Murphy's Law (part 1)

'Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong'. Do you believe in Murphy's law?

Have you ever bought a packet of coffee and when you are about to drink, the string snapped and it fell all over your pants and car seat?

Have you ever tried to beat the amber light when the car in front decided to stop? The result - my first car accident

Have you had a 2 year old kid who was about to be carried out of the car, decided to leave his mark by peeing all over on the car seat?

All these happened in a span of two days. My car has never been so badly mistreated before.

Just when I thought that my day can only get better, the car mechanics told me that I got to change my tires because the linings have worn out.

To add insult to injury, one of my beloved student smsed me early on a Sunday morning that I was in her nightmare. Ha...

Sometimes bad things happen in our lives. In such moments, it is easy to quote Murphy's law and feel lousy about our lives. However, if we take time to reflect, there are easily a lot more things to be thankful about. Here are some:

1. My passengers and I are safe.
2. I learn to be more careful in driving. (I have to be 'carless' for a week simply because I was careless)
3. I learn what to do in times of an accident and the follow-up.
4. Most important of all, I have the luxury of owning a car. All these won't come if I don't have a car. I'm already very blessed.

The Egg

Pamela wrote me a history of how the word 'Good egg' originated from you. So I shall officially confer you the title - The EGG. (Pamela, thx for calling me a good egg)

Veralene, you are one of the most cheerful student I taught in RJ. Your mum described you as a happy-go-lucky girl during the Meet-the-parent session and I fully agree with her. I always enjoy talking to you because the topic you choose to talk about is often interesting and you always appear sincere and genuine to me.

I will always remember the mentos, M&M chocolate and Mars bar that you gave me and it really really pains me to see you cry. I refused to let my dad eat the Mars bar because it was specially bought for me. Ha... people will start to ask you what happened... I hope you don't mind.

Your cheerful character has brought great joy to the people around you. Stay cheerful and real.

God bless!

Milo Swimming Champion

The reason why I called her Milo swimming champ is because of her childhood picture (refer to the Feb 11 post, pic 11). The pic looks like a Milo ad.

I'm impressed by your artistic talent. I used to think that drawing is a very 'introverted' hobby but I soon discovered that drawing has a creative and powerful way of conveying your thoughts and ideas. Keep on drawing!

Thanks for being the first person in RJC to draw me. Probably others have secretly drawn me but at least you are the first to show me. Ha...

I see you as a unique individual in the class. Though you are quiet most of the time, I can see that you are a thinker. Do expand your thoughts and let your voice be heard.

p.s. I keep forgetting to charge you and Bobo extra school fees for using 2 tables in all my tutorial lessons.

Teachers' Day

Hey all, I want to say a BIG BIG THANK YOU to all of you who made your way to school despite the exam period to make my teachers' day a meaningful and fruitful one. Thanks for taking time to buy the gifts, I like every one of them! I am also deeply touched by the cards that you wrote for me. I've kept all the cards and gifts from the past year and I will do so this year too! You are all in my memories! :_

All the best for your prelim! I will pray for all of you. God bless!

Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?

When I first saw the picture, I immediately want to set my hands on it so that I can draw a replica. It has always been my desire to draw pictures of Jesus. After weeks of procrastination, I finally asked my new colleague to lend me the picture that she had pinned on her table partition...

I deliberately use pen to draw to signify that Jesus' death on the cross is an irreversible process. It is His perfect obedience to God that eventually took the sting out of death and set us free.

A day filled with Encouragements

I only suggested each one of you writing encouragement cards to 3 people in the class but I was overwhelmed by the response. My whole box full of cards is now almost empty. I hoped you've enjoyed encouraging one another and most important of all, I hoped you have been encouraged. Thanks to those who gave me cards as well.

Thanks Geri for the drawing too. I like it alot!

"Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another..."

Romans 13:8

A MSN Conversation

Onion: "Sir, last year when you first introduced yourself. "

Me: "Ya?"

Onion: "You said that your hobby is solving Maths puzzles... "

Me: "Oh, lol. Doing Maths tutorial was also my hobby during my JC days. "

Onion: "I thought, OMG... "

Onion: "My teacher is a robot... "

Me: zzz...

My Beloved Classes

Finally after a few months, I've taken class photos with all my 4 classes.

My New Camera

The paronamic function is cool.

National Day

This is the first time I had Mac breakfast at the amphitheatre and I had the uncomfortable impression that everyone was staring at us. I bet the rest of you felt the same too. Thanks Marianne and gang for ordering, collecting and distributing the food.




In the process of taking this class photo with 1C, I unwittedly spoilt their surprise birthday celebration for XH.

Learning Journey - BMTC visit

Madhatters day!

dinner @ Changi Village

Ironically none of the pics depicts the actual learning journey. :P

Failure is not an enemy

Failure can crush you, hurt you, cause you to lose hope, to be bitter, to moan, to engage in self-pity, to become negative, to be ineffective... the list can go on.

Two weeks after I fell at the swinging bridge, I picked myself up and re-took my SOC. Even with my back pain, I recorded my best SOC timing. In the interview with my officer, he told me that he will put me in a shorter course because of my back injury. I was taken out of OCS. My dream of becoming an officer was shattered.

In SISPEC, I was supposed to be downgraded. Instead I was given many days of light duties. Till today, my warrant officer's words still resound in my head - In the first week of my SISPEC course he said, 'I will make you go through the whole ten weeks course and then put you out of course.'

