7

Sudden Poem

Dreaming of you 
Thinking about us
Is this feeling true?
Heavenly I trust?

Being together
Do nothing much
Just sitting near
Feelings gush

You are the apple of my eye
The fountain in my garden
The oasis of my desert
The pearl of my ocean
The sun in my sky
The diadem of my heart
The best mistake ever
The perfect decision

The love of my life...


(5 minutes to make)
6

The Weeks in Pictures

It's the rainy season, until October. It rained every day, and I like it very much because I prefer the cold. This is taken at 730 am in the morning, when the school was about to start. My plants get more than enough water and the weed grew like, oh well, weed. Have to pay somebody to have them cut soon... 

The bane of them all.... Science presentation. I took the month off teaching and forced my students to do it instead. The result? TERRIBLE. But they appreciate me a lot more when they understand how difficult it was to make people understand, making the complicated, simpler i.e. be a teacher.
(Most presentation were show-and-tell. They read from texts and were not able to describe the process clearly, or even methodically)
I am teaching again as usual, after warning them to never ever get in my way again while teaching. 
They agreed, readily. Lesson learned.

Students at the assembly square.... on a Friday.

My multi coloured chili plant. I love this plant, as it flowers and produced chilies everyday.  My thai basil and mint are doing ok. But my basil plant died of fungus infection (damn it!). I may want to but some flowering plants soon.
I love sunflowers, but was not able to grow some. 

This was taken during a fire drill sometime ago. The firemen talked about how to extinguish certain type of fire, using two types of fire extinguishers. I was chosen as the teacher representative to extinguish the petrol-fueled fire in the picture.
It's a 'meh' experience. (Arson was a childhood hobby).

Me and my niece at a wedding reception. I drove my mom here, her friend's son had this ceremony at a new university hall.
My niece Qasrina is having ice cream as dessert. When I was her age, we couldn't get any ice cream., because it was never part of the menu. But as weddings got bigger and more exorbitant, the menu and decor reflect thus.

People eating in the hall, wedding reception.

The place where the bride and groom shall take their place for the guest to admire, see. This is also called sitting-in-state ceremony @ 'bersanding'. 
The set up in this picture in typical for a big wedding, where smaller weddings may have 1/3 of this size.
The ultra luxury weddings may even have living flowers and armies of followers to company the newlyweds on stage.
(I rarely wait for the bride and groom, I like to leave early before the rush) 

The food. Typical high cholesterol, glorious blood clotting food!
Fat is flavour!

And lastly, some of my students accompanying me to eat at some nearby food shop. I do this sometimes when I stayed in school as warden for the day.


To answer why I am infamous to some people.... it is mostly my own fault. I was a fiery teacher who spewed profanity whenever I don't get my way, even in class. Not only my words were harsh, I ruled all my classes with an iron fist.
Students tolerate me, hate me, or whatever.
And these students will tell their parents, and their parents will contact the people above - why is this monster teaching our children?!!

I don't know where you come from.... But if a teacher cannot scold you for anything... what will you end up being? Spare the rod and ruin the children.

But no worry. The new Government, with the new Education Minister is accelerating the rot by restricting teachers a lot. "The students cannot be harmed emotionally. The students cannot be scolded. No punishment will ever meted. etc "

Don't worry, it was the end of Fiery Ramzu. Well Hello Docile Discipline Teacher!   

8

Introvert Me, Retrovert You

I remembered when I was in primary school, I was a really shy and silent boy. I even stuttered, and the problem lengthened way to secondary school, and made me speak rather fast in presentations to hide this embarrassing flaw.

I have no problem standing in front of any rows, mainly because I have less fear than many, yet I didn't call attention to myself by being too brilliant or very very stupid.

I found that I am more reckless nowadays. I talk louder and sometimes criticizing my superiors. I became relentless...

What happen to that quiet guy who don't make waves?

Recently in a district teachers gathering, I grabbed the mike and spoke for 20 minutes about the future of education, my own experiences and other grievances I can think of.
They were entertained.
I was drunk with power, ahahahahaha! 

Now those high and mighty in the Department know my name. Oops! (Was already infamous with reports of my radical mouth in class and school).

Why am I always envisioning that I will die in a huge fiery blast?
8

Must blog on.... Oh God give me the STRENGTH to go on! (Dramatic stance)

It has been almost a week and i have wondered off the trail again. Sniffing the wonderful scent of wild flowers (procrastination) and catching beautiful sparkly butterflies (idiot stuff) by the shadowy meadows of my mind (aka lots of sleep).

I am listening to music using my Bluetooth headphone, in the staff room, while waiting for a class in 30 minutes time. Ehem, I am actually doing teacher's work here, even though unrelated to the subject I am teaching, which is Science. Some students actually read my articles here, though they have a mighty hard time understanding as I don't really use 'simple words' (and they rarely use dictionaries nowadays...) And understandably, none will leave a comment as I will face and comment on them later in school, face to face. The power of fear, eh? Now let's photo - blog!

This is the school field at 650 in the morning. The warden house, next to the hostel has this view and as I have to wake up early to see the students off to school, I might as well snap a few pictures of the sun NOT rising yet. I sleep in school like once or twice a week.

My cat, Nabilah @ Kiki. A domestic long hair. The cat in the previous post belonged to my housemate. Cats are very clingy when you leave them for long hours. I was almost knocked down a few times when the kitties ran between my legs. Had some urges to slap them but come to think of it... that is one of the few ways they could show their love.
She will sit on the floor like this in front of me as I watch the television or play my games.

And this is the way up to school from the hostels. It's 720 and my prefects in blue are ready to take the names of latecomers. Everybody (except teachers) must walk up the hill, and those with transports have to leave them by the hostel parking lot. 
Come to think of it, this is about the ONLY proper exercise these students do on a daily basis.

