Saturday, January 22, 2005
The Relief Teacher Strikes Back
After 3 days' worth of primary school relief teaching, I'm firmly converted to Legalism. Young children are like little savages: unschooled, undisciplined and lacking basic social inhibitions. Oh, they
are kind of adorable, to be sure - when they are not running amok, screaming, crawling around on the floor or fighting one another.
Because the regular teacher usually does not provide me with a lesson plan or learning materials to keep the children occupied, it has been improvisation all the way. But I've decided that I've had enough (already?). I am going to prepare my own 'educational materials'.
However, since I have no inkling whatsoever of the primary school student's mind, the things I have in store for them will probably be grossly overestimating their capabilities. Besides, I used to be rather merciless in primary school. In P1, I organised an art competition, coldly judged the submissions and gave myself the 2nd prize. In P3, I drew up a list of obscure acronyms and gave it to my friends to decipher. (I was sincerely surprised when they couldn't do most of it.) In Nanyang, er... hmm, nevermind. I was truly horrible then (although, to be fair, I wasn't conscious of it) and I'm not much better now. But no matter: I'd rather have baffled silence than the usual unmanageable cacophony.
Oh, I'm
so going to enjoy this.
words were spilled on Saturday, January 22, 2005
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Monday, January 17, 2005
Thanks to Xuwen, I've got a 3 week relief teaching stint at Fairfield Methodist Primary, so I shall be dropping the beer promo job. What a relief. And it seems that I will be doing private GP tutoring.
words were spilled on Monday, January 17, 2005
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Sunday, January 16, 2005
Long ago, I used to have an embarrassing romantic infatuation with stars. I used to write
poetry about them. Sometimes I cringe at the memory, but usually I remember that period with amusement, indulgence, and yes, nostalgia.
Later, I turned it into a sort of general fascination with astronomy. I spent cloudless nights outside with my sister, squinting through a pair of binoculars, hoping to glimpse a nebula, or the rings of Saturn, or the distinctive bands of Jupiter. We did see some things, but without better magnification, we were never quite sure of what we saw. I pored over star maps, tried to identify constellations from my kitchen window, noted their nightly march across the sky, even drew diagrams for future reference.
It wasn't a solitary pursuit. I had friends who were similarly enchanted with the night sky, and we revelled in it together. The fleeting visions of shooting stars in pre-dawn hours at Ubin. The dizzying majesty of a starlit tapestry unsullied by the encroaching urban light haze. The sudden panic that if you didn't hang on to something, you might just slide off the face of the Earth - because the heavens are eternally stationary and the ground beneath your back is
moving.
These days, I hardly pay any attention to the stars. I haven't been doing so for years. Mould has long since made my binoculars useless, a telescope is beyond my budget, I've been so preoccupied with down-to-earth matters. The stars are nothing but indistinct, random pinpricks of feeble light - their past glory a faded memory swiftly slipping away with time, like everything else. And then, the clouds close in.
... ...
I'm becoming addicted to a nocturnal lifestyle. This
has to be unhealthy. It really ruins job opportunities when prospective employers call in the morning, forcing me to wake up in order to conduct a groggy, brain-addled conversation that I would later regret.
What
am I doing this late at night? Glaring disgustedly at trite and mechanical application essays, trying to inject a spark of something,
anything. Without much success, I might add.
What are your career aspirations? Good heavens, I don't know. Not the finer details, at least. What am I supposed to do when I'm non-committal to the core? When short-term uncertainties are already bad enough, not to mention
major career decisions?
Damn. The path of least resistance is the most tempting, but... but I WILL finish this, nevertheless. At least no one can blame me for not trying. (Ah, but as for trying hard enough?)
words were spilled on Sunday, January 16, 2005
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Saturday, January 15, 2005
Funny how time just seems to fly by, even in the absence of gainful employment. I almost regret that I'll soon be leaving this period of idleness behind. Employment is becoming an actual, immediate possibility. The horror.
