Pieces

Hai! I'm back. Just returned from a weekend trip to Kuching to settle some family matters. It's a break from the daily routine of Bintulu. John managed to borrow a friend's car and we went shopping and even visited my uncle and his family. Bought some of Ruth's favourite chocolates and Amos cookies. She loves them!

Hubby and Ruth decided to adopt a new dieting regime. Both enjoy good food and had been putting on some extra pounds recently. Ruth decided to stick on to a meal of oats instead of rice for dinner. Hubby's doing double the portion, with oats for both breakfast and dinner. It must have been real boring, having plain oats for both meals. Several times, I caught him "sneaking" in the kitchen. Ha! Ha! I do not fancy oats as the taste is rather bland and boring. Maybe, I'll try to find other ways to diet!.

Mum's back from her Philippines trip. She enjoyed the sumptuous food and sight-seeing. She will be going for another trip to China at the end of the year. She invited me along, but I had to decline as I could not stand the cold weather. During our trip to Shanghai last November, I was almost frozen despite of several layers of warm clothing.

Pickles

I am so much out of touch. Been busy with work and supervising Ruth's homework and projects. Her tuition teacher had not been feeling well lately so I had to stand in for her. It's really quite exhausting after a hard day's work at the office. Hopefully, Ruth will learn to study on her own with less supervision and coaching.
She is also slowly getting use to the medium of instruction (Bahasa Malaysia) for most of the subjects, although it will take sometime for her to use the language fluently. She loves to read English but not Bahasa Malaysia or Chinese storybooks. So, her grip on the grammar, spelling and vocabulary of both languages is still lacking.

Yesterday, I had a lunch date with an old buddy. She's in her early fifties, having enjoyed "early retirement" since the MAS rationalization exercise almost two years ago. Her children are all grown up and working elsewhere. She's got plenty of time on her hands and enjoys watching TV, surfing the net and chatting with friends over the telephone and internet. How I envied her! Here I am running from work to home, exhausted at the end of each day! We "gossiped" for almost an hour and before we knew it, it's time to go back to work at the office. Back to the deary routine of work, work, work!

Of Mountain peaks and valleys

Ruth finally got back all her school examination results. She recorded a slight improvement in her grades and managed to remain as one of the three top students in her class. But alas! She only managed a pass in her Grade 5 practical piano exams to hubby's disappointment. He had been expecting her to do better considering all his investments in tuition fees, books and the piano he bought her. Well, sometimes, one cannot have the best of both worlds, so she has to work harder the next round.

Mum and John dropped by Bintulu for an overnight stay last weekend. We intended to join them on their trip back to Mukah but did not materialised as hubby had to stay back to complete some rather urgent work. Maybe... next time, hah!

During our last trip to KL, hubby bought Ruth the whole set of the Harry Potter adventure series. As she is quite busy with her school work and monthly tests, Ruth only managed to complete reading the first book. Out of curiousity and seeing the books idle, I decided to try reading about the adventures of the boy wizard and found them imaginative, spellbinding, sometimes hilarious and "almost" magical. No wonder, children, teens and
adults alike adored the stories and just could not wait in anticipation of the next books in the series. So, this is how the author, J.K. Rowling made her millions. By writing about magic!

Rainbows......

Ruth's one week mid-semester break is finally over. She had a fairly easy week, where she spent most of her time devouring her Harry Potter books, watching some cartoons and completing all the homework that her tuition teacher assigned her. She snooze late and had quite a relaxing time before hitching up her school bag to return for another term of projects, assignments and homework.

We will be visiting my brother John in Mukah during this Merdeka holidays. It's been a two-year break since we last visited this township where John and I spent our early childhood and teens. Gone were days when we felt so free and innocent, playing those noisy childhood games with our friends, going for rides along the beaches and chasing hermit crabs in the sands. Those where our nostalgic and memorable moments whenever we think of Mukah.

