This is my 1-month-old niece, Elizabeth!
She is a naughty little girl who loves to be carried.
But she would box you on the face even if you carry her.
If you ’scold’ her, she will smile at you sometimes. =)
She likes to sleep with her legs folded.
She loves to stretch. And stretch. And stretch.
She smells nice.
I love her to bits!
The reason why I haven’t been blogging much the past few days and weeks is because like my students, I have been busy preparing for the A-levels. It’s only a few more days to the General Paper on 11 Nov, and we have been revising Content material, discussing life issues such as Happiness, Truth and Beauty, and practising skills such as paraphrasing and summarizing. I can feel their pressure and I see their countenance change as the countdown draws closer, but if anyone of you are my students, and you are reading this, I want to tell you to be calm and not be too nervous! You need all the coolness to do the papers! =) Just yesterday, a few of my students came up with a brilliant suggestion that I should record my voice reminding them about the things to take note of, so that they can replay the recording over and over again when they are doing things like brushing their teeth so that they feel more reassured. Haha, I thought that was a cute idea (no, but I am NOT doing it)
Think I will really miss them after my last lesson with them this weekend, but in the meantime, as the days tick by, omnes una manet nox.
“Hi Mr See, the gang and I graduated today. We had a farewell concert and all, just wanted to say that we missed you.”
Received this touching SMS this afternoon from my ex-students in TJC. I taught this wonderful batch of kids some 3 years ago, and I still think of them now so very now and then as they were quite special to me since I taught each and everyone of them (all 6 classes!)
All the best for your A-levels, TA1s! =P
“What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value.”
Thomas Paine
Recently, I have been redoing and updating my lecture and tutorial notes on the United Nations for my JC2 History tuition kiddos. It’s a fascinating study of the world’s only truly international organization and through its achievements and failings, we look through a mirror to see our world since 1945. One of my favourite personalities is one of the UN’s earliest Secretary-General, Dag Hammarskjold. There are many things about him that inspires me such as his activism for peace, his beautiful literary art, and his awe for God, but it is his quotes which depict a wonderful blend of reality and idealism to reflect a man whose eyes were always on the stars above us, but whose feet were firmly planted on the groud beneath him, in this “soiled and surly orb that engulfs us”. Here is a little selection from my collection:
Everything will be all right – you know when? When people, just people, stop thinking of the United Nations as a weird Picasso abstraction and see it as a drawing they made themselves.
Do not seek death. Death will find you. But seek the road which makes death a fulfillment. (This is a tragic quote on hindsight because he was killed in an inexplicable airplane crash on his way to Congo in 1961 for peacekeeping purposes)
The UN was created not in order to bring us to heaven but to save us from hell. (My favourite quote on the UN)
God does not die on the day when we cease to believe in a personal deity, but we die on the day when our lives cease to be illumined by the steady radiance, renewed daily, of a wonder, the source of which is beyond all reason. (A wonderful rejoinder to Nietzche’s oft-quoted claim that “God is dead”)
In the last analysis, it is our conception of death which decides our answers to all the questions that life puts to us. (Something that we discussed at our movie club after watching ‘The Bucket List’)
Never for the sake of peace and quiet deny your convictions.
Ever since my friend showed me that you could have ‘To-Do’ reminders posted on the wallpaper of your handphone (yes, I’m not a techie), I have been using it to great effect. And just the other day, I was musing at the words on display: “6 to-do items not done”. The number always fluctuates, but it has never, never been “0 to-do items not done”. Sometimes before you can reduce the number, you add another item to the list, and so the list balloons. Are our lives about having to complete all our to-do items? How much control over our lives do we have if all the time, new items pop up on our to-do list? No wonder there is this quote about how events are in the saddle, and ride mankind.
But a to-do list may not be all that bad. Just watched ‘The Bucket List’ a few weeks ago about how 2 men dying from cancer came up with a list of things to do in the last 6 months they have left before they kick the bucket. Interesting and heartfelt idea which demonstrates that sometimes we don’t live until we know we are dying. Everyday brings us one day closer and so we move inexorably towards the end. But before you think this is going to be a morbid, doom-and-gloom blog post, it’s not! I think it’s refreshing for us to pause and think of what we would like to do or have done or dreamt of doing. So this is my attempt at coming up with my own list!
1. Run up the escalator the wrong way
2. Study in Oxford
3. See the Eiffel Tower
4. Act in a play
5. See my name in print
6. Cook a meal
7. Scuba-dive
8. Visit Prague
9. Go sky-diving
10. *Censored*
11. Shave my head bald
12. Attend a pop concert
13. Learn to play the erhu
14. Write a book
15. Start a business
16. Dye my hair
17. See the Pyramids
18. Learn to surf
19. *Censored*
20. Kiss under a mistletoe
21. Make a movie
Ok, that’s all I can think of right now. Haha, but I’m sure they will be more to come! =)
I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he or she handles four things:
A rainy day, the elderly, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights.
I have finished marking script #197…41 more to go…
So I have come to the end of my teaching stint in Ngee Ann Poly. Having been with these bunch of kiddos for the past 5 months or so, it really grows on you.
They were supposed to come up with some comments and feedback on my teaching style and here are some of the nice things they wrote:
“He provides cool and interesting stuffs which fuel our interest in Written Communication.”
“He displays much energy and enthusiasm in class, capturing the attention of every student.”
“The tutor is spontaneous and dynamic in teaching, most interesting tutor I’ve met so far.”
I like this one best:
“Well, he tends to digress and show us some stuff like paintings and videos. But if anything, this makes me more interested in his lessons because he stimulates us intellectually.”
One of the classes also made a very touching video tribute for me that they posted on Facebook. What is amazing is that these kids whom you have to remind to hand up work or who have so many projects and assignments on their hands, actually took time to produce a video!
Go have a look: T01 – Irwin’s Tribute
The Module Leader was also very sweet as she gave me one of her favourite books to thank me for helping her teach her module. The book is ‘The Boy with the Striped Pyjamas’. I missed the movie, but now I get to read the book! =)
An enterprising student of mine started her own online business selling handmade accessories and gifts, and has kindly added an advertisement of Irwin’s Study on her business page.
Go check it out at tikel-me.blogspot.com!
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