50 years on, it is the SAME Queen!

Pistol (Disney +, miniseries; 2022)

Director: Danny Boyle

Thanks to my English language in Form 1, my friends and I were exposed to this British punk band. That, I think, is the role of a teacher - to expose the young minds to the real world, not just what is in the syllabus. Most teachers just wanted to finish their teaching plan and ensure that students were prepared for the public exams; KSG (Kiss Some Girls, he boasts) went that extra mile. He would tell us quickly excitable 13 and 14-year-old pubescents about the birds and bees. Somewhere along the way came the story of 'The Sex Pistols'. That was my first exposure to the Pistols, but only in name. The fact it was banned by the British Broadcasting Corporation made it even more fascinating. The jester of class JL used to croak out 'God save the Queen' with an obvious sexual connotation, much to the annoyance of KSG. At that juncture, I wonder if KSG thought that he should have stuck on to the syllabus. To this and much related non-academic exposure to the real world, I thank KSG.

Looking back, I understand that the late 70s were watershed years for the then not-so-great Britain. After the Sun decided to set on the British Empire, Britain was in the doldrums. The century of the English had ended. One by one, the colonial subjects had broken free. It was more about economics. Actually, the East Indian Company and the Colonial Offices had brokered deals that finally made it ever so expensive to maintain the colonies. The final straw came when the Indian Navy mutinied against the Masters.

With a bleak future to look for, with no job opportunities and the baby boomers basking in the glory of the past, the youngsters were filled with pent-up emotions waiting to explode. Against this background came a punk band composed of boys from dysfunctional families. 

Punk rules OK!

The story tells the tale of a shoplifting teenager caught redhanded at a boutique in King's Road in London. From there started a foul-mouthed band with an eccentric manager and a fashion designer who just wanted to showcase her creation. The punk group, Sex Pistols became the mouthpiece of the new generation. They had no filter and were forthcoming with what they thought of the Queen, what they felt inside, and the social pressure the average Joe or Jane was going through. They speak frankly about unwanted pregnancies, anarchy and destruction. Their version of Frank Sinatra's 'My Way' is just their way of saying this is our way, take it or leave it!

The miniseries narrates the decadent descent of the band of boys into alcoholism, drugs and depression. A good collection of 70s songs would jog our memories of the past when our chests were filled with hope for a more fantastic future, and politicians were honest.

(P.S. Thanks DA for introducing)

50 years later, it is the same Queen!

Prophetic or what, ask dwellers of Luton!

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Teachers, glad you didn't leave us kids alone!

PFS 55 GTG 2018
A meeting of students honouring their dear teachers. ©FG

The excitement was palpably clear. Hints of tinges of moistening of the angle of eyes were there but they tried to suppress it. Laughter was free-flowing, so were the stories of an era so distant yet so near. It was a reminiscence of the memory of a bygone era of Malaysia that we yearn to re-live and re-create. Chatter interspersed with occasional bouts of schoolboy chuckling and heckling was drowning the background piped-in music.

A student went, "Gagool (as we referred to one of the fiercest teachers in Form 1; after the character in Henry Huggard Ridley's 'King Solomon's Mines') told me that I stank." The speaker is now a former state football player, who, during school holidays, was forever seen in possession of a soccer ball. It appeared like his main intention of attending school was to play football. He could come to school early, at noon, for the afternoon session, just to play football with whoever was playing. After a hard play in the heat of the tropical high noon sun, he would enter the classroom all dishevelled, clammy and reeking of sweat. It was as though coming to class was an interlude as he would rush to the field during recess and again after school. Disapproving of his overindulgence in extra-curricular activities, 'Gagool' and many teachers would admonish him. He, however, defying all odds, secured a place in the state football team and is doing well in his career too.

