If you want a rainbow, you must first learn to embrace the rain...

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♥THE OWNER

little eagle
Female, age unknown, loves BLUE
Plays piano, played bass clarinet
in school band
Loves Snoopy, Chip & Dale,
Bugs Bunny, Seven Dwarfs,
Forever Friends Bear,
Doggies and Piggies
Eats when stressed.
Loves chocolates and icecream
Gets paranoid easily.
Prone to clumsiness and getting
frantic

♥DARLINKS

caixuan
huilun
yingling
wendy
zoe
huiyu
xiuqi
eehui
olivia
joyce
gmchoir
lileaglessons
H41B
faith

♥DREAMS

1. Go Tasmania
2. Go New Zealand
3. Have a dog
4. Learn driving (eventually)
5. Save more money (on-going)
6. Be Healthy (trying very hard)
7. Find someone and have a family
(trying :D)

♥HOLIDAY PLANS

1. Malacca with J21
2. Taipei!
3. Holiday lessons for Sec 5
4. Long overdue Clarinets outing!

♥SHOUT OUT

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♥MUSIC

Thursday, September 28, 2006

"LOVE YOUR JOB, BUT NEVER FALL IN LOVE WITH YOUR COMPANY BECAUSE YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN THE COMPANY STOPS LOVING YOU "

WHY WE SHOULD GO HOME ON TIME...

Mr. Narayana Murthy is undoubtedly one of the most famous persons from Karnataka. He is known not just for building the biggest IT Empire in India but also for his simplicity. Almost every important dignitary visits InfoSys campus. He delivered an interesting speech during an employee session with another IT company in India . He is incidentally, one of the top 50 influential people of Asia according to an Asiaweek publication and also the new IT Advisor to the Thailand Prime Minister.

Extract of Mr. Narayana Murthy's Speech during Mentor Session:

I know people who work 12 hours a day, six days a week, or more. Some people do so because of a work emergency where the long hours are only temporary. Other people I know have put in these hours for years. I do not know if they are working all these hours, but I do know they are in the office this long. Others put in long office hours because they are addicted to the workplace.

Whatever the reason for putting in overtime, working long hours over the long term is harmful to the person and to the organization. There are things managers can do to change this for everyone's benefit. Being in the office long hours, over long periods of time, makes way for potential errors. My colleagues who are in the office long hours frequently make mistakes caused by fatigue. Correcting these mistakes requires their time as well as the time and energy of others. I have seen people work Tuesday through Friday to correct mistakes made after 5 PM on Monday.

Another problem is that people who are in the office long hours are not pleasant company. They often complain about other people (who are not working as hard); they are irritable, or cranky, or even angry. Other people avoid them. Such behaviour poses problems, where work goes much better when people work together instead of avoiding one another.

As Managers, there are things we can do to help people leave the office. First and foremost is to set the example and go home ourselves. I work with a manager who chides people for working long hours. His words quickly lose their meaning when he sends these chiding group e-mails with a time-stamp of 2 AM, Sunday.

Second is to encourage people to put some balance in their lives. For instance, here is a guideline I find helpful:
1) Wake up, eat a good breakfast, and go to work.
2) Work hard and smart for eight or nine hours.
3) Go home.
4) Read the books/comics, watch a funny movie, dig in the dirt, play with your kids, etc.
5) Eat well and sleep well.

This is called recreating. Doing steps 1, 3, 4, and 5 enable step 2. Working regular hours and recreating daily are simple concepts. They are hard for some of us because that requires 'personal change'. They are possible since we all have the power to choose to do them.

In considering the issue of overtime, I am reminded of my oldest son. When he was a toddler, if people were visiting the apartment, he would not fall asleep no matter how long the visit was, and no matter what time of day it was. He would fight off sleep until the visitors left. It was as if he was afraid that he would miss some thing. Once our visitors' left, he would go to sleep. By this time, however, he was over tired and would scream through half the night with nightmares. He, my wife, and I, all paid the price for his fear of missing out.

Perhaps some people put in such long hours because they do not want to miss anything when they leave the office. The trouble with this is that events will never stop happening. That is life! Things happen 24 hours a day.

