Friday, May 22, 2009
Shocked and stunned but i am almost over it!
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Because You loved me
First of all , i am now kept on my toes with a number of new tasks at hand. I have taken on yet another English training session. This time it isn't the usual short stint of a week or a fortnight. This one is 6 months long , tho its only 2 sessions a week. I am exactly midway thru it now , and have 3 more months to go.
For most of the Listening and Speaking modules i have to download certain video clips to help with the training. And the one particular one for my session this week is about a Filipino girl called Charice who sings like an angel at the tender age of 16. And her dream is to sing with Celine Dion. Oprah found her and she performed a song in Madison Square Gardens with the celebrated singer. Nothing really extraordinary about that for most of you, even tho she has a wonderful voice. And my post isn't about her spectacular voice or about how dreams can come true!
It was the song she chose to sing and who she dedicated it to. The first few notes that came thru her lips were beautiful. She is a very amazing singer but from then on , tears welled up in my eyes. At the start of the song, the 16 year old girl had said that she was singing this song for her mother who was in the audience. And the song she chose was Because you loved me.
Her words touched my very heart as i listened to the lyrics. I am what i am today all because of my mother! I love u , Ma...... i always will . Happy mother's day!
PS: i tried i million times to upload the video here but keep getting the error message so if anyone wants to view the clip, its here :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WilGCuT8LlM
E-very day i love u
power coup within .....
its been a horrible and stressful week for me and my other colleagues as well especially all the HOD. It is just like in the movies and those chinese dramas that you have watched many and many times over and over again. Never thought that me and others would really got the chance to experience ourselves 1st hand...... wow... it is reallly very tiring and stressful for us.. what more those who are directly involved !! We are in the office "Coup" power hahaha.... eh... tis is for real.. no joke wan ah !! Family fighting each other for the ultimate ... the power / hot seat !! Actually, only two involved as the rest is just back benchers. It's either me or him..... u vote him.. i opt out and vice versa. Macam drama minggu ini. One will paint bad pictures about the other causing uneasiness among the family.. dragging the man of the house as well. Poor man.... one side son, the other side also son.... so how ..??
Advise to those voting.......to vote the Policeman... catch bad guys but able to bring in any business ??? wherelse, businessman... bring in business and able to maintain the sales n uphold the company..... Which one would you vote ??
its gonna be a very stressful weekend ahead..
S..tress..
Monday, May 4, 2009
Of Lice and Lies ...
The first few days of school, I was feeling lost and alone. I didn’t know anybody. Prior to Std 1, I did not attend kindergarden or nursery classes; the closest being Sunday School, if that counted at all.
That particular day, some of the girls were crying uncontrollably in spite of the fact that their mums were standing just outside the classroom, peering through the shutters, shushing and uttering “tiam” in their various dialects. The sight and sounds of kids crying made me feel worse. My mother wasn’t there. There was no one to console me had I contributed to the barrage of tears.
As I sat in class trying to be brave, she approached me and made a great show of pretending to cry. That broke the ice. I knew she was mocking the girls. I laughed. I’ve found a friend.
Bhavani was as puny as I was and we were both equally scruffy. Her uniform was crumpled all the time. Perhaps her family didn’t own an iron? Maybe they didn’t even have electricity at home? Mine were often crumpled too cos’ I tended to take naps wearing my pinafore. I wear the same pinafore throughout the whole week and only change blouse daily. Dirty-leh..
That we were of a different race didn’t matter. We managed to communicate even with the smattering of English that I spoke. We giggled over silly things and were soon friends with the other girls, including the cry babies. Recess times would find us playing “catching”, skipping ropes and 5 stones, which I never mastered, even to this day.
Children are usually affiliated with innocence but they can often be cruel as well. Young as we were then, there were already snobs amongst us. And there were the troublemakers too.
One day, someone (try as I might, I cannot remember who that someone was, maybe it has been blocked out to protect the culprit??) shouted, (why do kids shout rather than speak?) “Don’t friend her .. she got kutu-one! See her hair got white white one. After you near her the kutu fly to you. My mother say if got kutu, must cut botak head and then must put kerosene wash the head.”
After 40 years I still wonder if there’s any truth to that statement. Did Bhavani have lice on her hair and if you were infested, do you really need to wash your shaven scalp with kerosene?
All eyes were upon her and I could sense her discomfit. She looked at each of us in turn, her eyes imploring for someone, anyone, to go to her defense.
I would have you believe I was the heroine who stood up for Bhavani that fateful day or called the accuser bluff or that I had taken her by the hand and scuttled off somewhere else to play.
Bhavani looked at me with eyes that spoke volumes. I stared back. That’s when it happened.
At the age of 7 I committed my first act of betrayal. I chose to walk away.
From that day onwards, I did not speak to her. Perhaps I was ashamed of myself or perhaps I was angry with her for arousing such emotions within me?
As the days passed, the remorse I had felt dwindled to nothing or so I thought. Some years later an article with a similar theme appeared in the Reader’s Digest. I remember crying while reading that article. The feelings of contriteness and shame which I thought had dissipated so long ago, resurfaced.
Many years have past since I last thought of Bhavani but last year I read “The Kite Runner”. There is no connection whatsoever between that story and mine but I found myself identifying with the character Amir. Reading that book made me recalled that incident in school as well as the times I had opted to take the easy way out and in doing so, betrayed or had been disloyal to a friend.
Amir wasn’t a bad person but sometimes it’s so much easier to let others take the blame; to follow the crowd; to keep quiet rather than to stand up or speak up for someone whom you know in your heart is right. And if you miss your chance to do right at that moment, it’s gone forever.
Maybe this story isn’t so much about Bhavani but my own weaknesses rather? Little did I know that this act of cowardice had left a scar and even though the years have rendered it almost invisible, it will always be there.
F