This is a class of mine (14 years old), in the laboratory.
Since last month, I decided to take the backbench literally and made them teach to me and the rest of the class. All classes I teach are affected by this radical change; Sir Ramzu will no longer teach and tell. I will tell you why, soon.

And lastly, introducing my latest hobby! Stand-gardening! (Or standing while gardening, because I do not wish to have a back ache) or please rename this properly for me.
I use the place next to my gate to put some pots with plants at chest high. 
The one you see now is a chilli plant, a thai basil, a stevia, a mint, one bulbous and a mulberry. I should relocate the mulberry to a larger pot, as advised by a friend if I want it to bear fruits. I had to put my other basil plant inside the house because the Malaysian sun is just too harsh on it. Now it stays next to the kitchen sink (picture pending).

Yay! Another post done! Will do my rounds on your blogs soon enough.
My class is about to start soon :)  
8

Long Time No Siege... (Fav Age of Empires meme)

It has been ages since I blogged.
I used to blog because I love to write about stuff and maybe I also love to have people commenting on my article.
And I blog to increase my proficiency in English... as nobody around me talk the language (they understand, but they don't have the drive).
Sometimes I impose on my students, by talking or asking questions in English, which they rarely reply back in the same language...

Oh well.

The rise of technology makes people lazy (except to those who use the tech for money of course). I have buckets of books that I haven't read, which I religiously bought at the book-fairs.

I used to read 2 thick books a month. Now hardly so!

So ashamed of myself...

13

I am VERY BUSY yet I have TIME to PLAY?!

Last week I have finished marking 88 copies of Science paper, integral to the evaluation of 15 years old for the entire country. Each paper has 36 pages (no objective questions whatsoever) so I ended up leafing and marking through 3 168 pages of pure agony. I love teaching, but marking is a great bane of my life. Thirteen years of teaching and still I don't find any joy plowing through stacks of paper. But I have ways to make things go easier for me...
This is my housemate cat, Putra or 'Prince' in English. He has a female sibling, somewhere in the house, named Bayu or 'Breeze'. (Hey, I don't give these animals their names ok!) Here, the tomcat is seen being adorable by my stack of exam paper. (I still miss my faithful cat Kiki. Learning from my mistake, I will keep short hairs only now.) 
These two cats residing in my home doesn't belong to me, but my housemate. But I paid for their kibble and cat-sand. I don't do the feeding and changing the litter-box though. Putra is a huge cat from standard as the playful thing eats a lot more than his sister. I may buy more premium cat food to see how big he can grow.  

Malaysia is going through the rainy season until January next year. For now, it almost rained everyday, and I like it! This photo was taken at 715 in the morning next to the school buildings. Heavy mist, where dinosaurs or a King Kong or two may lurk...
I post 10 prefects around the school building to help teachers bring stuff to the staff-room. And they do this everyday in the weekday morning from 700 till 730 am. 

A student sleeping during an examination.
(You may think this picture is characteristically universal, but people don't fall asleep during exam in Japan, China etc) This is taken on the last day of the final exam. If it is really up to me, I let them sleep after finishing, and even while they were actually in the middle of answering questions.
You are responsible for your actions. Regret is not a luxury if you see it is fit to sleep in class and the exam hall.

And this is how I quickly get results from the stacks of paper. I make them attend a class with me, sometime late at night and we discuss and everybody marks their own damn paper. (Some teachers and parents are strongly against this, but I have my own reasons). 
This is a two pronged spear. First, during marking, the students and I displayed every possible answers (wrong or right) and by listening to the discussion, EVERYBODY learns something from the mistakes made, or questions well answered. I entertained every questions and telling them the correct way to mark their own papers (and I purposely ask them not to have ambitions to be teachers, noticing how hard it is to be one now).
The second reason is even simpler. TIME. We can finish marking the whole lot in one sitting (about 2 hours). If I did the honest thing and mark everything myself, it would take me more than a week, and I am the one learning multiple times from marking the same copy over and over again, while the students might not even bat an eye for any corrections when they get back their copy.
Oh, and I may spend almost 8 hours discussing the same paper THRICE to three classrooms. 
(Tell me if you agree or not with me).
If you are worried about the integrity of the results, and doubting the honesty of the students, I am way ahead of you. I only do these mass-marking by students for tests and NEVER major examination (like I mention above. 3 000++ pages remember?)    

And this is me (holding the camera) and my two BFF having a Korean bbq dinner after me finishing the papers. The price was expensive and it was worth every cent (in my opinion, Koreans make the best bbq and steamboat sets ever). We spent two hours eating, mostly in silence because the food was really tasty. Both of them went for prawns and mollusk and I am more of a meat guy (beef, lamb and mutton). I don't see why we need to touch chicken when there are more expensive things to eat. 

I am leaving for a minor pilgrimage @ umrah (to Mecca) this 7th December. And will be there for 14 days. My mom paid for everything and she wants all her sons to join her on the pilgrimage. I have mixed feelings for this journey, but I will not tell about it here.  

Ok, now time to visit your blogs. I believe many may assume me dead or missing or both from the blogosphere. Wait for your turn folks.

7

The Last Week of School

School makes me forgot to blog. I SWEAR!

I am swamped with paperwork (which I despise), marking (ditto) and general yelling at the kids as many teachers are absent for various reasons.

The admins purposely put me and another female teacher on duty this week, this very last week of school this year. Why? As the Malay proverb would describe us as "chained tigers", very very fierce individuals. (I actually like to be labelled as thus). Together we deter chaos in school by being extremely bossy and general unpleasantness.

I am busy, will do much more later. See you all soon.

Back to Top