And another went, "My economics teacher, Mr NB was so crossed with me that I kept getting poor grades in his subject that he said that he would eat his shoes if I passed my economics." "That spurred me to push hard. When the A-levels results were out and I got through with flying colours, the first thing I did was to ask NB, 'would you like ketchup with that, Sir?' "

Thus went the night with talks of moments that left a mark in their respective lives. Something that may be trivial to some, which the teachers did in the course of their day to day duties may have been a game changer in some. The bottom line is the respect of people of the yesteryears gave to figures of authority. Unlike the people of the 21st century, folks then gave their undivided support to teachers. If a student was punished in school for whatever reason, the last thing that he would do is to complain to his parents. He knows that that would signal another barrage of missiles from the parents instead! Such was the trust in the system. Everybody did their given job well with dedication. Job satisfaction was not measured in terms of monetary figures but in unspoken deeds of appreciation, staying true to the profession and moments like this.

Pink Floyd must be wrong. We need education. Our thoughts need to be controlled and steered towards the path most travelled. Only after that can we venture to areas less explored. We need sarcasm as we need to see the other side of things, from a different perspective. Did I say it makes you witty? We are all another brick in the wall but left to our own devices and the elements of Nature, we would wither away. We need the resilience to fight a good fight. All in all, don't just leave us alone! 

Thank you for all the guidance and the selfless contributions that went beyond the call of duty. 

  

 

©FG

https://asok22.wixsite.com/real-lesson 

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Ra, Ra, Rasputin, lover of the Russian Queen!

Rasputin- A short life (2014)
Frances Welch

After reading this book, all I thought of was my history teacher, Mr LKK. Even today, I can still remember his theatrical antics and his story-telling techniques as how he tried to impress upon us the events that happened in the annals of history.

Why I am saying this? Whatever Mr LKK taught us when he was covering Russian Revolution and Rasputin is clearly illustrated in the small book, the twisted preacher that he was; the mysticism that surrounded his prophecies; the devious ways that were employed to assassinate him as he was almost invincible and his scandalous affairs including the one involving the Tsarina.

Grigory Rasputin must surely mark the beginning of the end of the Imperial family in Russia. The mysterious peasant man from Siberia who proclaimed to be a Man-of-God but with questionable personal hygiene, moral conduct and penchant for all the very activities that were frowned upon by the Good Book, must have not down well with the starving subjects of Russia. His mysterious powers and his entry into the Royal household must have created ire on their part. His activity to wrap the Tsarina around his finger who in turn could manipulate the actions of the monarch was a sore point with the people.

The manner Rasputin managed to wriggle himself through the love of a mother to her haemophiliac son. Rasputin provided comfort that none from the medical profession could give.

He created enemies within the Russian Duma and the Orthodox Church for his outrageous behaviour. It finally took three men to put a stop to his nefarious actions - Felix Youssopov, a member of the Imperial Family; Dr Stanilaus Lazovert, an army doctor and Vladimir Purishkevich of the Duma. As the legend goes, Rasputin was no easy person to die. He was poisoned with cyanide, shot at, beaten up, thrown from a bridge and finally drowned in the river. It is said that he may have outlived all the attempts on his life. There was even a controversy that post-mortem may have shown water in the lungs, hence the cause of death may have been drowning (i.e. he defied all previous attempt at his life). Certain quarters claim that the postmortem report may have been altered in view for Rasputin to be canonised. Legend says that a Man-of-God would have perished in water! His grave was relocated thrice to thwart unnecessary attention and finally was just cremated by the roadside when his car broke down. Urban legend says that he 'moved' in his funeral pyre! Of course, it must have been just contractions of tendons in the heat.

He may have foreseen attempts on his life and had apparently prophesied that Imperial Russia would perish if Russians would kill him. Sure enough, the Romonav Dynasty collapsed, the Red Revolution changed the landscape of Mother Russia and Russia was never the same again. Even the lead singer of Boney M, who mocked him via his hit song, died on the same day as Rasputin (corrected for the differences between Russian and Gregorian calendar), of all places, in St Petersburg! (just like Rasputin).

Every living day is a learning experience

So you go around with a chip on your shoulder, with the nose so high up in the air as if you walk inhaling imported air. You straddle around like you are on Yudhistira's chariot, always two feet above the ground, quite full of air. You speak with such confidence convinced that your listeners are impressed with your command of the language.

You think you produced a masterpiece that everybody would sing only praises of it. That is until you send it for proofreading.

