Fell in love with the sea.
Nothing beats sitting on the boat, the feeling of sun on your face, the sea breeze through your hair and the occasional spray of water of seawater. *wistful*
Ah well, I am a beach newbie, though an "ahem" islander. Penang beaches are nothing to shout about..haha..much less about any "poetic-inspiring" beaches in Penang.
There were so much good things to say about Redang; the place we stayed were wonderful, the snorkelling was fanstatic, beach was simply beautiful and the company was Awesome!
Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great.
*GRIN*
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Wednesday, July 20, 2005
Sunday, July 17, 2005
Since, I am so free.
waiting to attach Huge-Ass File to email. *waiting till my neck is long*
Sometimes (Love Actually OST)
We've come too far we can't turn back
Have our good days, have our bad
When I'm feeling blue
You say that I'm hurting you
We try so hard not to fight
But sometimes we cross the line
And I wanna leave
But youWon't let me
We have our highs and lows
Just like everybody else
Doesn't mean that we walk away
We work through our mistakes
Sometimes I love you
Sometimes I don't
But I never ever
Never want to let you go
The road's not easy
But the feeling's strong
It's the little things that keep me holding on
We're both guilty of mistakes
Though you rarely take the blame
Are you coming through
SometimesI hate you
But it's not mistakes in life you make
It's the good you do along the way
The dues you pay
We have our highs and lows
Something everybody knows
Doesn't mean that we run away
We work through our mistakes
OhhhOf all the crazy things in life there's pain
It's you and me
We've come so far sometimes I can't believe
That I wouldn't change a thing
Sometimes (Love Actually OST)
We've come too far we can't turn back
Have our good days, have our bad
When I'm feeling blue
You say that I'm hurting you
We try so hard not to fight
But sometimes we cross the line
And I wanna leave
But youWon't let me
We have our highs and lows
Just like everybody else
Doesn't mean that we walk away
We work through our mistakes
Sometimes I love you
Sometimes I don't
But I never ever
Never want to let you go
The road's not easy
But the feeling's strong
It's the little things that keep me holding on
We're both guilty of mistakes
Though you rarely take the blame
Are you coming through
SometimesI hate you
But it's not mistakes in life you make
It's the good you do along the way
The dues you pay
We have our highs and lows
Something everybody knows
Doesn't mean that we run away
We work through our mistakes
OhhhOf all the crazy things in life there's pain
It's you and me
We've come so far sometimes I can't believe
That I wouldn't change a thing
Autism
Where I work, the centre aims to teach the children to be normal.
To be able to think like how normal people thinks.
To be able to do normal things e.g. wash yourself/feed yourself/eye contact.
To not do what other people think are not normal e.g. tapping your hand/humming nonsensically/saying irrelevant things.
It suddenly strikes me as ironic that we, THE NORMAL people are always striving to find our so-called Identity. To be different from the rest.
To have different clothes. To have different hairstyles. To have a different life from the rest. To think differently from the rest. In media/arts/advertisement, that'll be called thinking out of the box; creativity. That would be applauded! To have mannerisms/accent/slangs/lingo different from the rest. For the teenagers, that would equal Cool. Something that most yearn for.
How so is that the differentness of the autistic children is shunned? To be condemned as wrong? Why is their differentness deemed an abnormality?
To me, it seems quite unfair when we have yet to understand their logic, the way they think. And because we couldn't understand them, we haughtily say that it's wrong. That they should follow what we deem is Normal.
To revisit a past conversation:
Teacher A: It's difficult to teach them because they can't understand us.
Teacher B: No, it's because we canNot understand them
Then, what is IT that we deem Normal?
Sometimes, when I describe the mannerisms of autistic children to people who ask me, they'd most likely would tell me that they would have some of the characteristics as well. Funnily enough, they are not autistic.
Doesn't it seem that it's a very thin line separating normality and autism? And where do we even begin to draw the line?
and all the centre can do is to help them to be as normal as other people think. To stop them from being hurt by their peers, their teachers, their parents, the society. By people who don't understand that they are different.
It's painful to watch.
Kid A has blue black marks on her buttocks that resemble a pattern motif. There is 3 of them there and we deduced that someone hit her with an object. She has temper tantrums problem and sometimes is difficult to handle. Naturally, people under stress will react. Sadly, most of the time with violence. Different from other children, she can't speak. She can't tell us what happen. She can't ask for help.
Kid B is always bullied by friends in school. His friends will tease him, jeer at him, steal his things. Why? Just because he seems different and small kids are sometimes just mischievous and sometimes slightly mean. He doesn't have much friends in school, all his other friends are from the autistic centre.
