No Eating

Yesterday saw this gorgeous student's handphone that says "No Eating" on the screen. Technically speaking, that's a very high-end phone. Cos my stupid handphone has a very limited vocabulary. He can only tell me things like "No GSM card" or "No battery" or "No network", but never a big word like "NO EATING". That's too much for him to handle.

Of course the question my warped little brain would ask is, who is not allowed to eat, the handphone or the owner? If its for the owner, then I can understand why because she's probably trying to starve and look pretty. But I think she should change the phone's wallpaper to say, a picture of a Changi Prisoner of War. I think that would serve as a better reminder, and everytime she looks at the picture of some skinny bones half-naked prisoners, she would be smiling and imagine herself doing the catwalk at some Milan fashion show, where dinner would be water with three beansprouts.

But seriously, this student is pretty. She has that Oriental look (whatever that means) that would make Gong Li feel inadequate and Mao Ze Dong drool in his very long sleep. Anything slimmer than that would make her look wobbly and Olive. Some people don't look good when they are thin. Like elephants would definitely fail the circus audition if they look skinny and the killer whale won't make it to the aquarium without the blubber. Ever see a Ikan Bilis on exhibition? Market yes, Underwater World no way! They are always so dried out. The Ikan Bilis species are regrettably underweight and malnourished. Thats why they are always brown on the dining table, at least they looked tanned and crunchy and not pale and frail. And they usually need the Nasi Lemak to back them up in case nobody sees them.

Somehow the advertisments have a part in influencing how we should look. They always have those before and after picture to convince the feeble minded. The 'before' shows the person in five layers of ski jackets and then the 'after' picture with the same person in leotards. And for the the person signing up the programme, the 'before' photo is a grinning face with wallet full, giving money to the slimming centre versus a 'after' not so grinning wallet empty face, holding 50 bottles of do-it-yourself slimming jelly. For the owners of slimming centres, 'before' a Suzuki car and HDB flat and 'after', the Suzuki company and a $10 million bungalow.

These slimming centres are really anti-food people. They are the ones whom scientists hate and reviled. Man has been looking for food everywhere ever since the refrigerator was invented. Cos if there's no food, why would you need the fridge for? The scientists spend their entire lifetime and money and energy looking for more food for earthlings. They even went to the Moon and recently Mars to look for food in case one day we run out of fruits and vegetables. Thats why the astronauts always have that space vehicle with them when they travel, in case they find something they can buy when they are roaming around.

The Pig Trotters

Just had lunch at the hawker centre. Sat near the Malay food section and shared a table with a Malay couple, estimated to be in their early twenties. Then a Chinese hawker carrying two bowls of rice and a bowl of pig trotters in black sauce walked by, looking for his customer. Malay guy raised his hands to signal the hawker over, I almost fell off the chair.

I spend the next 30 minutes trying to make sense of this Malay couple feasting on some animal parts with toe nails. I don't know how they can eat that, I don't even want to try even if I am on Fear Factor. Its all fats and hair surrounding a tiny piece of flesh, looks more like a unemployed transvestite's legs to me. Can't imagine how pigs live with all that without getting heart attacks and bypass. I wanted to tell the couple it's easier to swallow a block of lard with butter.

Talking about lard, I just learned that lard is used in making some perfumes. Yes, perfume!!! I don't know which genius came up with the idea or who actually saw the potential. I think maybe some bloody butcher was working in the abatoir slaughtering and chopping up meat when suddenly he caught a whiff of Chanel No.5 from some pig's armpit or earlobes .. maybe that's how it all started.

Anyway, I thought Malays are not suppose to booze, no pork, no gambling and just circumcise and ride motorbikes? Maybe they are not Malays? But these two are too fair to be Indians and too dark to be Chinese. I started to look for some indications. They had the helmets, which is good sign, the Levis jeans, the Marlboros and were obviously enjoying the heavy metal music in the background, so a fairly good chance I am right about the race.

The only possiblity of a mistaken identity was perhaps the religion factor. Not all Filipinas are maids and so not all Malays are Muslims. Not all Chinese kids past Chinese exams and not all Americans can write in English.