Allowing for little rest is not ultimately practical. So, take a nap. Things will happen while you are asleep, but you will have the energy to catch up when you wake.

Hence, "LOVE YOUR JOB, BUT NEVER FALL IN LOVE WITH YOUR COMPANY BECAUSE YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN THE COMPANY STOPS LOVING YOU " - Narayana Murthy

:D 9/28/2006 09:11:00 PM

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Yesterday, I cried... but there were only a few tears... what hurt most is my heart. I regret my carelessness. I blame no one. I was overwhelmed with other things to even notice that I have made a mistake. I didn't know what had happen. I spent the entire afternoon trying to recall. And that was after I enjoyed lunch and icecream with some students. I was afraid it would be my end. I was unsure of my future.

I thought I would be miserable. I thought I would not be able to smile again. Somehow, today, that did not happen for long. Close to the end of the day, I somehow managed to let go. I don't know who brought back the smile to me. But thank you, whoever made my day. Like a friend said, do not worry about things that are beyond our control. I just have to hope that things will turn out fine. I'm just glad that things did not turn out even worse than this. Still no news yet. As of now, no news means good news.

I'm alright now, back to my bubbly self, I think. Maybe I'm in denial. But well, life has to go on whether I'm miserable or happy. So I chose the latter.

:D 9/27/2006 09:00:00 PM

Saturday, September 23, 2006

Went for the crystal growing prize presentation ceremony today...

Didn't win any awards, but all of us are winners because we put in our best. I really like our display, think it's the most striking of all... Judges have no taste lah...

Hwa Chong Institution are the big winners... Almost all the teams they sent in got a prize, 1st 2nd or 3rd... Sigh... how come their crytals all so nice?

:D 9/23/2006 04:34:00 PM

teaching the most 'interesting' topic in science now. It's really amazing how students can get so excited in this chapter. It's one of the chapters in the syllabus that there's at least 70% attentiveness in the class, no matter how boring the teaching is... haha.

What's so interesting ah? I don't remember getting SOOO excited when i was a student. It's really so tiring teaching in a class that gets SOO excited. Already in a rush for syllabus and they all still get so excited and ask all sorts of questions that sometimes get themselves AND me even more confused. But it's really fun to see them so eager to learn... hope their results will be as high as their enthusiasm...

:D 9/23/2006 04:00:00 PM

Friday, September 15, 2006

Today was so tired... I went in to my last class of the day, double period... I just sat there and told them to do their own work... only started teaching the second period. Totally exhausted... Anyway they are so much ahead of time... I've like 1 and a half weeks to do revision for them. Not like Sec 2.. rushing like mad...

Last night tried uploading files but failed so now have to attach the files to email send them to the students... Powerpoint slides lor... so huge... the yahoo mail takes ages to attach the files. After half an hour I'm still in the process of attaching the second file.

The crystals grew even bigger... took pictures of it... it's nice and clear... Ibut still quite small... the clear crystals are small... there are some very big ones.. but very blur inside and out of shape... Sigh... hope the clear one grows bigger over the weekend...
I'll show the photos when the competition over... or else later people copy... hehe...

Had to take over choir duties today again... not suppose to be mine... but the teacher went for marking without informing us and another one just 'siam' as usual... so left me lor... poor me... but choir always fun... the students are great... it's just the time that I go home is so late... sigh...

:D 9/15/2006 09:57:00 PM

Thursday, September 14, 2006

The boy who fell down yesterday was admitted to hospital. The mother called to say that his bones at the knee joint has shifted and he had to undergo operation to insert some metal pieces into his knee joint. So his knee will be in a cast for 6 months. Not sure how he's going to take his exam and when he's coming back to school. His classmates kept on asking which hospital he's in and whether they can go see him. But I think it'll be good for him to rest first, maybe they can visit him at home when he's discharged.

The second part of the paper was finally finished. She almost wanted to just hand in and go off... luckily reminded her in time. But still, after she changed a bit and left, we still found mistakes... and in the end I had to do the editting...

Recently I found out something... there're so many people around who can't do formatting of the documents. They don't know how to align text using tabs... so instead they resort to pressing the space bar until it is more or less align or just simply any how shift the indents until they think they get what they want. The strange thing is there're so many weird places in the document that I simply cannot imagine how those things came about.

