Wednesday, October 04, 2006 . 5:15 PM
Some updates, my mom rejected my idea of going to the chinese church.
Im gonna look for some counselling for my mom. Will start looking soon. When im less sian.
I came to singapore when i was 7. My dad rented an apartment in River Valley and sent me to Swiss Cottage Pri sch in Bukit Timah (beside Singapore Chinese Girls' school, but in those days, they didn't move into the nearby premises until i was in pri 5 i think)I was lucky, cos most m'sians will b required to stay back and repeat a yr if they wanna enrol into local pri schools, but i came at the right time which promptly earned me a place in Swiss Cottage Pri school, she had a school population of approximately 70% foreigners and onli 30% locals, at least that's how i rememebred it. Out of the 70% foreginers, 50% of them were from all parts of Indonesia and the other half consisted of Malaysians and some other pple from countries like korea,hongkong, portugal. Well, i tot all Pri school in singapore are like that. Multinational, multiracial, multilingual. So as you can see, 80% of the students came from gd family backgrds, with money. Well i gez i was lucky and blessed cos in those days, my dad were doing well and i belonged to those family who were doing pretty well. Not say very rich, cos i've known damn rich ones..spoilt idiots..but i def don't belong to that 20%.
Things were good for my family when i was in pri sch. He was doing well in his job, his relationship wiht my mom was ok. He would bring us out every weekend, but towards upper pri, we stopped going out with him n mom bcos we thought we are old enuff to make our own decision and we hate going out with them. Then eventually, he ended up sleeping at home most of the weekends.
I moved when i was in pri 2, to western part of singapore and have been staying at this house since then. I knew not a word of english when i came to singapore and this gal beside me was always bullying mi bcos her english was supposedly so gd. By pri 2, my english also zai zai. But u know u don't split class till..pri 4 rite? Oh man i can't rem haha.. Anyway tolerated her shit for a few yrs and my dad didn't believe she was bullying me. School terror. And i liked this taiwanese guy in pri 2 haha...i even told my parents i like him so much! He was cute. I wonder where is he now..
I obtained my PR only in pri 2, before that i was paying the sch fees at a foreginer's rate of $120( if i didn't rem wrongly) PER MONTH. And apparently, my father couldn't b bothered to update MOE about our PR status even when we obtained PR-ship. So they continued to charge us at $120 per month until one day my form teacher found out and she did all the documents, all those stuffs for mi, even reimbursed all those extra money we paid while we are PR but MOe didn't know. I gez tht's juz one of the many 'blur' things my dad did..over the years.
I had the same chinese languange teacher for SIX LONG YRS. And lucky for mi, i loved him. Come to think of it, he was so man. Haha..but a kid wouldn't think he's so man. I only tot of him as a fatherly figure. He taught us well, so well that my chinese standard didn't drop even at sec school levels, when my sec sch chinese tcher cannot make it. He was stern, but yet gentle. He almost made mi his god daughter n how i regretted not acknowledging him back then. It was a special bond b/w mi and him, cos not many pple followed him up the levels all the 6 yrs..
I had a maths teacher in pri 5 and 6, who is a christian. A rather naggy one. She would give the class gifts, and it always contains christian verses. She would always tell us how God loves us. Come to think of it, back then i really found her irritating...but then i end up being a christian a few yrs later, personally chose to believe in this Jesus she used to tok abt. BUt actually, all the while, in pri sch i did go to chinese sunday school when my mom dumped mi there while she goes to her chinese adult service, but i hated going there, bcos it's in CHINESE.
Swiss cottage pri sch has a really large field.And even by today's standard it's really huge, those were the days of running all over the field and u still won't finish covering the area of the field. The furthest ends of the field were fenced off, and beyond that juz forested area. Somewhere amongst the forest, there was a colonial looking house that was eerily situated there, with strange lights. Of cos it's normal we rumoured it to be haunted. Even getting close to the fenced area to check out the forest was like a adventure. Once, some boys did brought mi over to hte other side of the fence, bcos there was a hole in the fence and we crawled over. Can't rem much of wat happened, but was so exciting to known u were walking on grounds that you shouldn't. Anyway, was juz forest, lots of bugs..yew..and it was spooky so we went back not too long after that and felt like the world has changed. HAHA ok kidding.
We used to like catching tadpoles in the pond. The chinese teacher always made a few of us pluck off the weeds in the sch's garden bcos he was the head of gardening club. Back then i had the greeen fingers, plants grow under my care. Now i absolutely kill any plants in my care.
When i was in pri4, during chinese class i was assigned to sit bside a korean gal. Well she was in taiwan for a no of years before that, so she can speak chinese but with alittle weird ascent. How would i know one day korean culture n pop drama would b so popular, if not i'll ask her to teach mi korean instead. Actually come to think of it, she did...she drew squares and told mi that's her korean name. HAHA. Ok anyway she taught mi the zhu yin of the taiwanese chinese. U know in singapore we have the pinyin? Taiwan is zhu yin and yes i did master it for a while b4 i forgot about it later on. She also taught mi how to cheat in tests. We used to have ting xie and mo xie if you guys rem. She taught mi to cheat, and not to study. So when i failed, despite my efforts in cheating, i faked my mom's signature. That yr was a bloody bad year for mi. So i gez the chinese teacher found out about wat i was doing and he decided i need to b 'canned' by the ruler infront of the class. I was angry with him for embarassing me. He also went to call my mom up and told her that i've been not doing well, he didn't tell my mom i was cheating or i think i would not have survived till today. So somehow yes i was thankful for that.
I was a bloody gd gal in pri 5. Until i met another gal, she's from hongkong. She's the one who introduced mi to reading chinese romance novels and hey back then i think we are the onli idiots who read such things when the whole pri 5 and 6 pple are onli interested in playing. But we were involved in things like romance, who likes who..and how to attract the guys, how to b pretty. But she turned out to b such a bitch. Bcos she was secretly studying but she kept asking mi to go play. And so many stories that she told mi, i was stupid enuff to believe it. Nevertheless, gez i learnt to b smart after pri 6, after the encounter with her. So i didn't really study rite, hence i got into Tanglin sec sch.
My dad lost his job in end of my pri 6 yrs. And for the many yrs in the future, he will still not have a job, but lost alot of money trying to do business on his own.And i tasted life as how i would always rem life to b..miserable.To save 40cent of bus trip, and i have to take 2 bus trips to sec sch, i'll walk half the journey and take one bus or walk the whole way. I even tried not eating lunch to save the money.I didn't dare have tuitions till i really have to and chose a class tuition instead bcos it's so much cheaper. No new clothes. Everything was skrimp and save.No holidays.Buying anything required lots of thinkings and consideration b4 we will buy. i gez if things didn't change, i'll still b a da xiao jie now,living the carefree lives i used to have. And my family would still b happy. At least my family had betta days???
*shrug*
Last of all, my happy face in my Pri sch uniform. Many mistaken my uniform to b of RGS' juz like how they can mistaken Sarawak to b in SABAH.well i gez it won't hurt mi haha..but sorry it's not.
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