Monday, March 31, 2008

I am glad there is you..

When I was standard 5, I followed my mother to English class twice a week. Yes, my mother was joining English class when she was 48.

She started with zero since she finished her school before 12. And when she was early 20, she and my father joined a direct-selling company which during that time at my place was not as famous as today. After years of struggling and commitment that they had poured to this new-passion, they turned out to be one of the successful bussiness-couple of that company in my hometown, Terengganu. This impressed the head of that company so well. Few names came out to be nominated as the first 'leader' in Terengganu, and their names were there too. But, the only two criterias that made their names out of the list were, too OLD and cannot 'speaking English' at all.

I know, for them this can be quite frustrating. But this also never stopped them. Thing that does not kill you, makes you stronger, right? I think this is one of the motivation that has inspired my mother to take English class.

At 48, my mother joined English class which situated somewhere along Jalan Tok Lam. She insisted me to join too, and as a small kid of hers, I joined. When I first entered the class, I could see a very wide range of age inside it. There were only few small kids like me and one or two seniors like my mother, and the rest were between 15 to 25. I do still remember our teacher, super-size Madam Jothi who drove a mini Kancil. She is so nice. She taught us without discrimination of age. But the most terrible part was when we had to copy an essay on the whiteboard. As a fragile slow-writer, it really tortured me so much. I quietly started to shed tears. Then, my mother, as angelic as always, slowly pulled my book and copied the whole essay for me.

My mother finished the 1 year course, but apparently she still cannot master the language until today. Well, it might sound pathetic, but for me, I am very proud of her. She is extra-confident to read English articles and letters out loud in front of my father, which he is envy it so much. And, she does enjoy watching English movies on HBO without subtitles. But the most precious part is, her extra-ordinary spirit that I never had, made me never stop running.

Saturday, March 29, 2008

Reminiscence

I do still remember my first English teacher, Teacher Zaleha. As a young boy, I have always been fascinated by assortments of new vocabs about things that we can find in classroom like duster, blackboard, cupboard, chalk etc - but amusingly, all of them was wrongly pronounced. Then came Sir Ramli who loved telling stories with diverse intonations depending on how many characters inside his story. Or lovely Mrs Low, who appeared with various notions of teaching English. She first introduced us with her 'English corner' at the back of the classroom or her 'New 3 Words a Day' program. At almost every recess time, we had to go meeting and telling her what are those new three words that we had learnt.

But of course, people will not forget Teacher Rozilin, the fiercest English teacher that I ever had. Before starting the class, 30-plus of us had to stand up on the chairs unless you can answer her 'Tense Pop Quiz'. The trouble is, when you were the last five or three people standing, her extremely painful pinch on your tummy will be awarded. Then there was Mr Jaya, a replacement teacher who asked us to write 1-paragraph essay entitled 'My pet' which i had none. Truth to tell, he did love my imaginary pet, a monkey named William.

Yup, I miss those days like mad.

Friday, March 28, 2008

Bismillah

P Hsia told me to blog in English. I nodded my head and say, yes.

But it made me think, this is not that easy. I scared to blog in English.

The problem is not because I don't want to blog in English, but I really cannot write English properly with perfect tenses and variety of bombastic words. This is one of my biggest problem; English. I hate seeing myself talking or writing in English. I found myself 'funny'.

I told P Hsia that I even could not start blogging if I use English. I will be getting stuck in the middle of writing and blocking myself from expressing my true feeling. P Hsia just being as sweet as usual, "Write like you talk"

You may call me insane, talking alone and no response, but hey! It really helped! In fact, I can finish my 'muqaddimah' post even I can smell 'my standard 1 English' here.

But, please. please, please people, I really need your help to positively support me improving my English. Do leave comments and sit back. This will take some time.

*muqaddimah - introduction

 
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