That is when your bubble bursts, your ego gets deflated, and you get down from your mighty horse and is brought down to the ground. You soon realise that the things which you had taken for granted mean more than what meets the eyes.

You get an extra 'e' when you are a lady engaged to a man. A fiancée is to a female just what a fiancé is to a man.

Everything seems watertight as if you have a foolproof system but your friends tell you that he has full proof that 'fullproof' is not even a word! I guess you are the fool now.

You thought you had thrashed out all your work of trash, forgetting an 'h' thrashes your good to the trash bin. It just 'hanged' your credibility, not to have it hung in the hall of fame. Even your offspring cannot help as no matter how many of them you have, you will never know. The plural of offspring is offspring. You, even in the sleekest way, is not slick enough to notice that. I guess you should not have been too emphatic on your convictions but rather be empathetic to others' views as well. Anyway, I am contented that you have decided to put your ego aside and contend with all the line of corrections. But, I do wonder sometimes if it is all a facade, and you may wander into other fields to avenge after your recent ego-bruising experiences.

But we move on...

O' Captain, my captain!

Dead Poet's Society (1989)

All of us had that favourite teacher in school who could motivate and connect with you. He would have been that sympathetic ear that could understand all the teenage angst that you went through. He probably would have also changed the direction of your future as you had struggle through the aimless journey in those trying years.
This coming-of-age film is one which depicts such a teacher.
 In spite of all turbulences that Robin Williams had to go through as he manoeuvred through the crypts of life, he managed to inspire many a teenager to indulge in poetry and literature when he took the role of an English teacher, Mr John Keating, in this movie. Many still remember the verses 'Carpe diem' and 'O' Captain, my Captain'.
Just like 'The Paper Chase' with Prof. Charles Kingsfield and his sarcastic remarks to his Year One Law Students, the dialogues exchanged between Mr Keating and his students is simply poetically entertaining.
In essence, Dead Poet's Society is a story about a group of first year of a preparatory school students, their teacher who motivates them into liking poetry and literature, a student who defied his father's wishes for him to become a doctor but become an actor, his heartbreak, his suicide and the final expulsion of Mr. Keating for inciting chaos to age old traditional practices of the school.
The film is filled with many heart wrenching poetic lines that are worth sharing.

The times, they're achangin'!

There was a time, back in the days when the upper echelon of society would just exert their authority on the mostly illiterate, the helpless, the bewildered lower crust of society or natives. Words like 'you listen', 'I tell you', 'do as I say I say, not as I do' would be used with impunity to get things done. And the the elites, the one in power, the leaders could just get away with almost anything. The simpletons amongst the working class thought the elitist knew what they were doing. They thought everything was done in the interest of what they were sent to Earth to do. It was not their position to question. Some even believed that they had descended from the Gods. To disagree was cardinal  sin and treason of the highest order. Teachers, Rulers, Leaders, Heads of Family, professionals can do no wrong. Any mishaps were pure acts of God, predestined and misadventures.
Things changed and change it did. In my mind, education and dissemination of information are the prime mover towards this end. Education empowered the small men. Information exposed the masses to what others are capable of and drove them to do the same.
Parents feel the need to partake in their children's education and not just going to let go off their responsibility but keeping on their kids activities and perhaps of their teachers'. The man with the stethoscope who were given demigod status in most communities as their patients/clients/customers are fully aware of their rights and have no qualms of seeking redress if the outcome of their ailment not to their liking! 'What till your father gets home' used to be the dreaded mantra for children a generation ago. So what say the 'Like' generation. What can he do beside talk and advise? If he lays a hand on me, I have the social services to complain to. I can also blame my future failure on the account of he being an overtly strict disciplinarian! The wife is no more a docile subservient subordinate whose life accomplishment is to look pretty and to serve you tea! She is your equal partner, no longer made from a part of you but one who would shoulder to shoulder beside you.
Same to the leaders. The era of families ruling nation are long gone. The paternalistic condescending times are all passé. At most they are puppets on display to showcase the splendour of the bygone era. Whatever good intentions the leaders have on improving living conditions of the citizens, he is still going to be met with criticism and arguments that are sometimes difficult to brush aside. Don't they know every action has its merit and demerit? True, but critiquing for the sake of argument, we are not going anywhere.
Times change and we have to change.
Maybe two centuries ago, the masses could accept something as imaginable as a virgin birth or the concept God communicating through dreams. In those days, people would hail it as a Divine miracle, build a mammoth ark or justify temporary lapse of judgement. Try doing it today. People would sneer, ridicule or even get you institutionalised!

