Young Love

There's this one student in my class who has this weird rather peculiar habit of standing near  our door whenever she's done with works and all. Yes it's a 15-year-old girl.

She's been doing this since February this year. Later I found out from her that her boyfriend is in the next classroom. You see, our classroom's door is partially glass (on top). 

To be honest, I thought she was only joking. You know how kids love to throw pranks at us adults.

But this one, the whole class verified her confession. She has a boyfriend who is a year younger than her.

One more thing. Every week she'd ask me this question: 

"Teacher, do you think my Adam (not his real name) is handsome?" I just smiled at her first. Not knowing what to say. So I'd reply (again and again), "He's OK lah. Cute too."

And she seems not so happy with how I reply every now and then. So in the end, I'd give in and say "OK, he's handsome".

The rest of her friends told me that once a month Adam would bake cookies for her. He even walks with her after class to a fitness centre where her mom waits for her.

I did ask her "Does your mom know that you and Adam are dating?" She said YES.

Wow! Lucky girl, I said to myself.

When I had my first boyfriend 17 years ago, I had to date discreetly. My mother wouldn't allow me to have a boyfriend at such young age. But I did have one, met him at a church camp. I didn't do the first move, of course. We dated for 7 months until one day my mother discovered about us. So she gave me two choices; break up with him or she'd drag us both to the altar. The 15-year-old me freaked out and I broke up with him. Poor lad. My mother's the ultimate villain here, don't you think?

If you ask me, what happened to my first boyfriend later on? Now he is a happily married man with two young boys. Good for him.

Recently, the head teacher (sort of, since he does all the syllabus back at my workplace) came up with a topic on the negative sides of getting involved in puppy love relationship for the students to work on; they were assigned to write a report based on that topic. I found the points given on that sheet were a bit odd. Basically, the points seemed biased. When I handed out the sheets to my students, our Juliet (not her real name) kept quiet throughout the session. The moment I announced the topic to the class, it wiped the smile off her face. I felt guilty in a way. But I had to do my job. To compensate the negative feelings that surrounded us (I think some of the kids are in their respective puppy love thing too, judging by their reactions), I gave some good sides of being in love at young age. I told them one has to be smart balancing reality and the joy of being in love. Juliet beamed out of sudden when I did that.

Just wow...

Two years and still counting.

While most Malaysians have been busy crooning the litany of woes over the newly-implemented GST since Wednesday (of all the days, they chose 1st of April, cheesecake's sake!), I realize that I have been serving this learning centre for the past two years now. I began my job as an English language tutor here in Miri on April's Fool Day in 2013.

The biggest and the best joke to date, well sort of!

In just two years I have taught many young minds who were and are in dire need of help when it comes to mastering the global lingua franca.
To be honest, I am not a professionally trained tutor/educator. I did bachelor's degree in TESL halfway before I switched to performing arts and I graduated with Diploma in Theatre from UiTM. I spent almost 4 semesters for degree in theatre later on. Nevertheless, I had a harsh brush with one of the academicians in my campus and fell sick at the same time. That prompted my decision to return to my hometown on 15th December in 2012. Without the bachelor's degree, of course.

I recall how my parents, especially my mother, pressing me to find a job here. I was jobless for three months. One March evening a couple years ago, I went out with a former classmate. She told me that a tuition centre was searching for a part-time tutor. Since English language is my forte, she asked me to try my luck. Few days later I gained the courage to call up the centre, followed by an interview and VOILA! I got the job (I began as a part-timer) the very next month.

First few months I struggled as majority of the children speak only Mandarin. I was assigned to handle Transition levels and primary school levels as well. Nevertheless, I have never had problems in trying to adapt to languages.Since then, as I try to fix their English language skills, they generously try to teach me basic Mandarin. Oh dear! I should have tried harder at mastering Mandarin back in campus years ago.

But the journey wasn't all rainbows and unicorns. I did have one big kid (a bully) in my Transition class. A real pain in the arse, I must say. Weeks by weeks, I attempted to stay calm while having to be bothered by his nerve-wrecking antics during class. Until one day, he really pushed my limit button and I broke my "cool teacher" record. I screamed at him. The result? He refused to join the class and the mother even told my boss that her son wouldn't return if I am still teaching that class. Yes, I know, classic case of TEXTBOOK sample of SPOILT BRAT. But that didn't halt me from getting a cool offer to be a permanent/full-time staff at the centre months after the incident.

