It has really been a while since I last blogged something remotely fun – so here I am with this new hashtag thing on Dayre (yes this is WordPress WHATEVER) where people recount the top 20 moments (defining or not) of their lives… simply off their head.
I haven’t really thought about this yet, but some moments are dying to be shared, so let’s begin!! Really starting this in a whim and to be honest 20 moments seem too many.
And this will help distract me from impending doom (will next week be a better time to blog about this? I’ll never know) SO YES allow me to start!! I’m not sure if this will be an exciting read but you have absolutely no idea how excited I am to begin haha.
Edit: Only decided to work on this post and publish it numerous days later…. i.e. today
In no order of merit… (it’s probably not chronological either, but I’ll try my best)
#1 Cheating in Tic-Tac-Toe and almost losing a friend (in kindergarten)
I’m taking this chronological thing seriously.
I remember we were all in a huge assembly room (definitely not a hall, maybe two classrooms joined together tops) and I was playing Tic-Tac-Toe with a friend. If I’m not wrong, her name is Alison. She was a feisty child who took no shit, so obviously when I decided to draw “X” in all remaining 8 squares of the grid while laughing, she completely flipped and lost it.
She was really upset with me.
HAHAH to be honest I can’t remember what went down, but I know that was the only round I played with her. I’m not sure what happened afterwards. Kindergarten kids shouldn’t bear that much a grudge yes? But since I’m no longer keeping in contact with her, I don’t think we can be considered friends.
I do still remember how she looked like at the age of 5.
Her angry face is really still etched in my brain – I promised myself I’ll take every game seriously from then on.
#2 P1 Chinese Lessons
I did many, many ridiculous things when I was a Primary 1 student. Some are more private than others, but there are a few I can share.
I had a Chinese teacher (Zhang Lao Shi) who was honestly pretty amazing… but my experiences with her were quite the opposite.
We had to read han4 yu3 pin1 yin1 once, and ZLS was calling on kids to read ‘em out, loud and proud. CAN YOU IMAGINE I was once that kid who raised her hand enthusiastically? Apparently we were supposed to introduce ourselves before we read out the HYPY but nope, I didn’t hear it, and I proceeded to read those words out. I cant even remember what word it was. But let’s assume is fa1. Everyone laughed because they all got the memo – say your name first, then read. BUT I DIDNT. And she proceeded to call me that syllable for the rest of the lesson. It was awful. I was embarrassed.
And that same lesson, she caught me braiding someone else’s hair and she called me out on it. Why the hell was I even braiding someone else’s hair? I dont even know.
From that day on, I knew I wasnt going to raise my hand to participate actively in class anymore. Kudos to ZLS.
(I am kidding… right?) HAHAHAHAA
#3 OCD in Primary School
If you didn’t know, I was pretty much a nerd in primary school. Two plaits, round glasses, highly tucked in PE shirt… blablabla.
And not to mention I had OCD. All the way up to P6, actually – I had to have my classroom table look a certain way. My pencil case HAD to be at the upper left hand corner, my diary had to be parallel to my pencil case, and my water bottle would perfectly fit the space on the upper right hand corner.
On my diary, I HAD to have one ruler placed on top of it, a pencil below the ruler, a pen below the pencil, and an eraser to fill up the space at the side. Can you visualise it? Because I couldn’t afford a space for my correction tape towards upper primary, I left it in the pencil case. That was the degree of OCD I had, and if something is out of place, I’d feel really uncomfortable. Really nerd problems.
But towards NY/HC days this died down slowly but surely, since I used my diary less often and relied on my amazing memory to note things down. That often backfires.
This perfect arrangement thing doesn’t apply only to stationery positions, but also on my food plate. I need my food neatly categorised (think Pepper Lunch – the egg nicely at the side, the cooked beef in a pile, the rice in a pile, and the corn in a pile) but of course this also died down.
That may be the reason why my grades also died. And fell. All the way down.
#4 Getting Knocked Down by a Mini-Bus… Almost
I’ll always remember this scene as I think back on my primary school life. I’m not sure how old I was, but probably Primary 2. I was dashing to my mum’s car directly across the school gate (that opens out to the road) because I was so excited and happy to see her, and I completely didn’t notice a mini school bus moving towards me. I was then in the middle of the gate, and suddenly a wild aunty appeared and pulled me to safety. She was probably scolding me and my mum was probably terrified, but I remember smiling and running to my mum’s car quickly afterwards. What a freaking weird child. I wasnt that scared at that point in time but thinking back, if the aunty didn’t pull me aside I don’t really know where I’ll be at this moment.
#5 PSLE Results
I really wish I could remember the exact details, but that day was a fuzzy day. Somehow I wasn’t extremely terrified and I guess the weight on my shoulders wasn’t that heavy. I did desperately want to go to NY, and I did well enough to comfortably think I should be granted a place, and everything ended after that day. No additional worries, and I was pretty enthusiastic about picking up a third language – Japanese, and little did I know how much terror it was about to bring to my life (but looking back, it was really memorable. More about this later.)
I just wanted to share something vicious NYH said to me at P5. We have always been academically competitive (HAHA this is a joke) and I “beat” him in class rankings in P1 and P3, while he “beat” (primary school memories deserve primary school lingo) me in P2 and P4. While we were P5, he viciously told me something along the lines of… “this year you do better than me, next year I do better than you!!!! HAHAHAHA NEXT YEAR IS PSLE!!! MORE IMPORTANT!!!!”
He did do better than me.
Not that much better.
But he did.
HAHAHAHAHA I wonder when you’ll read this, NYH.
