Ambivalent feelings

Currently I'm feeling quite odd about the things occupying my time now. It's supposed to be the holiday and I think most teachers will feel a sense of freedom, but my days are still terribly packed, with meetings on 4 different days, parents to meet on 2 different days, a briefing concerning the YOG, a 3 day camp to go for, and 2 more days of invigilation. Plus, there's work to submit in mid-nov too.

But then again I am starting to do enjoyable things already. Just completed 3 small Gundam models, repaired a few paddling equipments and am going to put a new patch up my polo boat. Going out for river paddling this weekend, and of course, there's the 2 sea expeditions too. I am seriously busy having fun, and it seems like the holidays in NUS when I would be out on trips every few days.

The prospect of working for the new year isn't that unthinkable too. I'm going to teach upper sec literature next year, and will need to prepare lessons for it. And maybe, I'll end up writing a paper for my department too. Seriously, I don't think it's too hard to do that actually, and perhaps I might even make it my speciality, giving myself another item to brag about in my work review form.

Have contacted contractors and will meet up with them next week to talk - hope I don't faint upon seeing their quotes. I badly need a new place of my own to consolidate all my gear! Things in my house just disappear one by one...

Meeting up at S11

Met my sec sch classmates yesterday, and it was nice to dine out with them at a very familiar place to all of us, even though many of them have moved away from AMK already. It is always nice to catch up but then the complaint is that such meetups are rare. Remedial actions are taken though, next appointment for a dinner-drinking session is already made! The girls are going to teach us guys how to guzzle beer...amazing.

So they were asking me to get a Facebook account, post up pics and at least go be a voyeur and check out their own pictures so as to get updates. It's a thought, but I'll never get around it la. I think it's something that girls will be much more interested in, checking out other people's pictures. I think guys are inherently less curious?

So, sorry to disappoint you all! Just read this blog if you want updates la huh.

Still busy

It's 2 days to school closure but I'm still busy fretting about the upcoming school trip that I am organising. And it's utter chaos in school, new decrees come from the management everyday demanding new tasks to be performed instantaneously. Terrible administrative system.

Anyway, I do have a sense of perspective - for all my business, I am very aware that my immediate bosses have it much worse. Which really reinforces the point that I shouldn't get myself into a middle management position like that, not in the near future at least. It's a real shitty job, at least in my current workplace.

And my last work review made me realised that I'm not cut out for the job of an ordinary teacher doing routine things in and out. I love the holidays, but the school can never appreciate the novel ideas I have, or accept the speed that I like to implement new and exciting changes. They only reward those who can be the perfect slave doing everything thrown their way without complains. People like me are seen as being 'flighty' and 'unstable', and can only be trusted to a certain extent.

Well, through the ages, genius has always been feared by the mindless. Ha.

Paying it forward

I've got book prizes for the best literature students in my 3 classes, out of my own pocket. Thinking about it, I should have got 6 of them - 3 for best end of year scripts and 3 for best overall results.

I used to get a few book prizes in Primary school, but I think I got none at the Secondary level, strange huh? I remember I got a 3-in-1 volume of Agatha Christie's crime novels, which I was barely able to read but did finish it in the end after some effort, and I used a popular book voucher to buy the unabridged version of Oliver Twist, which I tried reading several times but always gave up. I can't find it now, but I'll always remember the effort I put into the attempt to understand it; that is memorable too.

And of course, in my formative years in JC, I've got D.H Lawrence's Sons and Lovers which did much to help me understand my literature text Women in Love, from the same writer. That was one book that made me a more mature reader/person.

I think students treasure book prizes especially when they come with personal messages from the teacher, and for my case, I'll make effort to finish them even though they were not really suitable for my reading ability then. It did me a whole lot of good, and I want to pay it forward. Who knows, one of them might graduate summa cum laude from the Literature department from a university someday because I had done my part to encouraged them.

What a waste...

• That the US currency had gone up and stayed stable. Wanted to see if it'll drop and I can buy myself enough greenbacks for a honeymoon in the US next year.

• I just threw away another inkless pen. I think I read statistics that says only 5-10% of plastics ever gets recycled, and I don't think that will be one of them. Our plastic rubbish either gets burned and contributes to greenhouse gases and landfills, or inevitably end up in the sea, littering beaches or broken down by sunlight until it becomes plastic pellets small enough for animals to ingest them, thus entering the food chain (Which we are part of, btw).

• It always seems like a crime to me that we use more water to wash a cup compared to the amount that we actually drink.

By the way, have you heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch? Read about it in the Natural History Magazine and Discover Magazine.

The big trip ahead...

Exams have started last Friday, which signals the start of the 'lull period', leaving me with more time to think about things other than work.

I just started planning for my touring trip in Langkawi, and it's both daunting and exciting to think about it, all the logistics and preparations involved! From small things like scrapping suncream into plastic containers (cos its current metal can will rust) and charging all extra batteries, I also am trying to figure out the best way to get there still - I missed the Silkair direct flight promotion last month! It feels like my first paddling trip all over again; maybe one can never stop fretting over the organisation of such trips.

Some other things I need to settle -

• Handling the weight of all the things we are bringing - boats are 20+ kg each already, plus camping gear and water and food and personal items.
• Food planning - planning for meals that do not need to be cooked for lunches, and breakfasts that are not a hassle.
  
• If I fly there, where do I get fuel for my camping stove over there?
• Still haven't found a nautical map of the place (not sure if the Singapore sea charts includes it though).
• And yes, I bought a GPS already, have it for almost a month now but I still don't know how to use it!
  

But, think of the beach! The water!

No rhyme or reason...

This is damn funny la, a German fees agency charged Mr Friedrich Schiller, the celebrated (and dead for 200+ years) poet over 40,000 euros for his TV and radio license fees. The bill was sent to a primary school which bears his name. How the hell did they manage to get his name, and who was the smart aleck that decided that his address must be that primary school? See the problem of being an illiterate philistine?

Incidentally, he's the guy who wrote 'Ode to Joy', which Beethoven then set to music and include it into that glorious 9th symphony's last movement. Sing along next time you hear the music!

An Die Freude	To Joy
1 Freude, schoener Goetterfunken,	1 Joy, beautiful spark of Gods,
2 Tochter aus Elysium,	2 Daughter of Elysium,
3 Wir betreten feuertrunken,	3 We enter, fire-imbibed,
4 Himmlische, dein Heiligtum.	4 Heavenly, thy sanctuary.
5 Deine Zauber binden wieder	5 Thy magic powers re-unite
6 Was der Mode Schwert geteilt	6 What custom's sword has divided
7 Bettler werden Fuerstenbrueder	7 Beggars become Princes' brothers
8 Wo dein sanfter Fluegel weilt.	8 Where thy gentle wing abides.

Lyrics taken from http://raptusassociation.org/ode1785.html