If anyone sees
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine box sets available for rental, please, please tell me? I wander into video rental stores wherever I can find them, but so far I've had no luck. The first season is by far the shortest, but it's still 7.6GB and is understandably taking forever to download. As much as I love BitTorrent and broadband, I'm painfully aware of their limitations. Outright purchase is out of the question: there are 7 seasons in all (so 7 box sets), costing an insane $189 each, and I've been practically masochistic with the self-denial these days.
I keep getting cravings for obscure bits of cinema that local shops will never sell in unexpurgated form. I think my credit card wish-fulfillment fantasies may be quite different from other people's.
words were spilled on Saturday, January 15, 2005
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Tuesday, January 11, 2005
I seriously detest waiting for the phone to ring. It never does. Even after I've Taken The Initiative and called people up.
I hate this interminable waiting game. I wish that they can just get on with it and give me an outright rejection instead of subjecting me to days of torment in frictional unemployment limbo.
But unfortunately that's the way the world
works. I had an interview with this slightly
beng guy who runs a tuition centre in Jurong East. He was a deceptively easy-going fellow with a very relaxed way with words, but stone-cold pragmatic underneath all that. He told me that contrary to what teachers' encouraging comments in progress reports may say, the world is not such an easy place to navigate, even if armed with an impressive array of certificates. Of course, I agreed.
Reality really can be quite a disappointment, and sometimes, it pays to be cynical. For example, I had to lie about my address to even be granted an interview - they had good, practical reasons for not considering applicants living too far away, but I was kind of desperate. (I was honest about everything else, though.) I used to think that I was cynical, but now it turns out that I wasn't nearly cynical enough - not by a long stretch. I still have much to learn about not being such an earnest, naive fool. According to a travel guide I read, in China, waiting dutifully in line doesn't get you anywhere - you have to shove your way to the front of the queue. I can feel myself growing jaded already, and it's only been - what? - 2 weeks?
An unpleasant family incident last night reminded me of just how foolish and naive I am. To summarise, my mother accidentally damaged a very cherished pair of earphones belonging to my sister and myself. When she heard that it was relatively expensive equipment (we appreciate quality sound, a well-rounded bass etc.), she flatly refused to buy a replacement, or even to sponsor a fraction of the cost, maintaining that it was an 'accident' so it was not her 'fault', and anyway, it was our fault for even buying such a needlessly expensive thing in the first place.
That extraordinary line of reasoning was aggravating, to say the least. Then I asked my sister if she would bear the full cost of replacing something that she had unwittingly damaged. Her answer: depends on the cost, depends on how much money she has... maybe 50%?
I have an overdeveloped sense of responsibility. However, 'responsibility' is a word with positive connotations - the sign of a good worker, a competent leader, a constructive team-player. However, in my case, I think it could more accurately be described as an unhealthy overcapacity for guilt.
In Secondary 3, I was charged with collecting class payments for the Biology TYS. I had this dangerously large sum of money in an envelope which I stupidly left on my desk for a short while. As could be expected, it went missing. I believed that it was my fault and seriously considered compensating the full amount myself. I was prepared to keep mum, quietly replace the stolen money and pretend that nothing had happened. Fortunately, because I was semi-hysterical then and couldn't conceal the facts well, my plan didn't work: my dear friends caught on quickly and reported the theft, even as I was begging them not to. (I was a silly girl in those days, terrified at the prospect of humiliation and blame.) The incident ended reasonably well - the class was sympathetic and generous (which made me even more embarrassed) and the culprit was eventually exposed (a long story... let's just say it didn't lack drama).
(RG life was rarely dull. Thinking about it now - even if I don't remember all of it - gives me a deep sense of nostalgia
and leaves me feeling faintly ridiculous. The things we got up to in those days! Now I feel insufferably old and boring.)
Yes, so - guilt. Or responsibility. Either way, I'm just too square for my own good. And yes, if I had been the one responsible for the earphones, I would have shelled out the money without protest.
words were spilled on Tuesday, January 11, 2005
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Sunday, January 09, 2005
Why fiction?
Philip Pullman: We're looking for an enlargement of imaginative sympathy, aren't we?
Archbishop of Canterbury: That's right. We're looking for a sense that our present definitions of what it is to be human - what it is to live in the world - are not necessarily the last word or the exhaustive version of reality, and that the truth is out there in another sense. It's out there in a bigger universe.