This brought me to think of another point. When students make mistake, sometimes we do understand why. For example, they jumble up the concepts, forget bits and pieces, here and there. But sometimes they can really come up with answers that I'm unable to figure out where they got it from. I'm sure I never mentioned it in class, or it was never written on the notes or powerpoint slides. How come they managed to link up things that are so unrelated??

Met a very friendly cab driver today. We talked all the way from school back home. At first I realised I forgot to bring my wallet... so he had to drive me back to school, luckily the school attendant was just about to leave. So the school attendant had to open the gate, disarm the alarm, open the office and then open the staffroom... The cab driver's has been a part time driver for 7 years. We started talking about how the students add 'spice' to the teachers' lives. He said his greatest wish is to fetch the teachers that have taught him when he was a student. But so far, he's never got any. He also talked about fetching professors from university... and some professors will just start talking about things that he's never heard before or things that we'll never have a chance to know... And interestingly, he makes record of the people he has fetch... especially those who come from overseas. So he's met people from Germany, Australia, Czech, France and so on... Now his target is to meet people from all over the world.

It's such amazing that such a humble job can meet so many people. I think it's a joy when you meet people and share experiences. You don't need to be a CEO of a MNC who travel all over the world for meetings to meet so many people. Neither do you need lots of money to fly around the world. Sometimes, opportunities just comes to you. Truely... the world is at our doorstep... it's a matter of whether we see it... and whether we want take that step forward.

:D 9/14/2006 09:23:00 PM

Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Crystals Crystals grow grow grow...

Forgot to talk about our crystals... two students growing crystals in the lab to take part in a competition held in NUS nxt week. Will be going down on nxt thursday to do the setup... After many many tries... our babies are finally growing well!!! Yeah!!!

Though not very symmetrical... but it's crystal clear and the shape is more or less there. Hope it's a good crystal... Don't know what the other schools have... Ours still quite small.. percentage yield is so low.... sigh...

Now have to think of how to decorate the whole display. Think think think...

:D 9/13/2006 11:02:00 PM

Ok ok... here I am to update my blog. I think if I still don't update by today some people are going to come and 'hum tum' me already......

Well, many things happened last few days. It's now the period of deadlines for setting papers. Everyone's rushing to set, edit and vett the papers. Set paper until 2 am in the morning on Monday... went to bed then went to school at 6.30am. Zombie the whole day...

Monday night was the terrible night. I had gastric pains... or rather I don't what's wrong with me and just knew that my stomach is bloated and I'm in pain and don't want to move a single inch. Didn't even dream of taking MC, cos if I'm going to take any MC, my science class is going to suffer... cos we're rushing syllabus now!!!

Tuesday still not good. Walk also pain... luckily I have kind students who show compassion. Some students even surprised me with the concern they show the moment I stepped into the class. Sometimes people that you least expect to show concern will say very comforting words. Of course there're still those who lack compassion... They'll wait until you faint in front of them then they'll realise the teacher is sick. Cannot walk fast... cos once I move, my stomach hurts... hungry but no appetite, dunno what to eat for lunch. In the end went Han's with students to eat porridge and almost forgot about my colleague's lunch until he called to say he's starving. The porridge was good... felt so much better after that. Funny thing is still got people ask me play badminton. Please lah... I walk also pain... u want me to play badminton???

Edited paper until 12.30 midnight... Sigh... late night again. Paper too simple... Had to change a lot of the qns. Today was a sleepy day. I almost fell asleep at the last period while giving a test. My students were like... are you sick? why don't we dismiss early and you can go and rest?... ya... like real... let me rest... haha

Today is 'getting injured/sick' day. One student had stomachache in the morning and then vomitted after that. But insisted on sitting for the geog test and said he felt better. But we still managed to get his mother to bring him home.
Another one, play ball until the knee sprain/twisted... I was in the office when my class boys suddenly run in to tell me the boy got bone jutting out of his leg. Got me scared.. I was thinking of lots of bleeding and broken bone jutting out. But no bloody scene, the knee joint was slightly shifted (i think)... the boy wasn't crying and said it's not painful. Then 10 mins later, the whole joint was swollen, and he was in tears.
The last one is the 'injury' of an object, not the person. Playing basketball... balls again... that's why I have phobia of balls flying around... can hit anything any time. Anyway... the ball has no eyes, so hit him on the face... be glad his nose is not flattened... and specs fell apart. Supposedly the 6th pair of frameless specs that's broken over the past X years. Frameless specs not cheap leh... Sigh...