Kid C doesn't talk except for the littlest of noises. A slight bit here and there. He can't play with a ball. We have to teach him how to throw/kick a ball. To think that he'll grow up with no concept/no enjoyment of football. Of any sports. He has a gluten-free diet. He'll have no taste of the other wonderful food in the world. He'll probably not grow up to travel, to enjoy life, so to speak. For him, it'll be trial after trial to overcome. The slightest upset to his routine would be earth-shattering to him.
Kid D is 9 years old. After school, he comes to the centre for computer classes. After afternoon sessions, his mother will bring him food from home. Then, there's more sessions at night before he is allowed to go back. At home, there'll be more homework to do. No time for playing. No time for entertainment. To be normal, be to accepted, he would have to work harder than other kids. What about his childhood? For his mother, for him to be a able-bodied, accepted adult in the future is more important than his childhood. Yes, that does seem like a fair-trade off for me.
Sadly so...
To be able to think like how normal people thinks.
To be able to do normal things e.g. wash yourself/feed yourself/eye contact.
To not do what other people think are not normal e.g. tapping your hand/humming nonsensically/saying irrelevant things.
It suddenly strikes me as ironic that we, THE NORMAL people are always striving to find our so-called Identity. To be different from the rest.
To have different clothes. To have different hairstyles. To have a different life from the rest. To think differently from the rest. In media/arts/advertisement, that'll be called thinking out of the box; creativity. That would be applauded! To have mannerisms/accent/slangs/lingo different from the rest. For the teenagers, that would equal Cool. Something that most yearn for.
How so is that the differentness of the autistic children is shunned? To be condemned as wrong? Why is their differentness deemed an abnormality?
To me, it seems quite unfair when we have yet to understand their logic, the way they think. And because we couldn't understand them, we haughtily say that it's wrong. That they should follow what we deem is Normal.
To revisit a past conversation:
Teacher A: It's difficult to teach them because they can't understand us.
Teacher B: No, it's because we canNot understand them
Then, what is IT that we deem Normal?
Sometimes, when I describe the mannerisms of autistic children to people who ask me, they'd most likely would tell me that they would have some of the characteristics as well. Funnily enough, they are not autistic.
Doesn't it seem that it's a very thin line separating normality and autism? And where do we even begin to draw the line?
and all the centre can do is to help them to be as normal as other people think. To stop them from being hurt by their peers, their teachers, their parents, the society. By people who don't understand that they are different.
It's painful to watch.
Kid A has blue black marks on her buttocks that resemble a pattern motif. There is 3 of them there and we deduced that someone hit her with an object. She has temper tantrums problem and sometimes is difficult to handle. Naturally, people under stress will react. Sadly, most of the time with violence. Different from other children, she can't speak. She can't tell us what happen. She can't ask for help.
Kid B is always bullied by friends in school. His friends will tease him, jeer at him, steal his things. Why? Just because he seems different and small kids are sometimes just mischievous and sometimes slightly mean. He doesn't have much friends in school, all his other friends are from the autistic centre.
Kid C doesn't talk except for the littlest of noises. A slight bit here and there. He can't play with a ball. We have to teach him how to throw/kick a ball. To think that he'll grow up with no concept/no enjoyment of football. Of any sports. He has a gluten-free diet. He'll have no taste of the other wonderful food in the world. He'll probably not grow up to travel, to enjoy life, so to speak. For him, it'll be trial after trial to overcome. The slightest upset to his routine would be earth-shattering to him.
Kid D is 9 years old. After school, he comes to the centre for computer classes. After afternoon sessions, his mother will bring him food from home. Then, there's more sessions at night before he is allowed to go back. At home, there'll be more homework to do. No time for playing. No time for entertainment. To be normal, be to accepted, he would have to work harder than other kids. What about his childhood? For his mother, for him to be a able-bodied, accepted adult in the future is more important than his childhood. Yes, that does seem like a fair-trade off for me.
Sadly so...
Monday, July 11, 2005
Teacher Ong, Mandarin, Kids
Yes, Teacher Ong here. OMG! That sounds weird even till now. The kids, the parents, the other teachers all call me that. Day in, day out. How spooky is it that whenever I go to a new place, I Earned myself a new name.
Penang= layping/Girl.
Taylors= layping/maggie
Cambridge=Ping
Back to Penang= Teacher Ong/Girl
So, to speak of a teacher's life. I am teaching in Mandarin. Yup, you heard that right. Me, a banana *eyes wide open* I have just grasped the basics; enough for scolding the kids, enough for subtration/addition (don't even know what it multiplication/division), enough for the famous teacher's sigh of disappointment "Pu Ke Yee Chiang De" followed by tsk tsk, enough for negotiating with the kids on how much playing time they are getting, enough for 1-100.