A few years later, I met him. Unpleasant memories began to fill my mind. He called me from afar, gave me a big grin and said, 'doing well huh?'. I have every reason to be angry and bitter towards him for aggrevating my back injury again and again. But I simply held my head high and smiled back. In my heart, I've forgiven him. I have ORDed with pride and dignity.

I realised failure and pain have made me stronger. Without failure, I will never know success tasted so sweet. This success can never be measured. It has become part of me, my values and my character.

Remember this - you will never fully understand the meaning of success until you have failed before.

'My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness'

2 Cor 12:9

If you were me... what's your next step?? (Part 2)

As my past flashed in my mind, I began to think of the things I've yet to achieve in my life. Do they still matter to me? I suddenly remembered Martin King Luther once said this when someone asked what will he do if he is to die the next day - 'I will plant an apple tree'. Profound and yet so simple. My hopes and dreams do not die with my physical body. I still do what I believe in...

Aha, this can go on. To keep the story short, here's what happened. The man with the knife stared at me. I stared back at him. He panicked and walked away. I live to tell the story.

More to This Life

Thanks for gracing my church performance and supporting my fiancee! My fiancee wants to express her heartfelt thanks too. Hmm let me search for my YellowPages and get some yellow slips for the 6 of you...

Our Musical gal

Priscilla is indeed a nice name used on a nice person like her.


Belonging to the F4 in 6I, Priscilla also displays a very composed, quiet and elegant nature. (I'm still figuring out who's the leader of the group.) I witnessed her band performance and it is fRantastic! She plays hmm... I always forget the name of musical instruments. Any chance by fluke is it flute? I always admire gals who can play musical instruments well. To me, it is an added beauty. Hey maybe you can play during my wedding. I heard Aisyah can sing very well. So Aisyah will sing and Charmaine + Vera can dance as the 2 of them have promised.

An occassion to applaud

I managed to find at least a representative from each of my 4 classes. Well done and I hope to see you again next yr on College day.

Auspicium Melioris Aevi.

If you were me... what's your next step??

One fine day, I was in the lift going down to the ground floor. Midway, it stopped on the 4th floor. Looking through the glass window, I saw a man pacing around. When the lift door opened, he hastily stepped into the lift.

At that moment, a glitter caught my eye. The man was holding a bare naked knife staring at me...

My childhood memories flashed through my mind... my parents holding me in their arms... My childhood modeling experience (you haven solve the puzzle, frAncis), my first physics formula learnt, E = mc2 .....

What would your response be???

Our Sweet Pie

I normally call her Ka Man. When I first heard the name Jiamin, I actually thought that there's a new student in my class.

Jiamin is a very polite soft spoken girl. She carries this elegance with her that I feel many people would secretly admire. When she has her glasses on, she is very hardworking and focused, never giving any problem during my lessons. Without her glasses, she is in her tight suit.... aha... she actually put her face in the movie poster of 'Mr and Mrs Smith'. Was very funny and well done. In an attempt to compete with our S.H.E. group (Yanmin, Rachel and Vern Yie) in 6I, she has her own F4 (female four)... you know whom I'm referring to. But I'm glad to see you mixing with the rest of the class more often this year.

Stay cheerful. God bless.

(btw I was doing a spelling check and I was prompted to replace 'Yanmin' with 'onion'... ha...)

Past Memories

Many of you might have realised that I seldom blog nowadays. Ever since I was diagnosed with degenerating bone and 2 slip discs, I constantly thought that I've this extra numbness on my arms that prevented me from drawing.

One day I was walking back to the staffroom and conversing with frAncis along the way. (Don't worry I wasn't talking to myself, I was talking to frAncis Sin and I'm not refering my sinful self either.) We were listing out the remaining people in 6I that I've not posted in my blog. At that time, I felt a stirring in my heart to draw again. Last Friday, I had a JC class gathering. It has been nearly 5 years that we have not met one another. Almost everyone couldn't believe that I'm actually a teacher now! Ha... if you know me well enough, you would see a great transformation between me 10 yrs ago and now. The process itself will take me hours to share. I will do that if I've time in future.

One thing struck me during that gathering. Someone brought our class journal and in one of the page, I saw my own drawing. Suddenly I remembered the time I spent in my JC days.

The drawing you see took me almost 8 hours to complete and I even drew a replica of it. How free I was during my JC days! Of course many pleasant memories were shared during the gathering. I reminded my GP tutor that she called me a 'sponge' in JC days because I simply sit there and absorb without contributing. I told her proudly that now I'm contributing as a teacher. Of course she took every single opportunity to correct my english in our conversation and she concluded that this is the part that I've not changed. I ended up speaking chinese.

As I look back my entire JC days, I've not regretted a single moment I spend in VJC be it with friends or with my notes. Now, as your JC days are approaching a finale, make every day count! Live without regrets.

p.s. I strongly encourage all of you to go for the grad nite.

An invitation to all of you

I like to invite all of you to a special performance on the 30th July, Sunday at SAJC. The performance includes drama, poetry and dance. The theme of this performance is 'More To This Life'. Applying to your context, there's more than just studying. As you are preparing for A levels and even transiting to army or uni soon, you find that the pace of life is so hectic... have you wonder why are we living for? King Solomon once wrote, 'life is meaningless, it is chasing after the wind.' Do you wake up everyday filled with joy because you know what you are living for?

This time, my fiancee will be dancing in one of the items. Come down and support my wife!

Do let me know if you are interested. I will be asking my 3 other classes as well.