Anyway, exam paper finished finally... Actually should thank the other teacher who set one part in the paper for being on mc for the past two days... cos if she's not back, she can't edit her part, i rush finish also no use... so my deadline extended until tomorrow... Haha

:D 9/13/2006 10:36:00 PM

Friday, September 08, 2006

Today brought 2 students to SP to take part in a competition. So few contestents as compared to last year. Only a few schools taking part this year. But competition was keen. We could see the other students still busy studying their textbooks and notes given to them by their teachers while our students were busy talking.

We teachers also took up the challenged and tried to answer the questions ourselves. Well, we didn't get full marks ourselves, but if we took part we sure win. So we were joking that if we wore school uniforms and went to take part nobody would know too. hmmm....

Well, we didn't win the top 5 prizes of DNA amplification kits, PCR kits, DNA isolation kits, micropipettes and digital camera. But I can say we got the consolation prize... haha... During the 'audience participation' session, we teachers were writing down all the answers for the students to answer. It's basically spelling and you have to rush to the microphone to answer. So we managed to booked the seats near to the microphone, so we won the most prizes. Nothing great, just notebooks. (not the laptop notebooks ok... it's the paper notebook) But we feel proud that we got the most... HAHAHA....

What's important is never the result... I think we learned a lot from this competition. The students got exposed to vocabulary and information that their peers and classmates would not have heard about, and even learn some basic knowledge of the chapters they're going to learn next year. So they can become assistant teachers ya?

But the organisers said they might end this series of competition soon. How can? Not after I realise that they recycle like 60% of their questions and I copied down almost all the the questions in the competition! At least have one more year.... please.... =P

:D 9/08/2006 10:26:00 PM

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

I got a message from my sis today to tell me that one of her friends got abalone from her students for teacher's day present. Then she ask me why I don't get shark's fin?

Well, I told her my kids are not that rich. Poor kids. Basically they have other things to spend their money. How many kids would buy abalone for their teacher? This is the first time i ever heard of it. Maybe the parents bought it. Must be.

Teachers always tell the students, no need to buy present... as long as you do well in your studies we're happy... no need to buy expensive present... it's the thought that count. I also tell my student this. But wait... I'm a materialistic person. I like the feeling of being able to look at something 'concrete' and recall all the memories. Cards are the best. Easy to keep, and you know who gave it to you. But.. consecutively for two years, I receive 1 EMPTY card. The envelope has my name on it, the card is beautiful, but when I opened it? It's EMPTY! Is this a trend or something? Luckily it wasn't threat mail. How strange can people get nowadays.

:D 9/05/2006 05:55:00 PM

Sunday, September 03, 2006

What are teenagers thinking of these days?

I lost count of how many times I ask myself every week the same question. It's an occupation hazard. Whether I want it or not, these people's problems will revolve around me and to help these people, I have to understand.

Personally, I'm not far from their age. Ok fine, a decade apart, plus minus. Why do they think so differently from people of my age, when we were at that age??

I never understood the fun of LAN games. They complain that they don't have money to buy textbooks, assessment books and stationary. They claim that they don't have time to do their homework. Yet they can spend their time (and money) in internet shops playing games online until midnight. One told me that once they were challenged by a group of adults and they won. They felt a sudden rush of sense of satisfaction in them. And they felt great.

So it's for the sense of satisfaction. How come they don't get it in school? Let's see... They don't do their work, teacher chases after them for homework, they ignore, and fail their test. Experience have told me that kids love praises. They can come jumping with joy to tell me that 'Mr so and so praise me for doing my work!' or 'Mrs so and so praise me for being attentive in class!'.

So since they like the praises so much, why can't they just be a good student all the time? And that's where I realised another problem. Good students get praised less often than bad students. Good students tend to go unnoticed while the mischievous ones gets all the attention (= scolding to be exact). Then... when the mischievous ones be good, they get praised sky high.