To Teachers with Love!

PFS '63 GTG 50 (Penang)
14th December 2013
Another trip down nostalgia yet again but this time around a potpourri of different crowd which include teachers as well. The trip down memory was sweeter with the venue being none other than where it all started - the grounds of alma mater, more specifically the school canteen where many hours were spent yakking and interacting through the much anticipated times of school recess. The tuck shop, as it was known by the older generation teacher who were educated by educators from the British Empire, was also a hub for activities of the extra curricular type, i.e. uniformed and non-uniformed societies. In addition to supplying calories to the growing bodies, the canteen was also a place to prepare themselves for human interaction and survival skills in life later.

1976

If those days, there was an invisible fence that prevented free interaction between immature teenagers and the patriarchal (matriarchal) figures of teachers, now there are none. After all the teachers are all way past retirement age and their pupils were nearing so!
It must have been such an honour for teachers to receive such a recognition for their unsung deeds over the years. And for their students, the opportune time to express their gratitude in person rather than talking about them in their memoirs or autobiographies!

RRF to PPSP: Ep.6: Some memorable teachers

We had a good set of teachers. To prove a point to the rest of the world who were mocking at the third Malaysian medical school for straying from the traditional teaching, the powers that be decided to equip the school with lecturers of high stature and calibre. To train some of the local lecturers, overseas dropped-out government scholars medical students were designated as trainee lecturers were excellent in making easy subjects more difficult to comprehend -and I guess they got a kick out it. Since they bungled up in med school, deep-seated psychological envy logically would drive anyone in their shoes (mortarboard) to do the same.

Anyway, only a few of them remain in memory. The process of natural selection and natural body defence of engulfing distorted glial cells must have wiped off these painful, traumatic moments!

Bacteriophage T4

Let me perambulate some of the lecturers that still linger in the memory bank. I guess they must have a permanent imprint on the cerebral cortex that they cannot be erased.
In year one, learning anatomy with its plethora of Latin terms were Greek to us. Thanks to NBR, we managed to make sense of this mumbo-jumbo. Speaking with a thick Indian accent and maybe not so much of head gyrating movements, we would get lost in some of his words. Discouraging us to read the Anatomy by R.J. Last, he would say, "Don't read Last, you would be lost and get last in class!". The problem was that his 'last' and 'lost' sounded the same and the joke was lost in translation. An excellent teacher he was.

Among the panel of lecturers were world standard scientists and researches who were obviously somewhat overqualified to be hanging around PPSP teaching nimble minded fools like us. There was a guy who was doing sleep pattern research in NASA astronauts (L) and another in WHO setting up virology laboratories (M).

The professor in microbiology (OKH) looked like an opium-smoking thick moustachioed pencil-thin man who never failed to create laughs when he demonstrated the action the T4 bacteriophage infusing its DNA into its host by crouching and flexing his elbows! (see pic).

The Professor (Gilligan's Island)

Then one day walked a Rajnikanth-Vijayakanth look alike lecturer (DCA) who taught us the more delicate things of internal medicine! And a very hirsute physiology lecturer swaying all his hands like tentacles of a squid while trying to explain the sodium pump mechanism in squids (which he worked on in his PhD paper!). One particular biochemistry lecturer (KTS) only appeared to deliver his lectures to the front rows of students who by chance happened to be all girls, thus earning him the nickname of BBDOM (busybody dirty old man).