So I suppose Malays are allowed to eat pig trotters then. Just make sure the nails are not painted ..

Go Mat Power!

The Stethoscope

Mr Sim was on medical leave the last few days. It was a massive operation to cancel all his classes over the weekend. I think he had prawn noodles last Friday night and was down with food poisoning. Strange what food could do to you. Haddad was admitted to the hospital twice this month. The last one was for asthma after eating three hashbrown at one go for breakfast. His stay only lasted a few hours because he couldn't stand the moaning and wailing of his fellow patients in the ward. I don't know why the people there moan and groan, either there are too many people dying or the nurses are having a good time with the patients. Not surprisingly, Mrs Amy had to rush down from class to bail her son out that night.

The thing I find amusing about hospitals is the doctors walking around with the stethoscopes round their necks. You cannot missed them. They go everywhere with it and sees the need to be identified every moment, from the elevators to the canteen ....

Is that really necessary?? They think we cannot tell the difference between a doctor and the air-con technician? I don't see my car mechanic walking around with the spanner round his neck all day long and teachers going to the washroom with their overhead projectors??!! Or they think if someone is doing the stitches that we may mistaken them as the tailor? Maybe one day I like to go up to these doctors and tell them:
" Look, we all get it. You are very good at saving lives and I am not ... ok? You are the top 1% of this population and you probably have straight A's for your O-Levels. But can you remove that door knob tongs from your neck and start living normally? "

Someday I like to see doctors walking into the ward without the stethoscope and get noticed for something else like the patients would go " wah, Calvin Klein underwear, cool siah ..."

That would be my kind of doc!

The Hearing Problem

Familiarity is suppose to breed comtempt. For me familiarity breeds hearing problems!!!

Weekends are always so damn exciting for me. You get multiple requests coming together at any one second, and you just wish you had 8 pairs of hands and legs and a Pentium 8 CPU in the head and 3 mouths (sorry, the story of 3 mouths and a head dated May 12, 2004 has been deleted by the Association of Fast Talkers). Sometimes you get 5 parents at the desk asking for info on the classes at the same time, one student asking for papers to be zapped, another student wanting to go to the washroom but couldn't open the door, the Xerox gets jammed, another parent wants to hand a jacket to a child in the classroom and then the phone rings ...

" Hello, is this Victoria Tutorial? This is Lee here .."

" Kuan Yew? "

" No lah .., are you trying to be funny??? Anyway can you please tell my son to wait for me at the carpark, I will be there to pick him up later."

" Sorry sir, but Hsien Loong just went down to McDonalds to get himself a Happy Meal .. "


Fellow jurors, can you teach me how to take care of this man's request?? First of all, I don't know who this Lee guy is and who the hell the son is and secondly, which level and which subject he is doing and which time-slot the son is at ! But strange enough, you get requests like this all the time. I had my team of scientists (not the ones from Inner Bangalore) to analyse this situation and they have unanimously pointed out to this phenomenon call ... familiarity.

They all assume that because they have talked to you, pay you fees, laugh and cry with you, cursed and screamed at you, that you automatically register their faces and their voices, together with the 20000 other voices of parents and students into your little brain. If I could do that all the time I would be featured on Discovery Channel documentaries.

Sometimes you think you really can recognise the parent's voice, but then again you cannot exactly tell who the child is. That's the time when I will be scrambling to look at the caller ID and then trying to match that number with anyone on the database. It also helps when they tell you their child's name is Michelle or Natalie. I scrolled down the list of Michelles and Natalies and there are least 10 of them.There are currently four Lee Xin Yi(s)in the centre and there are four different Crystals. There is Crystal, Christal, Kristal and Cristel. Somehow you just feel parents here have run out of names to give their new-borns that they just invent names of their own but they still want their child to be named after their great-grandmother's cousin's neighbour.

And I feel it's too rude to try and ask the caller who she is because she thinks after a few months with the centre, you should know by now her voice, face, children, tuition time, husband's name, handphone number, office number, fax number, car plate number, preferred place of parking, her maid's name, her maid's secret lover, her children's water bottle colour, bus number to her house, favourite mode of payment, favourite bank and favourite jeans.