The optimistic me thinks that it should be enough to get by for the next two months until....
a smart aleck walks in with superior Mandarin. How superior, ah well Std 2, enough to trash me, so to speak. ;)
Z.Yang: Shen me shi monkey?
Me: Monkey is monyet *at lost for Mandarin word*
Z.Yang: Monkey shi hou zi *haughtily*
After 2 seconds and my blush have yet to recede,
Z.Yang: Shen me shi Crocodile?
Me: Crocodile is Buaya
Z.Yang: Crocodile shi Er Yu
Me, trying to replace everything into BM which obviously the kid doesn't understand. After a few more questions, I whispered to the kid, " Bu yao wen wo, wo bu dong" and hastily asked him to ask another teacher.
After a moment of silence, he continued. I think he's determined to teach me Mandarin. *blush*
Another Mandarin misfortune, this morning a kid came in asking for thing sia. Me, and two more teachers all do not know how to read Mandarin, just the basic words. *pengsan*Poor kid however found help in the form of another older kid who have read those words. Somehow, I think that the pedestal the kid put us on just came crashing down on her today. *guilty*
Yet another diversion. I have finally come to terms with my job and is starting to enjoy it. Sorry for the earlier bout of complaints. *sheepish* Teaching the kids are fun! Hugs are aplenty, tickle them, tease them and "negotiate" with them. 5 mins playing time, then back to work. hahahahaha and you'll know how manipulative some kids can get. They'll purposely manja with you to get off the work, that's the better ones. The worse ones will kick/shriek/scratch/run away and you'd think that doing some ABC's is worse than seeing the dentist.
Last but not least, kids smell good. Hahhahaha, I either sound like a paedophile saying that or like the nasty Giant in fables that eats kids for breakfast.
But yeah, they smell good, like smell of the air after the rain.
To revisit a past conversation:
Me: I waaaaant Kids, Now *moans*
Alvin: Get a goat
Now, is that a good pun or what? *wink*
Penang= layping/Girl.
Taylors= layping/maggie
Cambridge=Ping
Back to Penang= Teacher Ong/Girl
So, to speak of a teacher's life. I am teaching in Mandarin. Yup, you heard that right. Me, a banana *eyes wide open* I have just grasped the basics; enough for scolding the kids, enough for subtration/addition (don't even know what it multiplication/division), enough for the famous teacher's sigh of disappointment "Pu Ke Yee Chiang De" followed by tsk tsk, enough for negotiating with the kids on how much playing time they are getting, enough for 1-100.
The optimistic me thinks that it should be enough to get by for the next two months until....
a smart aleck walks in with superior Mandarin. How superior, ah well Std 2, enough to trash me, so to speak. ;)
Z.Yang: Shen me shi monkey?
Me: Monkey is monyet *at lost for Mandarin word*
Z.Yang: Monkey shi hou zi *haughtily*
After 2 seconds and my blush have yet to recede,
Z.Yang: Shen me shi Crocodile?
Me: Crocodile is Buaya
Z.Yang: Crocodile shi Er Yu
Me, trying to replace everything into BM which obviously the kid doesn't understand. After a few more questions, I whispered to the kid, " Bu yao wen wo, wo bu dong" and hastily asked him to ask another teacher.
After a moment of silence, he continued. I think he's determined to teach me Mandarin. *blush*
Another Mandarin misfortune, this morning a kid came in asking for thing sia. Me, and two more teachers all do not know how to read Mandarin, just the basic words. *pengsan*Poor kid however found help in the form of another older kid who have read those words. Somehow, I think that the pedestal the kid put us on just came crashing down on her today. *guilty*
Yet another diversion. I have finally come to terms with my job and is starting to enjoy it. Sorry for the earlier bout of complaints. *sheepish* Teaching the kids are fun! Hugs are aplenty, tickle them, tease them and "negotiate" with them. 5 mins playing time, then back to work. hahahahaha and you'll know how manipulative some kids can get. They'll purposely manja with you to get off the work, that's the better ones. The worse ones will kick/shriek/scratch/run away and you'd think that doing some ABC's is worse than seeing the dentist.
Last but not least, kids smell good. Hahhahaha, I either sound like a paedophile saying that or like the nasty Giant in fables that eats kids for breakfast.
But yeah, they smell good, like smell of the air after the rain.
To revisit a past conversation:
Me: I waaaaant Kids, Now *moans*
Alvin: Get a goat
Now, is that a good pun or what? *wink*
Sunday, July 10, 2005
KL.
I did miss KL as well.
Back in 4 hour-bus rides to and fro. Back to noisy, packed, smelly Pudu. Back to Major Huge shopping complexes. Back to Good Japanese Sushi. Back to cranky, funny taxi drivers.