A short nerdy professor of Pathology (NF) with his crowning glory of thick straight white hair and a nerdy black thick plastic rimmed aphakic (after cataract surgery) glasses to match his pristine white lab-coat and intellect. Obviously overqualified to be hanging around PPSP, his brand of intellectual jokes spoken in full Ceylonese slanged sing-song English, just did not tickle the ribs of an average PPSPian! His classic joke was, 'Don't you know the sad story of a doctor? It is always a clean shirt but empty pockets!' Looks like I remember his jokes more than his teachings!
PKD was working in world standard labs the world over till he finally landed in PPSP. He fell in love with Penang and is still residing there after his retirement. In spite of his monotonous deep accented voice, he commanded a lot of respect as an excellent lecturer. I wonder why after being away from his native state of Bengal for so many years, he still pronounced iron as 'ai-ren' (as in I RUN), Japan as 'Jah-paan' and example as 'act-jump-pearl' as how a typical Bengali would do!

The pathology department was teaming with so many brainiacs in their own fields that many intra-departmental politics excited bored students like us.
DrB, a lecturer in Obstetrics and Gynaecology would introduce the subject to newbies with the opening statement like this 'Pregnancy is not a problem unless you are not married'. We soon realised that marriage is just a public declaration of a caveat much like the branding of cattle in the Wild West. Sex has nothing to do it. Sometimes love comes in the equation; Pregnancy, the punishment for the lackadaisical.

The express bus from Penang to KB

SKMK (Syarikat Kenderaan Melayu
Kelantan) - acronym fondly 
remembered as Sampai Kelantan
Mahu Kahwin by mates after
looking at awek Kelante!

(Kelantan girls)

SL, another lecturer in Ob-Gyn, related to us how he, a shy doctor early in his career, found that field to give him confidence in mixing with the fairer sex. In his own cheeky way, he said that it was the only profession where a lady would tell him all her intimate problems that she would never dream of telling another man and would allow him to look into restricted areas without raising an eyebrow but thank him instead and return for more!
A psychiatrist (SU) express his gripe that people in his profession do not get introduced or acknowledged in parties, unlike gynaecologists. He feels that somehow, ladies find joy in introducing their gynaes but not so comfortable even to look at the direction of their psychiatrists in public!

Then there was a youthful looking paediatrician (JA) who was quite vocal with his comments. Medical students, being Malaysians and kiasu, felt compelled to write in verbatim all words uttered by all lecturers. JA, irritated with this act of talking to scribbling journalists, would rattle off' "I am not telling something quite profound or divine, whatever I am telling is found in any standard textbook!"

Being an experimental curriculum in this side of the world with a motley crew of students with diverse academic achievements, many lecturers found their funny bone while lecturing. A lecturer in Paediatrics once quipped, "Why is USM offering MD (instead of MBBS) for its degree in medicine? Is it because you are mentally deficient?" And she went on a hyena-like hysterics interposed with a laboured asthmatic attack much to our amusement. I guess we had the last laugh at her peculiarly comical antics!

To the lower secondary school teachers with love...

PFS was a new experience for me when I stepped into its compound in the early days of the year 1976. Besides the super-smart students that I had mentioned in the previous posts, there were equally memorable and dedicated teachers to match that. The most striking teacher that awed me was the late Mr Koh Sin Ghee. In Form 1A, he taught us the English Language. But in reality, he opened my eyes to many other things in life, like divergent thinking and letting the mind wander as well as being verbose. He would come in dressed in his 'uniform' of a long-sleeved white shirt, black pants and crimson coloured tie, carry his briefcase bearing his initials KSG. He would try to humour our young impressionable minds by saying that it stood for 'Kiss Some Girls', contributing much to the class's commotion. We called him DOM (Dirty Old Man) instead. 

He was a self-proclaimed walking dictionary as he tried to open our eyes to the plethora of words in the English Language that (at least to me) appeared gibberish. He would impress us with bombastic words like rendezvous, gargantuan, melancholy, debris (with silent 's') and on and on... so much so that I started a scrapbook religiously enlisting all the 'new' (at least to me) words introduced by Mr Koh, which on average is about 5 words a day. Generally, his class is filled with laughter. Some of us will forward to his dirty jokes and newly coined words like sexperiments, mostly self-discovery of one's own adolescent body! And his dirty humoured laced quotations like, "Hope like eternally in the human in the human breasts!" (emphasis on breasts) and "Time flies, man's hopes go!" The second quotation was more like a sign off when he leaves the class, much like in the 'Mickey Mouse Club' where their parting song goes, "...and now it is time to say goodbye to all our company, MIC....see you real soon, KEY...why? Because we love you, MOUSE...and the waving of the cute children, which included Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera, who later become not such good role models!


