My Earlier Days until Now...
I was born on 02/12/1976 at some unknown hospital in Kuantan, Malaysia. From my childhood photos, I remembered living in a kampung house when I was a toddler before coming over to Singapore at about 4 years old. I come from a poor family. My parents borrowed money in order to come here to provide me with better education. We rented and lived in a single room near Newton Circus (Hooper Rd) when I was in primary school (I was in Monk's Hill Pri until it closed down when I was in P5 b'cos the student population was too low to continue. I was then posted to Swiss Cottage). My parents were both working so I was taken care of by a nanny, whose shophouse is located near the current Tanglin Mall. I spent most of my time (when I was in lower Pri) catching spiders, hiding in discarded boxes, cycling to Botanical Gardens and feeding the swans and turtles.
When the shophouse was torn down to make way for a shopping mall, I followed my mom to work at Lucky Plaza. I spent most of my time standing at the video games shop playing Nintendo (still remember playing Super Mario, Zelda & Street Fighter). I just stood there for hours everyday without moving, my eyes totally glued to the TV screen. I studied reasonably hard for PSLE (while I was still addicted to video games) and managed to scored 3 As and 1 A*.
When I reached Sec 1, my parents decided to make me a latch-key child. That means coming home everyday to an empty house and with no one to bother about me. I don't blame my parents for "dumping" me at home b'cos I know that they are working hard to provide for me... I was lonely initially but I managed to know a couple of boys in the neighbourhood and I picked up soccer, computer games, Karate, skateboarding, basketball and also some undesirable things like gambling, stealing, vandalism and having gang fights (I was smart or coward enough to run away most of the time!). I was pressurised by my "friends" to smoke as well but they never succeeded b'cos I hated the smell of it! I was quite rotten to the core during my secondary school times, rebelling against my parents, arguing back and holding onto the cane when my mom tried to cane me. I usually go out most of the time and only return home at the wee hours. It was a good scolding and caning and when my mom started crying that I woke up and I started studying for my 'O' Levels (please don't be like me!). With whatever time left, I managed to obtain 14 points and got into the science stream in SAJC.
That was where the turning point in my life happened. I was in triple science for the first three months but I decided to switch to double maths & double sciences b’cos my brain just refuse to allocate any hard-disk space to store all the details… I dropped Chemistry after a few months b’cos the chemical equations were not reacting in my brain… You may think that I am someone who gives up too easily. Well, you may choose to believe that but I believe in studying at what I can manage. Anyway, that’s not the main point! The turning point in my life came at the end of JC1, just before my final year exams! A few days before we sat for our first paper, I received a phone call from my classmate at night, telling me that one of our classmates committed suicide! That really shocked me! I was still playing Chinese chess with him that morning and he was looking so normal. He jumped from a HDB block near to his girlfriend’s place. He left a letter and I later realized that she dumped him for another boy. I thought it was too impulsive of him and my class was quite angry with his girlfriend for causing his death. However, I later felt sorry for her and find her most pitiful as she has to spend the rest of her life trying hard to take away the guilt of causing his death. His death started to make me think about life and how saddening death can be! It reminded me of an incident in Sec 2 when I cried and asked my mom what will happen when we die. She did not give me any answers then and that made me fear death tremendously. When our class stepped into the examination hall to take our first paper for JC1 promos, we saw, to our surprise, a marshmallow sweet and a pass-it-on card on each of our desks. What surprised me the most was the fact that the gesture of encouragement was actually from our fiercest teacher (Ms Kok, who teached me Maths).
The card had this message: God, grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change and the grace to change what I can. That was what inspired me to give out sweets to my students during exams and what set me thinking whether God has the answer to my fear of death… I was asked by one of my friends to church during that Dec holidays and I accepted Jesus Christ to be my saviour when I realized that death is inevitable but I am promised of a wonderful place with God if I choose to believe that He has died on the cross, on my behalf, for my sins. About 6 months later, I was baptized (without the permission of my parents – they scolded me but gave in when they noted a change in me). From a rebellious brat in Sec school, I started to realize the sorrows and hurt that my parents had to bear when I frustrated them during my Sec school life and how I have taken all the things that they have provided for granted.