To solve this problem, I have decided to enrol myself with the special hearing division of the CIA in United States. I hear that these people actually train ordinally folks like me to have super hearing power, as good as Spiderman's and it comes with 30 Day Money Back guarantee. Those CIA guys you see in the movies, always in the black suits and the hearing aids, those are the trainees. Tell you when I graduate I will be able to hear feathers collide and cotton wool flying. That way when that Lee calls, I will be able to tell exactly who he is and what he wants and whether he is the father or the mother! (ref: 7 May 2004)

This is the essence of customer service.

The Banana

I love bananas.

I don't know why some people hate it, but I just love eating bananas. I heard that if you eat bananas before a certain sport, for example, TENNIS, it would boost your energy ten-folds.

We all know bananas have certain nutritional values and it helps with certain digestive functions of our body. Besides eating the banana alone, we can eat with something else, like ice cream for instance, which is made popular by the Banana Split. We could deep fry it which we call Goreng Pisang, or we could drink it with milk which we call Banana Shake. Elvis Presley's favourite snack is banana peanut butter sandwich, which of course we all know gave him his heart attacks.

But other than that, bananas have many other uses. For instance, banana leaves have been used as plates in certain cultures. Some boats have been shaped like a banana. The banana peel has been used by countless stuntmen in movies for slipping and if any actor should slip and fall, it has to be the banana peel's fault, never a papaya or a orange peel. And should you see anyone in a movie ransacking a rubbish bin, 99% of the time, there will be a banana peel as a prop. The banana has also made guest appearance in certain currencies during World War 2.

The banana is a staple food for some animals. The chimpanzees, as usual, eat bananas alongside their peanuts and cigars. When the first monkey was sent into space, they packed for him a banana for his re-entry into the atmosphere. The elephants love long bananas and the monkeys love the shorter ones. The zebras love green bananas but the birds prefer the yellow ones.

The banana, as a word as been use in certain languages also. The Cantonese, as what I know, would say "You go eat Banana" instead of asking you to FO. In most cultures, the banana, because of its perculiar shape has been used as a symbol of a certain genital of a certain species. I know of a China girl whose name is Banana and I know a group of British girlfriends who called themselves Bananarama. There is also Banana Man, who is Superman's neighbour and there is Banana Woman who is also a neighbour of the Banana Man.

So although I don't play certain sports like, Tennis, I still love my bananas. What about you Jinxy?

The Green Tea

Today I looked in the mirror but I am not quite sure who I am anymore. It’s not the same person I used to know just 4 days ago. Sometimes I am not sure who I am supposed to be, who I want to be, or who I need to be. For those yet to know, I must confess I have a serious addiction problem now.

I tried detox and cold turkey but it just got worst.Every waking moment I have to sleep away the cravings, but I would then get up in the middle of the night shaking with intense pain running down my spine, like a zillion needles piercing through every pore on every inch of my leathery skin. My body was visibly twisted by the unreasonable spasms and my eyes rolled around every corner of the bloody socket. I kneeled in front of the toilet bowl and tried to vomit out every toxic intestine entangled in this sickening body. My legs and hands are swollen from the retention and you have to beg them to hold still. The mood becomes unstable and every hour I get a panic attack, afterwhich my vision would turn blurry and eventually blackout. For once I feel totally really powerless and useless. I am ashamed of myself and I have embarrassed all those who have trusted me and loved me.

As of this writing, I have succumbed to the devil’s call. I am sick of challenging the mind! I am having my eighth straw in less than 48 hours. All thanks to one person or I would not have sunken to this level.

CRYSTAL GOH. IC NO: S8458390J, you and your GREEN TEA FRAPPUCINO, now I cannot stop slurping this fabulous drink !!!

Burp

The Discount

Got this call from a parent who wanted a discount on her daughter's fees because they are going for a one week vacation. This is the second time this week I am getting such requests. VTC Rule 5, Section 46 para 2 says I cannot give pro-rated fees for any reason unless due to brain defects of the owner.

" But hor, you all do business one must learn to be flexible.. "

What crap??? Flexible??? how flexible you want us to be?? You want me to be a contortionist and squeeze into a coke can for you to see? Once in a while you get very demanding customers like these, but two in a row was a little too much for me. I almost wanted to strangle Porky that day to let off steam!!!