Coming to KSG, he looked a bit like Costello (of Abbot and Costello), short and plump. His temperament was sometimes unpredictable. He would be jovial at one instance, and suddenly he would explode in anger when someone in the class misbehaves (usually chit-chatting or napping). His usual weapon is the soft blackboard duster he would use as a missile to throw at the offender, occasionally missing its intended target.
Rumour had that KSG was a compulsive gambler and declared bankrupt. Many angry old ladies were occasionally seen harassing him, and he sheepishly quietening them. KSG used to sell his personal collections of stamp collection and related paraphernalia to the class students. All the stress must have taken its toll on his health as he succumbed to a coronary event a few years before his retirement when we were in Form 4 or 5!

My form teacher in F1A was Encik Azman Aziz, the fair pot-bellied Randhir Kapoor look-alike sloppy appearing Bahasa Malaysia teacher who was actually trained to teach English. He was called in once to fill up for a dearth of Bahasa Malaysia teacher, and he never taught English after that! Despite his lethargic outlook, he was quite a good Bahasa teacher. I can categorically say that I obtained a distinction in Bahasa Malaysia in SPM through his early input.

AA usually speaks English in the Malay Language class. There was once a circular from the education office requiring everyone to converse in the Malay language in the language class. One fateful day Cikgu Azman attended the class. We had just finished a strenuous (as usual) physical education under Mr Wilson Doss, and we were cooling down under the fan. AA told us to cool down first before we started the class. One smart alec (PV) immediately told not to speak in English in BM class, and the correct word should be 'sejuk bawah', much to the amusement of the whole class! And off PV was sent off to stand at the corner of the course. It was quite distracting with a 6ft 2in figure is standing facing the wall for the entire period whilst lessons went on as usual afterwards!

Lat's caricature

The History syllabus in Form 1 started with the beginning of human civilisation itself -the Indus valley civilisation of Mohenjo Daro and Harappa. This was covered by a fierce-looking over-sized over-endowed tight cheongsam clad tiger-eye bespectacled teacher named Mrs Lai. She was the exact replica of fierce teachers depicted in Lat's cartoon strip! She was later replaced by a highly viviparous but not so vivacious, Cilla Black hair-styled (of 'A Lover's Concerto' and 'Blind date' fame) Puan Majidah, who had just returned from maternity leave. As far as I can remember, she was perpetually pregnant (twice between 1976 and 1978). 

She managed to be pregnant more successfully than she cared to teach us history! Her teaching strategy was simple - a student reads a page aloud, she re-read the page aloud and asks students to underline the relevant parts of a page. Students receiving textbooks for a loan were told to erase the underling before returning them! The stars answered our prayers in the form of Mr Lee Kok Keng, who gave new meaning to learning and relevance to History in Form 3 via his critical dramatisation and story-telling mode of teaching. It was as if he was there at the turning point of history! We missed the lessons that he had to miss as he had to handle the textbook loan scheme at the beginning and end of the year.

Art and craft had never been our cup of tea. Mr Kam Eng Chye just managed to kill the passion and the hidden talent (if there ever was) altogether. I do not remember a single thing that he taught as an Art teacher. He would just come in and ask to draw this and that, without teaching about colours, shades etc. Unlike now, there were no textbooks for Art and Craft either. Only Ho King Hee managed to produce masterpieces after masterpieces, especially for the examinations, with his mother's help or someone who was an art teacher! This changed when Mr Tan Teong Kooi came to the picture in Form 3. The bearded teacher with dark glasses was the patron of the Photographic Society of the school. He at least taught us something which at least helped to get a 'C' in Art! He actually was impressed with a painting of mine which depicted an old lady who was choosing durians from a roadside stall, and he pasted it in the Art and Craft room! And helped in crafting a comical puppet head (Puss in Boots type) for SRP. His wife, Mrs Tan Teong Kooi, was a no-nonsense Maths teacher and my form teacher in Form2A. Mr KSG once made a sexist joke in front of her, only to be told off in a very nice way outside the classroom! Their son, Rene, a year younger than us, was an all-rounder. He excelled in sports and studies and was the head boy of his batch.