#6 Getting into NY
I still remember that day school allocations were released, and my mum told me, “You got into RGS.” AND I WAS SHOCKED for a good few minutes before I realised she was kidding. Nothing is wrong with RGS and if given the opportunity, I may reconsider now that I’m kinda out of the IP system.
But back then, NY was really my dream.
Partly because my sister was there also and I am clingy as heck. HAHAHAHAHA.
But as I mentioned first year in NY didn’t go all too great, but thankful the remaining years were perfect. Nearly perfect, at least. I did have a wonderful, wonderful time in NY.
#7 Japanese
I feel that I have shared so much about third lang in my blog that there is nothing you guys don’t know.
I’m not sure if you ever heard of this, but towards the end of Sec 1, a large proportion dropped third language and I was very tempted to do the same.
My mum gave me an ultimatum – if I get A1 for the subject, I can choose to drop it.
And eventually I did get an A1 BUT who in the right mind will drop it? Nobody.
This lasted till Sec 4 when I decided enough was really enough.
I completed my journey, with a pass in N3 for JLPT. Pretty impressive I would say.
Really don’t regret not taking up H1 Japanese, because I could guess how stressful and terrible an extra subject can bring me, and I wasnt even sure if I’d do well enough anyway!
That said, I am really keen to revise my Japanese stuff to make sure they’ll be kept in my head and not dumped into my memory waste bin.
#8 My Mum Forcing Lady Fingers/Durian Mooncakes Down My Throat
This is a commercial break.
Can you believe that my mum ever did the above to me? I know they are food and there’s nothing wrong with eating some greens/stinky fruit (sorry durian lovers) but they are absolutely hated.
Mum didn’t gently force ‘em down my throat you guys – she really scolded me badly and told me to finish up the greens and I was so terrified and repulsed I was sobbing. This was probably in Sec1. How morbid.
I remember puking out the durian mooncake thereafter (I really hate durians) and the vomit was red. They say if you eat a good durian, the vomit will be red. Sorry guys I don’t mean to be gross. At least that proved the durian mooncake was made with good old durians. If you want to know the brand, hit me up.
From that day on, Lady Fingers made it to my No. 1 most hated vegetable.
Nasty.
#9 Theatre
I know these are more of elements of phases/stages of my life rather than moments, but there are a few moments I wanted to share! I apprehensively entered Theatre as a member who lacked a lot of confidence, and I wouldn’t say I left feeling like I’m at the top of world, but Theatre will always be a lovely lovely memory.
One of the best moments was definitely Dramafest’11 because 206 got frigging first, and until today I’m not sure why. The original idea started off as something very laughable (a senior did laugh after watching snippets, I believe) and it became something darker. We explored schizophrenia (it’s a classic, but I think we did it pretty sophisticatedly HAHAHA) and family love and sacrifice and guilt, without missing out comedy, in case it got too dark. Our props and set and sounds were really amazing, and in the end we also bagged best actress and best publicity poster. The class really did work together, and it really was one proud moment of my life going up on stage with April to collect the hugeass hamper. It’s really a great big memory I have of 206. And that really encouraged me to love Theatre even more, as an art.
The second biggest moment was when I guess I kinda got the lead role in our TWAC production, and it wasnt that much bigger than that of an ensemble member, but it was really a first for me. I am not a brilliant actor, as said by my lovely family members (i.e. Mum and sister) but I was granted a solo moment of having to sing 3 words on stage to an entirely quiet audience. My sister said she was so impressed I didn’t go off-tune (the tremendous faith in me, really) and apparently she was almost touched to tears. Same goes for POP day when she saw me dancing and realised I was capable of coordinating my hands and legs. But that’s another story.
All my mum said was how fat I looked on stage. But I know she’s probably a teency eeency bit proud of me.
I remember during rehearsal one day, Mr NN told me he felt my acting was really on point and told me to keep it up. He hardly ever praised me la okay and words of affirmation really do wonders for me, and that motivated me.
There was also once he told me I was completely out of it and told me gently and kindly, in short, to get my shit together. HAHAHA those days were really golden.
I miss being part of a PA group with lovely people.
#10 Feeling Really, Really, Really Down
There was this period in Sec 3, I think, where I felt really, really down.
There were definitely numerous times I felt really upset, but there was a phase I felt like I had hit rock bottom.
Shit was flying in all directions, and I think I really broke down. Don’t think I confided in anyone at that point, because when you feeling sad as poop, you don’t want to spread the negativity. Sometimes it seeps through, but you try to keep people at bay so they don’t get too close for comfort.
I remember this phase included me failing a Physics Block Test… for the first time in my life. I’m not quite sure if I failed 50% or 60% (HA HA HA, NY benchmark, sounds really foreign now) and it was really brought my fear and dislike for the subject to a brand new level. That year I also saw an E8 for a CA2 for Japanese I think… and I’m really like “okay, shit’s getting real”.
Thankfully, I had pretty happy endings for both subjects by Sec 4 EOYs HAHAHA.
Sad times are fleeting, and they come as quickly as go, but it sucks to be stuck feeling like you’re in a rubbish dump. Poor comparison, but you get me. At the bottom of the chute. But sometimes you really prefer acknowledging to yourself you’re at the bottom of the chute, than pretending you’re flying like a kite in the sky.
In a nutshell: It’s okay to feel sad sometimes.
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20 moments are really too many for me at one go, seeing how much I’m elaborating, and hence this’ll be part 1 of the post.
I’m not sure if part 2 will ever come up, but keep your eyes peeled!!! If you care enough!!
I’ve been typing away for an hour and the feels have faded.
HAHAHAHAHA but yes more moments coming soon.
I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I had fun typing and recalling.
Seey’all soon :)
P.S. No photos because they take away the attention from the words, which YOU should be reading if you care enough yes??? HAHAHAH