We also planned a birthday surprise for mum. John and I hoped that this occasion will serve to bind our family closer together, having being separated throughout the year due to work and family commiments.

Down memory lane.........

What a relief! After a week of cramming and revision, Ruth finally completed the first round of her second semester examinations last Friday. She had her Grade 5 practical exams yesterday, but it seems that she did not do well. She came back in tears and was depressed. Apparently, she made some glaring mistakes in her scales and pieces and her hopes of getting a merit or distinction were dashed. Well, there's nothing she can do about it now until her school receives the results in two months' time.


Hubby and I returned from Kuala Lumpur after attending his 15 year's long service award ceremony. He received a plaque, two glass cups and a cash incentive as an appreciation and in recognition of all the hard work, sacrifices and dedication to his employer. The dinner was a gala affair, featuring a number of popular local artistes. It was a lifetime opportunity to watch the live performance of Malaysia's singing sensations like Mawi, Khatijah Ibrahim, David Arumugam and Rambli Salip.We enjoyed a sumptuous spread of Asian, Western, Japanese and Middle East food. It was a real memorable event and we look forward to attend his twenty years' award ceremony in five years time.

Intermittent

I had been too busy to update my blog. Or disgustingly lazy to put in a few words here and there. In fact, I had been supervising Ruth's revision for the past week as her tuition teacher was away on a course. The first round of her second semester examinations will start next Monday, so it's another week of cramming and revision. After her school exams, she will have to sit for her Grade 5 piano practical exams. She could hardly take a breather in between. Poor thing!

I will be attending hubby's long service award ceremony in Kuala Lumpur next Friday. Unfortunately, Ruth will not be able to accompany us as she is in the midst of her exams. Maybe I'll make it up to her by getting some of her favourite storybooks and VCD games.

A way of seeing....

Ruth had been real busy these two days. But not with homework or revision. She's attending her junior prefect orientation program organized by her school. She came back home at the end of the day exhausted and complaining of aches here and there. For one who seldom exercise, it's definitely a trying time for her. Well, from now onwards, it takes alot of self-discipline and effort to balance the time between her studies and her prefectorial responsibilities.

Speaking of discipline, this brings to mind the warden of a boarding school caught in the middle of the "soaking in the pond" controversy recently. She ordered 200 girls into a pond as a collective punishment because no one owned up for flushing a sanitary pad into the toilet. She claimed that the girls had been repeatly advised to disposed off their soiled pads with the old newspapers and dustbins provided by the school but they just would not listen. So, she sent them for an hour's soak in the pond.

The incident sparked a furore and with all the media attention, various parties condemned her actions and even called for her suspension and dismissal. It was only after her repeated apologies to the parents of the affected students that she managed to get off the hook.

Looking back, I would not be so quick to condemn her actions. Thirty-three years ago, I was a boarding student in one of the colleges in Miri. I studied in the college for four years and stayed in the girl's dormitory during that period. The dormitory, built in a longhouse style comprises of ten rooms each on the ground and first floor. One can say that thirty years ago, students are less irresponsible, more obedient and easier to discipline. But the problem on the disposal of sanitary pads is an old age one. We had about 200 students in our dormitory and one can imagine the number of pads used by the girls. Our warden also faced the same problem, soiled pads were indiscrimnately thrown in the toilets and bathrooms. She repeatly reminded the girls to dispose off the pads in the dustbins provided, but often the advice would often fall on deaf ears. At one time, the problem was so bad that she ordered the girls from each room to go round all the toilets and bathrooms and collect all the pads and disposed them off at the end of the day. So, a duty roster was drawn up and all the girls had a hand in collecting the soiled pads and disposing them off. It was a really..... dirty and disgusting job. I am quite sure if there's a pond nearby, she just might herald us there for a soak, too! Understandbly, it's never easy being a warden. Besides talking care of the welfare of the students, enforcing discipline is often a problem. I can say, it is often a thankless task.