, I draw the line at being a surrogate parent.  Hey, I was not the one who conceived after a night of torrid passion so why the hell am I expected to attend to your child 24/7?  He / she is not the only student in the school and contrary to popular belief, I do have a life!!!  Also, no where in my job description did it state that I have to be someone's surrogate parent after his / her own set of parents have washed their hands off him / her!  I can only do so much between 7.30am till 6.45pm, Mondays to Fridays, and once the child steps out of school, it is the parents' responsibility to ensure that the child is not up to no good. Recently, I found out that a girl from my form class has not been home for three months.  She cannot communicate with her father or stand the sight of him, hence, she packed her bags and have been staying, since April, with three cousins who are in their early 20s.  No one in the school was aware because she had attended school as per normal.  The story only came to light during the June vacation when the father called the school and asked to speak to me because he did not want me to release his daughter's report book to her.  So he came down on a Saturday, with his wife to sign the report book and to lament the fact that they do not know how to handle her.  Apparently, this is a yearly occurrence except that this has been the longest that she has not been home.  When asked, the parents claimed that there was nothing that they could do.  I am certain that if it had been me, my father would have dragged me home from wherever I was holed up in.   I said as much but they insisted that they could not do that and instead begged me to knock some sense into her head.  What I wanted to do most was to knock them on their heads instead!  What sort of parents are you to lose all semblance of control over a 16-year old girl?  You are both adults and are her parents for heaven's sake!  Show her who's the boss!  Mind you, I am not asking that the parents beat the crap out of her but if none of the soft approaches work, then be firm and try the hard approach.  I know that it is not easy to be a parent in the 21st century but those who choose to have children must learn to shoulder the responsibility of raising their child / children instead of passing the buck to a stranger.  Honestly, the government must make it compulsory that in addition to attending the marriage preparatory course, couples must also attend parenting workshops BEFORE they settle down.  If you are not ready to be responsible for your offspring, then for goodness sake, stock up on those pills and condoms!!! Read (1) Comment

- The insufferable colleague - [ Posted on July 10, 2007 @ 3:06 am ] [ mood | annoyed ] [ music | Gavin Degraw's 'I Don't Want To Be' ] Well, well, well...  It appears that my attempts at wanting to leave the school between 4 to 5pm has so far, remain a mere pipe dream.  Since the start of the new semester, I've been one of the last to go home and this looks certain to continue for a while yet, what with the additional work load that has been dumped on to me. Today was another supremely long day spent at school.  Other than the day-to-day grind, I also had the misfortune of having to attend a discussion pertaining to the school's Speech Day-cum-50th Anniversary Celebration-cum National Day Celebration-cum the school carnival that will be held on 8th of August 2007.  Eventhough the idea of combining all four events is laudable, the decision to place an inept person as one of the organisers of this mega event is laughable, and mind you, I am being kind here.  He was pompous through out the meeting, asserting his ideas and was oblivious to the fact that they were in reality, totally ridiculous.  One of the darndest things that he suggested was to have a helicopter fly past the school with a banner that reads '50th Anniversary Celebration'!!!  If he had intended that to be a joke, well, it backfired on him because instead of laughing, the few of us who were forced to attend the meeting looked at each other incredulously.  We were totally aghast at his stupidity and wondered for the umpteenth time, how an idiot like him was given the chance to hold a leadership post.  At that juncture, I gave a silent prayer that should I really be given the SH post next year, I will not turn into an ass and that I will remain grounded and sensible and have my department's as well as my colleagues' welfare at heart... Comment

- A new appointment in 2008? - [ Posted on July 08, 2007 @ 5:34 pm ] [ mood | contemplative ] [ music | Enya's 'Only Time' ] Now that I am done with the formalities and have already stated the reason for the birth of this blog, I can finally rant and rave over anything and everything under the sun and which affect my sheltered cocoon.   For starters, the Head spoke to me on Tuesday and asked me whether I am certain about my desire to be on the Leadership Track.  Apparently, with my Reporting Officer's (RO) impending departure to greener pastures in Shenzhen at the end of the year, the post of SH Humanities (HY / SS) will be left vacant.  Hence, if I so desire, the post will be mine for the taking.  Well, I've been teaching in the school for five years and it is high time that I take up a new challenge as I feel that I have already achieved all my immediate goals...   Academic achievement: attained value-added results based on the performance of the graduating class of 2006. CCA achievement: been winning the Frank Cooper Sands Award since the establishment of my scout troop in 2003, culminating in the Gold Award for 2006. Personal achievement: two promotions in a span of four years... Thus, if I do not take up this new appointment, I will probably just rot and lose all forms of motivation to work.  As it is, I am already bored to tears with the regular hum-drum in school.  So, I told her that yes, I want the position and with that, my fate is sealed.  Even before the official announcement, I have been tasked with several projects to do, to prove to the Head, that I am capable of leading the Humanities Department.  I aim to do my best since I have my own set of goals to attain and also because I do not want to disappoint my RO or my mentor.  Both have played major roles in ensuring that I remain high-profile and have stood by me when I was at my lowest ebb some time ago.  So obviously, I would like to be an excellent Subject Head as my RO is to us all. Anyway, it appears that the Head has developed a fear of giving a greenhorn the chance to assume a post.  Why?  Because she made a huge boo-boo by appointing a particular colleague whom I shall simply name as Homer, to the post of Subject Head.  Two years into the job and Homer has proven to be totally inept and worse, sorely lacking in EQ.  So the Head does not want history to repeat itself and has as such, preferred to import foreign talent who are already established in their careers and who have already assumed their particular post for a while, rather than groom the growing local talent.  This has resulted in plenty of unhappiness amongst the staff and some have left or are leaving as they are unhappy with the management.  Granted, the Head is new, but she honestly needs to smarten up or pretty soon, she'll be left with an incompetent lot of teachers.  Also, this desire to win amongst others, the People Developer Award (when what the school needs is to improve the discipline of its students and then to attain value-added results on a regular basis) is driving the teachers nuts as we honestly do not know what the area of focus is.  So we are all overworked and unduely stressed out as we work towards winning as many awards as we can possibly garner in one full sweep.  That's about as much as I can rant at the moment.  Need to get back to reality for I have the Swiss Alps beckoning me, from my study table.  The piles of work that I will need to grade continues to rise to such great heights that I am tempted to simply burn them.  But, sensibility prevails... so mark I must...     Comment

- This friendship heals all wounds - [ Posted on July 08, 2007 @ 3:53 pm ] [ mood | pensive ] [ music | MJ's 'You are not alone' ] So...  I've finally hopped onto the bandwagon and joined the cyber legion of bloggers.  Why the sudden interest in a pastime that I had initially resisted and abhorred?  Well, it is all because of my BFF (that's Best Female Friend, for the uninitiated) who had decided to pack her bags and uproot herself Down Under, specifically to Melbourne, back in May.  So now that we are a million miles apart and rarely get to chat with (be it online or via the telephone) or send text messages to, each other, the only way for her to remain in the loop with the goings on in my life is for her to read my blog.  So Yatt, this blog is dedicated to you.  Even though you are a continent away, I still want you to be part of my ups and downs, so happy reading, babe.  And, please remember that I miss you loads... Read (2) Comment

navigation [ viewing | most recent entries ]