Education

As a son I really valued the way my father was towards education. I remember in primary one 1974 at Sekolah Rendah Tunku Besar Tampin Negeri Sembilan I was warded for malaria. After I was discharged from the hospital I was so afraid to go to school again.My father dragged me into the car and sent me to school. When he left I suddenly remember I forgot my school bag. My class teacher Mrs Krishnan quickly punished me. Mrs K knew my father because he was a senior assistant at another school within the same district.So when I told my father later that day she scolded me my father replied I deserved it. Those days parents do not care much if teachers spank or pulled a pupil's ear as long as there was no broken bones and no deaths.

I could not remember how many times my father took the Higher School Certificate HSC (STP) examination.Finally he was admitted into Teachers Association twinning program with National University Jakarta Indonesia. My grandfather was a poor peasant and a mudim (circumcision man). I knew my father was smart but he was not allowed to go English school for fear of being an apostate.But he did go to a Japanese school during the 2nd world war.I remember he sang the Japanese song "Miyato okaino sora ai kete" many times to his grandson at the hotel room a few days before he passed. The irony was, his last posting as a teacher was at Sekolah Rendah St Aidan Bahau (the English missionary school that he was supposed to attend as a child)

Yet when my father tried to go to Sultan Idris Teachers College ( SITC ) in Tanjung Malim (now UPSI )he did not get a place. He chose to go to Pahang,stayed with a relative and finally able to go to SITC in 1955. Back then SITC was the only institution in Malaya. The British created SITC in 1922  with the aim to make Malays better readers than their parents as most Malays then were illiterate. I was looking at his SITC certificate,no flying colors but it was better than have nothing i.e.empty handed like me. My father could not speak fluent English but he reads English newspapers. However my mother has Senior Cambridge qualification.

I couldn't care less anyone who reads my blog complaining about my English. My English is good not like some distant cousins of mine who studied in Egypt but could not speak fluent Arabic.

In order to improve my English while attending University of Saskatchewan I asked the help from my friend BEVERLY. I knew Bev by chance while waiting for my Sociology class. There was a class project paper on hand and I needed someone to proof read it before submission to my instructor Leslie Biggs. Bev agreed to proof read my paper and said I owed her nothing. When she finally gave me back my paper I was surprised when she gave me a cleaned paper.There was no pencil trace or red marks what so ever. It irks me at first so when Bev asked me to have coffee with her I quickly agreed.It must have been the longest one hour coffee break that I have with Bev.I thought she never read my paper but then I realized I myself had difficulties answering her questions as if I'm defending my thesis project. It turned out Bev was an English tutor not a student as I had initially thought.
She had been an exchanged student in Sumatera before so throughout our three-year-friendship ,Bev was speaking Indonesian Malay to me while I talked in English. The way she reread my thoughts was different from my lecturers at College of Preparatory Studies ITM (now UiTM) Shah Alam Selangor when I did my South Australian Matriculation. The lecturers at ITM not only left red marks on my paper but instead rewrite the whole paragraph. In the end the papers I wrote and presented while in ITM were only 50% of my original ideas.

In the summer of 1988 I took the English 115.3 class under Mrs Claire Lipscombe. The Malaysians made up most of the class. So it was easy to postpone the morning class to afternoon instead  as we were celebrating the end of Ramadan (Aidil Fitri). I don't know how I got through that class. It was summer and the blonde girl in front of me was wearing a very tight short and see through blouse. I remember Claire would always call the male students to look at her instead of the blonde girl every now and then.

Meanwhile
For the past week
1) Ron 97 up 20 sen to RM2.90 per litre
2)CPI for Q1 2011 is 2.8%
3)OPR Overnight Policy Rate up 25 basis points to 3% (floor 2.75% and ceiling 3.25%)
4)FSIs Statutory Reserve Requirement SRR up 1% to 3%
5)Sugar up 20sen to RM2.30 per kg