MGS

4 years.. of actual growing up with lessons learnt along the way with pain and tears. my granny died in feb, 1997. i was torn. the only friend i knew then was renita but she wasn't in my class. it was lonely. and i had only accepted God just a wk ago. i cried... scolded God for taking her away. it just hurt so much because she was suffering from dementia then and could barely remember me. my final memory of her was the choking sound from her room as i laid in my bed, sobbing madly. i had asked God to stop her pain. and He took her away. it hurts to know that she was never saved because she never heard or believed the gospel. i finally composed myself.. and muttered a prayer of thanks for ridding her pain.

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so this is who i am

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the teachers were concerned for me.. wanted to make sure that i would be able to cope since i was only starting sec sch.. that yr, my grades suffered. despite my cheeriness, i was dying inside.

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and this is all i know

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my whole sec sch was a rollarcoaster of emotions. there were times where i was really happy.. but so many others where i nearly broke down..screwed up my sec one life really. sec 2, i was slowly picking up the pieces and did considerably better in sch. my maths teacher stressed me so badly in class and i really miss my sec 1 maths teacher who was really encouraging. then, i learnt to channel the horridness felt into studying.. really pushed myself that year and i did really well for maths that yr after an average grade in sec one. after my final year paper results were out, i had an B for maths. i ran up to my maths teacher and thanked her. for once, she really smiled at me and i have no idea who was happier that day. to think my class had erupted in "amazing grace" before the results.

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and i must choose to live

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sec 3 was much better, or so i thought. there was pressure at home to perform as well as my older sister did. but i cannot match up to her. despite continual encouragement abt my "in born intelligence", i only had a flair for memorising song lyrics and nonsensical stuff along those lines. my form teacher, mrs khoo, was the best. she was like a mother to our class and we felt really loved. my maths teacher was the tops too! mrs sim. the whole class adored both teachers for making learning fun. however, it did not stop the struggles at home where i was starting to feel unloved and very much at war. it felt like everything i knew was crashing down.

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for all that i can give

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spoke to ms see lai yin, a staff in our sch's ministry, after that. as i spoke to her, memories of my grandmother floated and i cried and spoke abt it even more. it felt really good to release everything. i guess i was never really over it. ms see helped eased that pain a lot more. i confided in her then, telling her that i never did dare to cry in front of anyone 'cos i saw it as a sign of weakness. she then told me that "showing people that you are capable of emotions is not weak". cried until i had a headache.

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back to studies though, i spoke to mrs khoo abt compo and she dared me to be different, to think out of the box. by the mid term, i was among the top 10 in class. my class wasn't fantastic.. we were all a bunch of horrid slackers. but mrs khoo encouraged us to work harder. it broke our hearts then to learn that she would be moving to states at the end of the year.

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the spark that makes the power grow

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i promised to make her proud of me. during the final year compo exam, i chose the title, "if only i had known.." and turned it into a funny story. it received mention during the exam assessment in front of the sch even though the marker could not remember who wrote it. she said that it was a relief to her brain which would take no more car accidents or cancer-stricken patients. when mrs khoo passed me back my paper, she beamed at me, clearly aware of that anon writer mentioned. i could only grin back happily at her. that sem, i achieved an A2 for eng.

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and i will stand for my dream if i can

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however, i was struggling with maths, chem and phy. sec 4 was a downer. we hated our new form/eng teacher. she was not able to fill in the shoes of mrs khoo and we turned to mrs sim for solace. she then offered to be our surrogate mother after i accidentally called her "Mom" in class. embarrasing.

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symbol of my faith in who i am

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i started to push myself.. by sec 4, i was getting A1s for both maths and maths D. was really happy.. my chem was up to an A2 too but phy was a struggle. between the prelims and the O's, mr heng, our teacher worked hard with us. for once, the class started to appreciate him for all that he went through for us. i still recall him walking around the class while we did our assignments, telling us that "if mohd won't go to the mt, the mt will go to him." ms goh, our scary chem teacher was amazing too. she pushed us to the max and i got my distinction for O's!

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and i must follow on the road that lies ahead

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the result day was scary. i called ray, (my "granddad" in ac) and cried before the results came out. when they did, i was disappointed. wanted to meet zc to jump off a taka together. rhys called shortly after. he didn't do too well and both of us tried to comfort each other before he passed the phone to my other acs(i) friends made in acjc so i could talk to them. i did thank my teachers. ms goh was really happy for me and told me, "i knew you cld do it." mr heng smiled as he shook my hand, glad that my physic was out of the C range with an A2. my maths, as expected, were A1s. hugged and thanked mrs sim before breaking down. she thought they were tears of joy.. but secretly, i was fearing that i might not be able to return to acjc. oh well, that's another story for another time i guess. =]

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i won't let my heart control my head..

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funny as it is, so many of my friends were getting attached and all.. yet i found no need to get involved in a relationship. i was happy the way things were... felt no need to get bogged down after seeing how some friends weren't too happy.. and the constant changing of bfs was all too confusing for me. oh well.. kinda glad i didn't do anything abt it now.. 'cos really man.. no point entering a r/s when i didn't know back then what it meant to be in a r/s, esp as a Christian. grateful for how things turned out eventually.

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other matters with concerns to my friends in mgs are matters so personal that i wld rather keep to myself. hang in there for part 1 of acjc!