Pullman: Well the truth is in the library, perhaps.
Exactly what I have always liked to believe, thank you so much. The rest of the transcript is
here.
Pullman, an atheist, has a civilised debate with the Archbishop. An intriguing read.
My usual, irrational antipathy towards the phone has intensified. I tell myself that it's a Really Silly Idea, rather like shooting the messenger, and an inanimate, completely blameless one at that. It used to be that I could cheerfully, with clear conscience, keep my mobile on permanent silent mode. Not now, of course. So every time I leave my home, it feels as though I have a live bomb in my bag. I so do not enjoy drawing attention in public, and handphones tend to go off (obnoxiously) at the most inopportune moments.
I have also found that impressive grades can backfire when you are trying to angle for the safe, financially pragmatic admin job instead of the risk-fraught, weekends-only teaching position at the same tuition centre. Ah well, I'll just have to deal with that when the call comes (if it ever will). Maybe they will be sufficiently unsettled by my very frank and very eccentric replies on their personality questionnaire. They may decide that I'd be a bad, corrupting influence on the kiddies and give me the admin job. Or more likely, it'd turn out to be yet another fruitless round of job hunting.
My mum suggested part-time Pizza Hut. At this point in time I no longer consider myself overqualified for
anything. I can't stop myself from thinking in terms of the depersonalised labour market, and I see a steadily depreciating market value.
words were spilled on Sunday, January 09, 2005
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Thursday, January 06, 2005
After the initial panic about temporary unemployment passed, I became a lot more relaxed about the situation. Perhaps a little too relaxed. The classifieds are full of sales and street jobs that don't appeal to me, Kelly Services has probably forgotten about me, and schools don't seem to need any more relief teachers.
Anyway, does anyone know anyone who might want some tuition? I am a straight A student who may or may not know anything about teaching and is desperate for some income to fund a very costly trip to China from May to June. Besides, I'm sick of having to rely on unreliable parental units for extra funds. A measure of financial independence would be very welcome, especially when it comes to miscellaneous expenses like bicycles, braces, books, DVDs, mega out-of-country experiences...
Revisiting some of my old obsessions to keep unnecessary angst at bay. I'm
amazed at the sheer amount of time, energy and notebook paper I used to lavish on such things. The geek factor had fallen off quite a bit since I had entered JC (and was virtually non-existent for the middle part of last year), but now it's picking up again, thanks to a surplus of spare time.
words were spilled on Thursday, January 06, 2005
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Saturday, January 01, 2005
Happy New Year, everyone. It's 2005, I'll be 19 soon (fancy that), and there are a lot of things I need to get sorted out.
Didn't get any relief teaching offers from any schools, which was a bit of a disappointment, to say the least. Goes to show how useless my O Level cert is in getting me a job - Initiative, Persistence and a fair bit of luck would probably count for more. A good relationship with teachers in my alma mater(s) would help too. Unfortunately, I don't have any of these - just some grades that are becoming increasingly meaningless, even to myself. Along with a handphone that refuses to deliver good news. I have classmates who received offers, even multiple offers, from schools they don't even know, to teach subjects they are not especially proficient in. And then there are friends who are held in such high regard by their teachers that they have been invited back to teach at their JCs.
I think I may have some inkling of why many of the unemployed suffer from a loss of self-esteem. I'm only 1 month out of school, facing my first (sort of) job rejection and I'm feeling the sting of unemployment already. It's the kind that makes you feel like giving up, staying home, and being a professional slacker.
It says a lot when your career role model is a diminutive, bespectacled Blue Max sales assistant who knows exactly what movies are in stock, exactly where they are located in the store, and who can actually address your questions about obscure, decades-old films without ever once referring to a database. See, video store sales assistants are usually young and ignorant part-timers who are only marginally more knowledgeable than the customer, which is why I'm always impressed by those who are genuinely helpful (instead of being an unwelcome hindrance to peaceful browsing). I wonder if such a job pays well.
words were spilled on Saturday, January 01, 2005
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