Someone did something that is very ‘naughty’.

Tsk tsk .. and now The New Paper has picked it up

and how things have snowballed … tsk tsk.

……….

Senyumanmu satu azimat
Buat diriku yang hina
Manusia terpinggir melara
Tak pernah kenal erti bahagia
Namun ku masih gembira
Bagiku rahmat semuanya

……….

Do you know what this means?

There goes the June holidays plans …

SINGAPORE HAS FIRST H1N1 FLU CASE

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - The Singapore government on Wednesday confirmed the city-state's first H1N1 flu case, a 22-year-old Singaporean woman who is being quarantined in hospital and is the latest of nearly 13,000 cases worldwide.

http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-SwineFlu/idUSTRE54Q0EK20090527

Some people would look at past years’ questions and will try to work on those – hoping that some of the questions would make an encore. Some will get lucky, as some questions DO get recycled, albeit via a very flimsy masking of the original question. Hurray …

Some, when faced with many, many chapters to revise, would focus only on specific chapters. They would pour all their energies into the selected chapters - say half out of 14 - and skilled themselves in all manners possible to tackle any questions that arise from the selected chapters. Some do get lucky, as some of the questions DO come from the selected few chapters. Hurray …

Some are, well … anxious. They are not satisfied with Plan A – Study Exam Questions, nor are they contented with Plan B – Selected Chapters Only. They need to know ALL. They need to have an overview of ‘what the heck it is all about’. So, what do they do? They studied ALL chapters in association to the module. Well … of course, these people get ‘lucky’ – questions do come from any ONE of ALL chapters anyways. However, people who revised in this manner are often not masters-of the-trade. Due to the heavy volume they are attacking, their grasp of each chapter is just that – an overview. The ability to approach any question is there but to what depth … well, that’s subjective.

Some may go with Plan C – Study All Chapters, but due to the massive volume, decide to incorporate a Plan B as well, albeit on a very minute scale - to drop a chapter or two or three, hoping that the discarded chapters would not make an appearance on the big day. I mean, really and surely, when you have studied almost ALL chapters, what are the odds that the ones which you DID not study for will be featured? Very unlikely, right?

Well, I went for Plan C, with a dash of Plan B - as in, instead of dropping two or three chapters, I only dropped one. This is the one chapter that I totally cannot stomach. On top of these, I also did a Plan A. So basically, you could say that I did almost all the Plans - that well-prepared I was (or so I thought .. cheh).

And you know what happened last night? The very chapter that I discarded made a very unwelcoming appearance – get this – as one of the must-be-answered set of questions.

Twenty marks gone just like that.

Two happy things happened yesterday, 12 May 09.

Thing 01

Pau2 has finally ‘graduated’ to Quran! Wow … Unfortunately, I didn’t get to be present for his ‘graduation’ but Ibu Ros had it all on video. So, when I reached home at about 10.20pm, I quickly reached for the camera and viewed it all.

Amazingly, albeit he was very unhappy a couple of days ago – to the extent that I had to compromise that he only need to read one page per night – it was a different picture altogether. On camera, he was a bubbly boy and I noticed that he went on to the second page of Al Baqarah – without even so much as a pout! And Ibu Ros just informed me, if I had been there, I would be so proud of him – he had wanted to read on and on.

Sigh … who would have thought my boys – both under 7, are reading the Holy Book now? Any mother would have been so proud

Thing 02

Notice that I ‘reached home at about 10.20pm’ despite blogging earlier that I would only be done at 10.30pm? Hee. Yes, I did! I finished an exact hour earlier than expected, went to find a corner and quickly called on Hubs to come and zoom me home. And I reached home in good time to gaze at catch Grissom in CSI.LA!

Do you know that while English dominates the Internet, the users for whom English is a first language is lower than those for whom English is not a first language?

Allow me to consider my boys.

While their race, following Hubs’, is Malay, 98% of their communication is being conducted in English. To speak in English, to them, is as routine as blinking. When they are to converse in Malay, there is an evident struggle, as they search into their limited vocabulary for the appropriate Malay words and finding the right gestures to accompany their response in Malay.

Thus, my boys, while Malay in race, and effectively Malay should be their first language, are more expressive and true to themselves if English is their medium of communication.

So, would English be considered as their first or second language?

I’m amazed. You are wearing so many hats – employee, mother, wife, student – at least, workwise, I can definitely say your attitude is never waning, you are always able to deliver, regardless of task and timeline. And just now, you say, you will still be at home, with your family for the next crucial 2 weeks, not even thinking of going anywhere during the weekend to study on your own, without distractions… well, I am amazed. I could never do that – I’d probably just leave my children and my husband and the maid and off I go to the library or something to study for exams. The stress you are under! I am very amazed! You are … almost … noble.

Huh? Hee. Err … ok, thanks very much lah. That’s not much to it, really. No one forces me to do THIS at THIS point in my life – I walked into THIS with eyes wide open, so why should people around me have to (fingers bending in the air, gesturing inverted commas) “suffer” anymore than they do now? Hee.

So … you don’t sleep, do you? At nights, you say you revised and did your assignments. You don’t sleep at all?

No lah! Of course, I did and I do. Hee. I just sleep less.