2014 was quite a year for me. I got the shock of my life when one of my students fell into epileptic seizure one afternoon. I went blank when the boy collapsed and there's so much blood and saliva on the floor. How can I ever forget that incident? My student had a close brush with Death and I was so helpless.

My 31st birthday was another unforgettable experience too. One of the classes that I taught last year found out about my birth date and they set me up. Cool birthday prank, to be honest.

Now that I have entered the second year of my service as a tutor here, I am looking forward to several more years of teaching experience. And oh! I almost forgot this. I began to teach arts since last August and this year I have gained 4 students. I take it as a blessing in disguise as gazillions years ago, I did think my artistic talent was sort of a hand-down jinx. But hey! The old rules DO NOT APPLY anymore. New games of survival are flowing in. I hope to utilize my skills and knowledge as long as I live.

The Ringer, The Aristocrat and The Posh Secret Agent!

Alright, I know I have not been blogging about movies for quite some time now. So far for this year I’ve watched only 3 movies. The first movie was The Wedding Ringer starring Kevin Hart, and ( the most anticipated but I ended up feeling vain and disappointed) Mortdecai and the most recent one is Kingsman: The Secret Service.

Let me begin with The Wedding Ringer. I’m not going to copy and paste the plot of the film for all I know you’ll be Googling for it later on. Wikipedia to the rescue! It was just an OK movie, pretty much like Will Smith’s Hitch. Typical American jokes, blending in racial, cultural and even religious stuff. Basically FRIENDSHIP and "bro-over-hos" kind of flick. To be honest I am not a fan of Kevin Hart but I gave the movie a try. Just an OK from my POV. 

I have been adoring Johnny Depp's style of acting ever since I was a kid. After Edward Scissorhands, and What's Eating Gilbert Grape, I've been his fan since then. OK cut the story short; after Pirates of the Caribbeans sagas, Willy Wonka and that 60s vampire flick that he was in (I forgot the title!), I looked forward to see Depp playing the role of a British aristocrat and an art collector in Mortdecai. I saw the trailer on Youtube and I made sure that I must watch it in the cinema. So after The Wedding Ringer, I went to watch Mortdecai on the same day. The first half an hour the scenes shown in the movie were laughable. Tongue-in-cheek, sort of. Full of English puns, antics and all. The rest of the film *sigh* I felt so miserable in the end. The movie was a flop.

Yes, the film is not unforgettable. Oh dear, I shall be waiting for the next Johnny Depp flick.

The next one was Kingsman: The Secret Service. Now many would have expected me to fall for the new hero in that film (newcomer Taron Egerton). WRONG! I was delighted to see COLIN FIRTH (swooned) after his amazing portrayal of the stuttering British monarch in The King's Speech. That was the real reason of me wanting to watch Kingsman. 

The film was bombastic. OK, I am being biased since this is the first time that I've seen Firth playing the role of a smart and posh-looking secret agent.

Wayyyy better than James Bond, to be honest!

And Firth did most of his own stunts. Not bad for a 54-year-old father of three, eh!

And LOADS of vulgar phrases and LOADS of gory actions! And, and, and....remember the villain in Sherlock Holmes and also Robin Hood, that baldy baddie Mark Strong?

HE'S SO MACHO..Yes, he played the good ol' secret agent trainer nicknamed Merlin.

Of all these three flicks, I am going to rewatch one of them. 

*drumrolls*

Yes, I am so gonna watch Kingsman AGAIN!

The year of the Ram enters!

Hello everyone!
Guess it's not too late for me to wish everyone A BLESSED NEW YEAR.

I purposely did not say HAPPY because once again we were shocked with the Airasia aircraft mishap that claimed about 162 lives on board.

What a tragedy to end the year 2014. Plus, we're still saddened by the missing MH370 MAS plane and the doomed MH17 MAS aircraft bound for Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam.