So why be a good student? I was a good student. The fact that I was seldom scolded by teacher tells me that I'm probably not a bad nut. But neither was I praised. So what's the problem? Good students don't get attention, don't get praises. So why be good?

Another big problem. It's how youngsters complicate their lives. And I mean in all aspects. When I was a student, life was simple. Go to school, go home, lunch, homework, dinner, tv, sleep. If there's band practice, I stay in school, then go home after practice for dinner. Weekend, I stay at home or go out with my parents. Boring ah? I call it simple. No worries, except probably homework stress.

Today some worry about saving money to get the latest mp3, handphones etc. Some cry and cry when their handphones were confiscated, despite several warnings to tell them to keep it. Some cry and cry when their handphones were lost when we tell them not even to bring it to school.

Some worry about the people around them when they can't even solve their own problems. Education aims to broaden their minds. We teach them to be global and to widen their circle of friends. We teach them not to be self-centred but to show compassion for others. Have these caused them to stop thinking about themselves?

Relationship with others is another BIG problem. Some have no common sense at all when facing a girl or a boy. Some see an obstacle, and choose to avoid and run away. Defence tactic ah? Run away in order not to get hurt further? But how can you run away from a person who comes to the same building as you every day? Face it. Trash it out. If it has reached the point that you hate the person, ignore the person. Note the difference between ignore and avoid. Ignoring is taking that the person does not exist. Avoiding is wishing that you yourself don't exist.

The more you run, the more hurt you'll get. It's like digging a knife into a wound. And does that person know that you're running away? If the person doesn't, what on earth are you doing? It's totally senseless. It's just like scolding a person in the face that that person doesn't know that you're scolding him. It's a waste of energy and no purpose is reached. Get it?

:D 9/03/2006 10:33:00 PM

Friday, September 01, 2006

Happy Teachers' Day

My 2nd Teachers' Day. The teachers' day celebration day yesterday was really fun. Looks like the students were enjoying it even more. Staffroom became an open house, with hundreds of students and teachers trying to squeeze through the narrow aisle in the staffroom. Some clever ones left the presents in the pigeon hole. Carried two big bags home in the rain. Mum's first reaction: So much stuff again! But mum, it's the thought that counts.

Interesting presents I have this year, spend last night unwrapping the presents and also trying to figure out which one is given by who. Next time write your name please...

One student gave me a bottle of 'Chuan Bei Pi Pa Gao'. I kept wondering why that present was so heavy and thought it's a porcelain figurine. Got chocolates from Wee Keng, a very cute photo frame from Winson (my very cute class monitor), a mug from Pearlyn and Jiawen and another one from XinYing. There's one that's a scented leaf. Another interesting gift given by anonymous. Not forgetting Kok Chun who gave me a candle holder and Jane gave me a box of hearts. There were also other photo frames and figurines.

I like hand-made stuff. Cookies from Sandra, koniyaku jelly from Wanjie. Many cards, both bought and hand made. Dear Fiona bought me my favourite biscuits. It's such a nice feeling when students remember your favourite things. But the story of these biscuits is only known to the choir members who went to KL with me last year. The H31A students gave me a jigsaw puzzle of Chip and Dale. Also another bunch who remembers my favourites. Thank you very much.

Almost went to woodlands. Luckily didn't go. Halfway to MS to meet jinxuan kaijing janice and lydia, singyee called to say they're bored and want to come MS to find me.

Got my last teacher's day present at MS. Janice and lydia went to buy the piggy pillow, that i was eyeing at action city, when kaijing jinxuan and me went to arcade. Actually i knew more or less when jinxuan asked me if i really wanted it and then u all started looking at your wallets and talking behind my back. But I'm really really very touched.

Bowling was a disaster cos my hand still aching from tuesday's badminton. So many zeros... sigh... throwing money into 'long kang' again. Stomach totally bloated after sakae. Kaijing and Jinxuan u two are ultimate lor. The shop owner sure scared of u all if you go too often. They sure suffer loss. And I think I won't dare to go to that shop within the next month.
I had great fun yesterday. Thanks for telling me so much of your stories. Thank you so much.

:D 9/01/2006 06:01:00 PM