*grin*
It doesn't feel quite like back yet till I went into this taxi driver who loudly proclaimed that a bridge collapsed and killed 5000 people. Then he went on a rant about people shopping that are causing all the massive jam and why does people shop anyway. Ah well, the lil' shopaholic me kept quiet. ;) Bemused by what he said and was not really believing till I saw the night papers. OMG! It's true except for the 5000 killed ppl that is. It's just that a part of the bridge under construction has fallen off. So yes, back to funny/cranky taxi drivers. Hahaha, I have met my share of them and most of them are soooo funny. You have the cranky ones which complain about traffic/weather/politics. You have the nice, fatherly types who tell you to be careful in the Big, bad city, KL. You have the really inquisitive ones who ask you where you stay, where you stay, where you come from. and from time to time, you'll have the quiet one that doesn't say anything. and When u are really unlucky, you get the ones which bleed you dry. e.g. RM20 from Pudu to Midvalley. sigh.
Basically this trip, I ate a lot and shopped a lot. and oooh..*clap clap* found a really good restaurant below Cititel Midvalley that does To-Die-For Siu Loong Pau. *smacks lips*
One rant that I have about my trip is however about "Get LayPing attached" campaign. At every other minute, she'll lament about me still being single. and how if I don't take the opportunities that come my way, I'll miss my "jodoh" and will live a lonely old maid with 1001 cats or something. Then, when I cannot tahan, I will just shake my hands and tell her I don't want to get married. Then, that'll start her campaign again. sigh. I need a better tactic to ward her off. I am just 21. Give me break. and the She is my Mum. sigh....
Ok. Back to happy things. Bus ride back to Penang and crossing the Penang Bridge at night. Brings back lovely memories of bus rides during Taylors with Sookie/Justine/Alan/Alvin and sometimes alone.
*grins*
Back in 4 hour-bus rides to and fro. Back to noisy, packed, smelly Pudu. Back to Major Huge shopping complexes. Back to Good Japanese Sushi. Back to cranky, funny taxi drivers.
*grin*
It doesn't feel quite like back yet till I went into this taxi driver who loudly proclaimed that a bridge collapsed and killed 5000 people. Then he went on a rant about people shopping that are causing all the massive jam and why does people shop anyway. Ah well, the lil' shopaholic me kept quiet. ;) Bemused by what he said and was not really believing till I saw the night papers. OMG! It's true except for the 5000 killed ppl that is. It's just that a part of the bridge under construction has fallen off. So yes, back to funny/cranky taxi drivers. Hahaha, I have met my share of them and most of them are soooo funny. You have the cranky ones which complain about traffic/weather/politics. You have the nice, fatherly types who tell you to be careful in the Big, bad city, KL. You have the really inquisitive ones who ask you where you stay, where you stay, where you come from. and from time to time, you'll have the quiet one that doesn't say anything. and When u are really unlucky, you get the ones which bleed you dry. e.g. RM20 from Pudu to Midvalley. sigh.
Basically this trip, I ate a lot and shopped a lot. and oooh..*clap clap* found a really good restaurant below Cititel Midvalley that does To-Die-For Siu Loong Pau. *smacks lips*
One rant that I have about my trip is however about "Get LayPing attached" campaign. At every other minute, she'll lament about me still being single. and how if I don't take the opportunities that come my way, I'll miss my "jodoh" and will live a lonely old maid with 1001 cats or something. Then, when I cannot tahan, I will just shake my hands and tell her I don't want to get married. Then, that'll start her campaign again. sigh. I need a better tactic to ward her off. I am just 21. Give me break. and the She is my Mum. sigh....
Ok. Back to happy things. Bus ride back to Penang and crossing the Penang Bridge at night. Brings back lovely memories of bus rides during Taylors with Sookie/Justine/Alan/Alvin and sometimes alone.
*grins*
Thursday, July 07, 2005
Too much to tell...
Whenever I have too much things to tell, I just make a list. So far, things that have made me happy/sad/tired/disappointed/pensive are
- working at the autistic centre; ABC-ing, 123-ing the whole day
- May, Alvin, Chongka came out to Penang
- Going down Kl this weekend with Parents
- Being at home
- Catching up with friends, Justine especially whom I haven't seen for ages..
- London bombing
Please match the correct mood to the occasion. Note that they are not in the same order and one mood can be used more than once.
Yup. it's proof that I have been a teacher for waaaay too looong.
- working at the autistic centre; ABC-ing, 123-ing the whole day
- May, Alvin, Chongka came out to Penang
- Going down Kl this weekend with Parents
- Being at home
- Catching up with friends, Justine especially whom I haven't seen for ages..
- London bombing
Please match the correct mood to the occasion. Note that they are not in the same order and one mood can be used more than once.
Yup. it's proof that I have been a teacher for waaaay too looong.
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