NUS Geography Challenge 2007

Congratulations to Wasiur, Victor, Hong Cher, Jun Lin and Sean for making it to the finals on 9th June 2007. They will be competing against 29 other selected teams (out of 90+ schools) on a Geotrail around Singapore. Look out for their news on the media!

I must say they had given me a scare last Saturday, 26 June. They were supposed to report to NUS for their Preliminary round and they called me at 9.20 a.m. (which is only 10 mins away from the start of registration) that they went to the old campus of NIE at Bukit Timah instead! I quickly ask them to take a cab to NUS and what a relief when they called to say that they made it on time.

I will be giving them all my support on the 9th June and I hope they will do well - esp when Wasiur and Victor are quite experienced in orienteering. All the best to them!

Sunway Lagoon 30th May to 2 June 2007

I will be staying in Sunway Lagoon Pyramid Tower Hotel from 30th to 2 June 2007. I will definitely update when I am back!

Visit to the Toa Payoh Senior Citizens' Centre

Our Red Cross members visited the elderly today at the Senior Citizens' Centre at Toa Payoh Polyclinic. The cadets tried to interact with the elderly as well as helping them to do some simple exercises. They also helped to serve tea to the elderly. I hope that they had learnt more about compassion through service and continue to serve one another!

I was pleasantly surprised when some of the Sec 1 gave me a nicely wrapped pack of stones. It seems that they had picked them up from the beach and decided to give them to me. I am comforted by the fact that they remembered my passion for rocks and had kept that in mind. One of our ex-student, Peiwen, called me from Australia and I was pretty touched by that. Another ex-student, Fong Yee, wrote in her blog how she recalled my Geog lesson when she went to China for a CIP project and visited Jiu Zhai Gou. Of course I will not forget those who had tagged in my blog and told me that they appreciated the Geog lessons or that they missed me after graduation.

I suppose these are the moments which pushes us on in our teaching carreer - students who really appreciated us and that we had made a difference to their life. I used to have a student who kept sending me greeting cards for Chinese New Year and teachers' day despite the fact that I have shifted house three times! I could still remember her name, Zhang Miao Hui, as I have taught both her brother and her in Rangoon Sec.

World Red Cross Day

Our unit celebrates the World Red Cross Day today. Even though Mrs Lai was sick, she actually came to support the unit. I am still on medication - my third course of antibiotic so I know how it feels to be sick. Marianah also made an effort to come down to help out - a big Thank you to her too! I think it is her birthday yesterday and mine is tomorrow - will always remember that the world Red Cross Day is sandwiched in between our birthdays!

I must say that I am very proud of our Red Cross cadets and looking at the Senior members taking charge of the event, I can't help but think of the time when they were just recruits themselves. They have definitely grown much, not only in size but leadership strength.

Like what Mrs Lai has commented, our unit seems much younger this year, with more Sec 1 and 2s compared to last year when we had a lot more Sec 4s. I must say that the unit has done the school proud, clinching the two GOLDs for both the Community Service Award ( which we had done so for 3 years) and the Unit Excellent Award. The recruits have done us proud too, clinching the champion and 1st runner-up trophies for two categories in the World Red Cross Day Celebration Flag Design competition.

The cadets rehearsed yesterday for today's ceremony and I must say that I can see much efforts put in by them. The only disappointing news was that the dates for our unit annual training camp coincide with the Sec 1 swimming course and I have to excuse 5 of them from 8.30 a.m. to 11.30a.m which is going to be very disruptive! Click on the link below to view more photos taken today.

http://adobe.kodakgallery.com/Slideshow.jsp?mode=fromshare&Uc=16n5tjhb.4gspa4zj&Uy=nbqq99&Ux=0