2014 was a year of tragedy, I must say. The people of South Korea were hit by the sunken Sewol ferry that got over 300 people perished in it. The Arab world was  stricken by the mad so-called terrorists ISIS or ISIL that targeted the Arab Christians.

I don't want to sound like I am a street preacher blabbing about doomsday and all but we are on the verge of the end of the world.

I may be sitting comfortably in an air-conditioned room, be it at home or at workplace. Looking at things via the mass media, I feel nothing but heartache and anger.

Politicians have become circus entertainers. Now this is not quite a new scene. It's just that the plots are getting more and more interesting....and ridiculous as well.

Where do people like us, civilians, stand now?

By the way, I do hope the ram brings in comfort to compensate what the mighty horse had done in the past year.

Hope is all I have although things may turn out vague.

Utilised but Not Appreciated

Nowadays I feel that most people take me for granted. I said MOST, not ALL.

They only notice me for my abilities in certain matters. After they are done "using" me, that is it.
It's pretty sickening. As I try to distant myself from them, they always come up with requests and demands. Do I look like a machine that can just make people happy.
I am tired of dealing with all these craps.
I would love to go away again.
Leaving everything here, be gone silently.

I cannot speak out my anger.
I cannot blurt out my unwillingness.
My hands are tied.
My lips are sealed.
My legs are chained.

When will they ever realize my pain?
When will they let me soar high?
When will they leave alone?
I just do not comprehend things they have asked for.

I need my very own space to live.
Seriously.

Enough is enough.

I was doing some work when I overheard my students were talking about their mothers a couple of months ago. It turned out that they were comparing whose mom is more strict. I had to butt in their little gossip because I have expected them to finish their revision. Before I could blurt out more words to halt their conversation, one of them began telling how his mom normally treats him and stuff.
Then one by one started to share their own matriarch anecdotes with me.

I just paused and listened to them. I did share my own tales as well.

Sometimes I wonder why did God choose me to be in this world. I quote Simon Birch: "God has a plan for everyone."

Yes. But what plan? I have always asked myself that ever since.

I know that little feeling every time I was or am asked to do things against my will. Not pretty at all.

Hearing all their tales, it made me to scream within "ENOUGH!"

Just stop for a minute and look around. This world is getting sicker than ever.

Inked

Last Sunday after a brief meeting with my boss, I spontaneously (actually it was pretty abrupt) brought up something about tattoos. Since my boss shared what is going on and he related the current events with his faith (he's a devoted Christian himself), I suddenly thought of questions of having permanent tattoos among Christians. To begin with, many of my own relatives have things inked on their body. I even overheard my siblings talking about getting one or two weeks ago. My dad, another Christian devotee, pointed out that he has no problem with people getting inked for eternity but he did clarify his view based on this:

“Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the LORD” (Leviticus 19:28) 

And he added later on,"...you want tattoo? Use your own money!"

Now back to my conversation with my boss that evening. He pointed out that Leviticus is in the Old Testament, years before Christ came into this world. And he quoted something from the last book in the Bible, the book of Revelation. It says:

“On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written: king of kings and lord of lords.” (Revelation 19:16)

"His" here refers to Jesus Himself. Well according to one of the blogs I'm currently reading at the moment, whereby the blogger discussed about whether or not Jesus had some writings inscribed or in other word, tattooed on his own flesh?
So I kept reading the blogger's explanation on this matter. 
Towards the end I realized that the writer himself played safe by not leaning to any side.

If it wasn't for my skin condition (I've been suffering from atopic dermatitis @ eczema since I was a toddler), I could have both of my wrists to be tattooed. Nevertheless, that idea is still idling around my head. Years ago when I watched Ayat-ayat Cinta, an Indonesian film based on a novel of the same title, I was attracted to one of the characters, Maria Girgis. Maria is a Coptic Christian Egyptian girl who happens to have a small crucifix tattoo on her left wrist.

Yes, deep down in my heart, I would like to have the similar tattoo on my left wrist. Recently I've have been missing my late paternal grandmother. She passed away 16 years ago. She embraced Catholicism roughly about ten years before her passing. She chose the name "Teresa" as her baptismal name. Now, I am thinking of inking her names on my right wrist. Names? Her birth name was Mawa.

We will see how it goes.