Nana Mouskouri

Geography was taught by Ms Teh, a dedicated mild-mannered teacher with Nana Mouskouri hairstyle and spectacles.
Ms Tai was a fierce spinster with a bulldog face who taught us Commerce. She looked like a potato with toothpicks at four sides, further accentuated by her tight body-hugging cheongsam. Another fierce lady taught us English Literature. All I remember of her name is that we use to call her 'Gagool' - the same character (an evil witch doctor) that she was trying to teach from the book King Solomon's mines.

Talking about slave drivers, Mr Wilson Doss fitted the bill absolutely. He was supposed to teach us PE, but he would ask us to do manoeuvers that were humanly impossible, like Duck Walk and Crouch Bounce. The aches from the exercises would last a whole week until it was time for another session. His famous words were, "Do as I say but don't do as I do!" as he had a drinking problem and subsequently succumbed to it. Despite his strict disposition, he was liked by many, especially the cricketers, as he moulded the school team to victory.
In Form 1, we got the most uninspiring teacher of Science in Mr Chew Kee. He was a plain Joe with forever the same set of attire and brown plastic bag tucked under his armpit and cycled to school daily on his grandfather bicycle.

Ray Milland

Another funny character with a twisted sense of humour taught us Science in the form of Mr Teoh Chin Kooi. He had the uncanny resemblance to Ray Milland of Alfred Hitchcock's 'Dial M for Murder' with the same broad forehead, receding hairline and back-combed hair. One day his lesson to teach prisms had to be cancelled as it was raining. He then told us, "We will do the experiment tomorrow but ask your God not to pass urine tomorrow!"

Before Paul the Octopus came into existence, we had our own soccer soothsayer through Mr Chang, our Mathematics teacher. 1978, when we were in Form 3, was a FIFA World Cup year. Mr Chang was the first to discover that the cup always stays in the host continent, except for Brazil, in 1958. His exception seems to have recurred in 2002 (Brazil won In Asia), and this year - Spain won on the African continent!

Cikgu Ibrahim:2010

En Ibrahim recently appeared on the 50th anniversary of the 7th Georgetown South Scout movement in Penang (see pic). He was the Afternoon Session supervisor and a strict discipline master. He had taken a few relief classes and tried teaching a thing or two. What I remember from his classes is the joke that he had repeated a bit too often. A young boy went to a shop to buy pencils. He picked up a pencil and its cost. The shopkeeper said, "10 sen". He picked a second and asked him again. This time, the shopkeeper said, "15 sen!"  So our hero put back the first pencil and pays the shopkeeper only 5 sen!

He and so many other teachers like him who found great pride and pleasure in their profession are true icons of 1-Malaysia. Their sweat nurtured the young ugly ducklings into majestic swans that we are today. To all my teachers, a big 'Thank You' from the bottom of my heart!

Next attraction: Upper secondary teachers...

To Sir & Teacher with love…

18.5.2010
To Sir & Teacher with love…
Teachers’ Day Special (Primary)

The Chinese proverb says, “If you give someone a fish; he will eat for a day but if you teach him to fish, he will not stay hungry a lifetime!” FG says, “You cannot teach anybody anything, you can help him learn.” My friend Regu in PPSP USM used to say that any student can learn something from even the most uninspiring tutor because of their (the tutor) superior experience in life. With that background let me indulge in a little of retrograde recollection of my school teachers, starting from Hutchings Primary School. This is about the time when the screen is supposed to be hazy and the plucking the harp strings is supposed to reverberate in the background and kaleidoscope of colours is supposed to twirl round and round…

In Standard 1, Cik Aishah Abdul Rahman was my class teacher. Her fine curly hair used to be tied up into a bun at the back of her head, donning colourful fine floral baju kurung, smelling fresh with liberal splashing of strong non alcoholic perfume and her grinning toothy smile exposing her gold filling at her incisor tooth. I met her after 15 years later at a post office looking not a day older than how she appeared in 1970.