To cut this long story short (thanks for your patience if you have read until this far), I worked very hard during my U days, completed my bachelor in electrical and electronics engineering and managed to obtain a scholarship to study Masters in NTU. When I finally graduated from my Masters, I did not manage to get a job in the Biomedical field as the economy was bad (the area that I researched on). My wife (who was training in NIE at that time) encouraged me to go into teaching but I told her that it was the last thing that I would do. Anyway, after searching aimlessly for a job for about 6 months, I was granted the special permission to be freed from my bond (of finding a job in an R&D company) and my feeling for teaching began to grow after attending a career talk. Finally, after confirming with God that it is His will that I should go into teaching, I did contract teaching at NHSS for half a year (I taught some of the current Sec 4 and just graduated Sec 4) before going into NIE. Afterwards, I was posted back again to NHSS… Well, that’s a summary of my life story. My entries are rather disorganized, going back and forth in time but it doesn’t really matter, right? Even Star Wars movies are like this…
When the shophouse was torn down to make way for a shopping mall, I followed my mom to work at Lucky Plaza. I spent most of my time standing at the video games shop playing Nintendo (still remember playing Super Mario, Zelda & Street Fighter). I just stood there for hours everyday without moving, my eyes totally glued to the TV screen. I studied reasonably hard for PSLE (while I was still addicted to video games) and managed to scored 3 As and 1 A*.
When I reached Sec 1, my parents decided to make me a latch-key child. That means coming home everyday to an empty house and with no one to bother about me. I don't blame my parents for "dumping" me at home b'cos I know that they are working hard to provide for me... I was lonely initially but I managed to know a couple of boys in the neighbourhood and I picked up soccer, computer games, Karate, skateboarding, basketball and also some undesirable things like gambling, stealing, vandalism and having gang fights (I was smart or coward enough to run away most of the time!). I was pressurised by my "friends" to smoke as well but they never succeeded b'cos I hated the smell of it! I was quite rotten to the core during my secondary school times, rebelling against my parents, arguing back and holding onto the cane when my mom tried to cane me. I usually go out most of the time and only return home at the wee hours. It was a good scolding and caning and when my mom started crying that I woke up and I started studying for my 'O' Levels (please don't be like me!). With whatever time left, I managed to obtain 14 points and got into the science stream in SAJC.
That was where the turning point in my life happened. I was in triple science for the first three months but I decided to switch to double maths & double sciences b’cos my brain just refuse to allocate any hard-disk space to store all the details… I dropped Chemistry after a few months b’cos the chemical equations were not reacting in my brain… You may think that I am someone who gives up too easily. Well, you may choose to believe that but I believe in studying at what I can manage. Anyway, that’s not the main point! The turning point in my life came at the end of JC1, just before my final year exams! A few days before we sat for our first paper, I received a phone call from my classmate at night, telling me that one of our classmates committed suicide! That really shocked me! I was still playing Chinese chess with him that morning and he was looking so normal. He jumped from a HDB block near to his girlfriend’s place. He left a letter and I later realized that she dumped him for another boy. I thought it was too impulsive of him and my class was quite angry with his girlfriend for causing his death. However, I later felt sorry for her and find her most pitiful as she has to spend the rest of her life trying hard to take away the guilt of causing his death. His death started to make me think about life and how saddening death can be! It reminded me of an incident in Sec 2 when I cried and asked my mom what will happen when we die. She did not give me any answers then and that made me fear death tremendously. When our class stepped into the examination hall to take our first paper for JC1 promos, we saw, to our surprise, a marshmallow sweet and a pass-it-on card on each of our desks. What surprised me the most was the fact that the gesture of encouragement was actually from our fiercest teacher (Ms Kok, who teached me Maths).
The card had this message: God, grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change and the grace to change what I can. That was what inspired me to give out sweets to my students during exams and what set me thinking whether God has the answer to my fear of death… I was asked by one of my friends to church during that Dec holidays and I accepted Jesus Christ to be my saviour when I realized that death is inevitable but I am promised of a wonderful place with God if I choose to believe that He has died on the cross, on my behalf, for my sins. About 6 months later, I was baptized (without the permission of my parents – they scolded me but gave in when they noted a change in me). From a rebellious brat in Sec school, I started to realize the sorrows and hurt that my parents had to bear when I frustrated them during my Sec school life and how I have taken all the things that they have provided for granted.
To cut this long story short (thanks for your patience if you have read until this far), I worked very hard during my U days, completed my bachelor in electrical and electronics engineering and managed to obtain a scholarship to study Masters in NTU. When I finally graduated from my Masters, I did not manage to get a job in the Biomedical field as the economy was bad (the area that I researched on). My wife (who was training in NIE at that time) encouraged me to go into teaching but I told her that it was the last thing that I would do. Anyway, after searching aimlessly for a job for about 6 months, I was granted the special permission to be freed from my bond (of finding a job in an R&D company) and my feeling for teaching began to grow after attending a career talk. Finally, after confirming with God that it is His will that I should go into teaching, I did contract teaching at NHSS for half a year (I taught some of the current Sec 4 and just graduated Sec 4) before going into NIE. Afterwards, I was posted back again to NHSS… Well, that’s a summary of my life story. My entries are rather disorganized, going back and forth in time but it doesn’t really matter, right? Even Star Wars movies are like this…
posted by papaphysix at
9:25 AM
