My First Day in Primary School

Was pretty awful.

I was one of the kids that was scared. Now that you come to think of it, why do kids cry at school?

Hmmm, it's probably a bummer that children don't keep records of what happened, and recollection is fuzzy at times.

Let's try to do this as objectively as possible with the known facts.

I started one week late. Or was it 2 weeks? The family had just moved from Miri, Sarawak to this new place called Subang Jaya, Selangor at USJ3.

The Ministry of Education had posted me to Sungei Way, but my mum, who never takes no for an answer, got me into Lick Hung anyway. At that time, I think there was a scandal about the racket that was going on in school whereby parents donated increasing amounts of money to get their kids into THE school.

As it transpired, a particular set of parents who had donated a fair sum eventually had their kid rejected anyway, so said parents lodged complaints with the MOE about what was going on.

Which was why when my mum broached the idea of donations, the Headmistress brusquely said, "We don't do such things". Years later, I learnt that my mum had also told the headmistress that, "My son is an asset. If you don't take him in, you'll regret it."

I guess I never truly appreciated what those few words have had on the trajectory of my life thus far; those words which bought an unknown kid from the deep fetid depths of darkest Sarawak a place in the most prestigious (and only) Chinese school in Subang Jaya, and through the oversight of the class room allocation administrator, a place in the class for scions of the (obscenely) rich and connected.

Anyway, the upside of not attending school for the first week (or 2, depending on the fungibility of my memory), is that I got to stay in my aunt's place doing sweet nothing, which as a kid, was pretty cool, because my cousin had really AWESOME toys. Oh, that and the fact that Subang Airport was the main airport serving KL, so I woke up to the sound of airplanes flying overhead those few weeks.

The downside was homework. I had to catch up loads. Lick Hung was notorious for the amounts of soul-crushing homework they thought were reasonable. Coupled with the fact that my family did not speak nor write mandarin, and I knew I was going to be in for a tough time.

I think the highlight of the day was the computer lab sessions, which were good, because the computers had some sort of typing super mario program installed, and we basically played that all the time, even when we weren't supposed to. It was mainly because of that, I know to this day the mandarin words for naughty or bad, which literally translates to "bad egg".

Anyway, I digress. My first day, now that I come to think of it, wasn't awful at all. I don't think I cried. I must have confused that with that incident about a month into school when my mum cut my eye by accident with her fingernail and it hurt like hell and there was this awful prefect who was always mean to me but somehow treated me rather nicely on THAT day which made me bloody confused and which probably explains why I hate authority figures till this day.

I guess apart from the fact that I was almost kidnapped, the first day was pretty cool.

Oh, did I mention that I was almost kidnapped on the first day of school? The sheer debauchery that is KL.

Anyway, what happened was as the last bell for the day rang, my mum, my sister, and my cousin sister came to pick me up.

A primary school at closing time is the living embodiment of chaos and entropy. Picture hundreds of tiny humans running around screaming their lungs out as they're finally rid of the shackles of brutal authority (at least till the next day).

Somewhere along the line, my kidnapper-that-almost-was must have taken me by the hand and started escorting me out of the school. All normal and steady.

People often imagine school kidnappings as fast and furious, when the opposite could not be more true.

I had honestly thought that I was still holding the hands of my mum, who had less than 5 minutes earlier, been escorting me to a school bench while we waited for my dad to swing by to pick us up.

So there I was, all of 7 years old, pointing out my PE teacher to my "mum", and saying, "that's Ms Lin". And when I didn't get a reply, I did what any normal kid would do, looked up, and realised that she wasn't my mum.

So I dropped her hand, turned around, saw my family, and walked back to them.

And she coolly walked on, out the school gate, got in a car, drove away, and NEVER looked back.

None of us thought anything of it at that time.

Less than a week later the nation was riveted by the news that a school kid had just been kidnapped from outside his school in Klang. This was a time when drive-by shootings were unheard of, and snatch thefts incomprehensible myths of foreign lands. This made the national headlines.

The manhunt went on for a month.

Ting Song Sheng was never found.

Rumour has it that he was later handicapped and forced to beg in Thailand.

I was less than 5 metres away from the school exit when I dropped her hand.

It still sends shivers down my spine on how close I was to having a very different life from what I have today.

We are living in an apocalypse

We walk in underground tunnels;

Trundling along tubes of steel;

Lit up by artificial fluorescence;

Packed tightly with cells of a greater whole:

Society!

Yet each ensconced in their own reality;

Consciousness contained through the magic of mobiles;

Thoughts silenced by auditory drugs;

Mode of delivery: earphones;

No one looks at each other;

No one even bothers;

Connected yet disconnected.

We are living in an apocalypse;

And we don't even know it.

Limbo

Soft cascading snow fell upon his cheek.

He bit back his hunger and the rising urge to vomit.

No time for feeling hungry, he had to get out of the snow if he were to survive.

Where the hell was he?

Also, a gnawing feeling that was growing in his gut, not unlike his hunger, but more sinister.

Something wasn't quite right, but he couldn't put his finger on it.

It was almost as if...

Blinded by the oncoming snow, he came upon the sea almost as suddenly as it came upon him.

Strong, wet, and made colder by the deep of winter.

And in that moment it hit him.

He had forgotten who he was.

Still Learning

Dear Prof L**,

Something new happened today: I cried at the office.

Not in front of everyone mind, just my boss. Trust me, that's humiliating enough.

Strangely enough, it's not because he abused me, or scolded me (although he started off rather angrily).

It was because I had (pardon the profanity) fucked up, and he was giving me a second chance.

The truth is I lack discipline and dedication to the law, and it shows in the way I turn up late for work, or how I book a long holiday in advance in the month of August without informing him before hand (and it doesn't help that we're shifting out before the end of the month i.e. extra work).

Nor does it help, as you astutely noted when I worked at the LAB, that I am an inefficient worker.

If people think making someone angry is bad, they should try disappointing someone who has treated you with nothing but kindness, patience, and respect; it's probably 10 times worse.

So I cancelled my trip for tomorrow.

I don't see it as a sacrifice. Nothing as grand as all that. The simple truth is that there's work to be done, and no time for a break right now. Not yet anyway.

Sometimes, when I tell people my life and the "uncertainties" e.g. no call break, no fixed amount of leave, variable income according to how much work we bill, they think I'm being abused.

Truth is, I like it better this way. I would like to believe it's no Stockholm syndrome, or misguided self-aggrandisement - simply the acceptance of a non-salaried lifestyle.

And today, when I decided I would work through the holidays to finish what needs to be done, is hopefully, the day when I decide to be a lawyer.

I'm not sure if I won't relapse again. Some mistakes are so ingrained, you end up making them a few times before you train yourself to stop.

But in a sense, owning up to your shortfalls, and taking the first mental step to what is really a lifelong commitment, is simultaneously scary and liberating.

Time will tell what will become of me.


Yours sincerely,

24 and still learning