In Standard 2, the smashing teacher with the 70s Chinese matinee actor’s look, Mr Khoo Cheow Hin was the class teacher. We looked forward to his fortnightly stories, spiced up with his good story telling techniques. I remember once he told us the story of ‘Si Tanggang’ – the prodigal son. As he had forewarned us before the story, that students who do not show any emotion after the story ends do not love their mothers, many of us were seen wetting our eyes with saliva just to show that we care for mothers. Of course, many of my colleagues actually cried! He must have been quite a story teller because many young pretty lasses actually used to come to the classroom, some crying to and some quarreling with him. With his looks and story-telling technique, I wonder how his ending was. Towards the end of Std 2, a trainee teacher, Ms Tan Gaik Lee and another gentleman took over the reign. The male temporary teacher had taller tales to tell – he told us that he was almost decapitated when he was about to see just how deep his father had dug when he was still at it! Ms Tan was hardly able to control the class.

In Standard 3, Mr Beh Seong Leng, our class master drove a 1300cc golden metallic Volkswagon. He had a reputation of being a disciplinarian and a terror at that. His secret weapon was pulling the side burns and pinching the inner aspect of the thigh. His ultimate torture device was public stripping. I remember once Liakat Ali failed to memorise his timetables when he was subjected to this form of torture. Lucky for him, the school bell rang just as he was stripped to his undergarments. Lucky for him too because it was not customary for most of his contemporaries to be clad with undergarments!

The pretty Ms Yeoh with her impeccable spoken English was our class teacher in Std 4. She once told us a racist joke about a Indian headmaster and his way of sing song way of pronouncing ‘Good morrning laydees and yentlemen’. The petite curvaceous Ms Olive de Mello with her body hugging gown was our teacher for a while whilst Mrs Indrani took us a few lessons in Civics. Mrs Indrani was also in 70s straight cut body hugging gown but with the XXL type.

The ever smiling bespectacled Mr Cheah Yong Chee was my class teacher in Std 5. He was a dedicated teacher who hardly loses his temper even when I once turned up at his classroom after recess!

Mr Chan Leong Huat (Std 6) was a lean mean master who did not mince his words. He would sneak behind the classroom as he entered just to find out who the class noise makers were. We have a good time seeing his favourite Deputy (aka Class Monitor), Ang Jit Eng, hated by us – we called him Anjing which sounded like his name anyway!- got into trouble this way. Mr Chan disliked people who tried to prove their point by swearing (sumpah). Mohd Yassin once got punished for a crime he did not commit all because he swore he did not do it. At the same time, Mr Chan would talk to us in a friendly manner sometimes. Of all the animals in the world, he hated cats to the bone. He would tell how he poured hot water from his bedroom window at night over noisy cats in heat during mating season! (ouch!)

Somewhere along the way came Mr Khay with his piano playing skills and his music class. He taught us to play the recorder and mouth organ and prepared us to play at the school’s parents’ day. Mr Phuah was the senior assistant who claimed to have eyes at the back of his head and rotan up his sleeve, drove around in a Morris Minor station wagon. Mr G.S. Reuten, the headmaster took us a few classes too. One interesting character came in our life in the form of Mr Tan Ah Bah. He was a temporary teacher (probably retired) who forever asked us to sleep! He had a fierce appearance, podgy like a boxer, slighty curly haired with multiple moles over his face and neck. He walked around with a cane in his hand telling us, “Kun… ah bah, pak lu si ah bah!” – Boy, sleep! If not, I will whack you dead! (Hockkein dialect) I remember going to Mr Paul Ng’s class for relief lessons and beat the daylight of the boys in the back classes for misbehaving. He was a man of few words. His cane did most of his talking! Even though I was in direct contact with Ustaz Sheikh Abdul Rahman, I heard a lot of good things mentioned by the Muslim. He was apparently a strict disciplinarian but at the same time loved by his students.

All these people are instrumental in where we are today. To all these teachers, Thank you very much… you are the true meaning of 1-Malaysia.