Then met another parent on the way down to Macs. All I did was ask her how's she doing. She went on and on about how her son did so well with the school band that I almost fell asleep standing. I love to match her enthusiasm for her son's success but sometimes on a hot sunny day, its really challenging. If you were standing at the side watching me control myself from yawning in front of her face, you would be laughing curled up on the floor. You know that familiar feeling, suppressed yawning? My teeth were clenching and the jaw muscles are in a tug of war. The chin was puffing up like a blowfish and my cheeks were vibrating furiously.You could feel yourself breathing through your ears. Its almost like having a 3 month old constipation problem and your anus suddenly decided to give you a sneek preview on whats coming .. thats how intensed suppressed yawning can get!

What a day!

The Tourist

Just saw a tourist posing with the Mr. Ronald McDonald sitting on the bench opposite the now defunct Coffee Bean. I was just wondering, this man probably flew 50 thousand kilometres round the globe, go through lengthy check-ins, cramp plane seats and sickening jet-lags just to pose with this brain dead mannequin ???

Granted this McClown looks a little more smug ever since they took over the Coffee Bean space, but there's always Stamford Raffles ,the Merlion, the Esplanade ..... but McClown ???

Come mid-night when the store closes and all the clowns meet up for supper, they will be comparing and laughing at all the exhibits from different parts of the world.

Mrs Seow

Mr Sim finally got his I-tune to display chinese song titles and I am still struggling with my Windows Media. Damn.

Mrs Seow became the first parent to study in the centre! She's studying for her degree in Human Resource and tomorrow is her final paper. I thought only students would study at Burger King ... apparently she studied there to avoid the noise from her three children ... got bored after 9 hours and decided to come up to VTC to pay her kids'fees. I invited her to study in the classroom for another 2 hours before she surrendered to fatigue.

McTiger

Coffee Bean at Parkway is finally gone ... yay !!!

McCafe is taking shape ... BOO !!!

I thought they should make it into a study room or something to match the predominantly tuition centres building right ?? Or least a pub for those mothers who are waiting for their kids ...then they can numb themselves with booze when their kids get 99 instead of 100 for their mid-year exams ..

A McTiger would be good ..

Two Tennis Players

ATTENTION
We are looking for the parents of these two girls. The one on the left burps incessantly from whatever thats left over from last week's dinner. And the one on the right was last seen holding her homework assignment " My Hainanese translation of Macbeth "

Both have strong tennis arms good enough to whack a sumo wrestler to the south pole.

The Registration

Just got this call from this A-level boy who wants to work as a part-time tutor. For whatever reasons, they tend to talk very fast.

" I want to register. "

" Register for marriage or birth ?? "

" I want to be a tutor. "

" What's your qualification? "

" Waiting to go to the U. "

" Sorry but we only take trained teachers ... Hello, Hello, hello? ...."

Then occasionally you get the mainland India expatriates' wives with nothing to do but cook yoghurt all day long.

" yello, yiam calling regarding the post of part-diam tutor in yorr established centre ."

" What's your qualifications ?"

" yiam holding a Doctorate in Nano-Fuzzy Science and a Masters in Advance Quantum Mechanics from the University of Inner Bangalore, and mai husband was a Rocket Scientist with the Toys R Us in India.

" Can you speak Mandarin ?"

" No, but yiam willing to go through a course to learn how to speak Mandarin"

" sorry but there's no ....hello? hello? ... "

Registration for some students can also be a amusing process. I look forward to those students who are shy and hesistant. I usually have a good time with them. They are like buying condoms at the 7-11. Paiseh paiseh like that. What will the cashier think, why is he staring at us? Are we underage?

I remembered about four years ago this elderly looking person came and ask for a registration form for a Sec 4 Maths class. Sometimes I can have a problem telling people's age, and sometimes I can be quite tactless.

" Wah, not bad arh, register for your grand-child, you know I seldom get grandparent making their way here to register ... that one your grand-daughter izzit?"

" THAT'S MY DAUGHTER LAH ! "

" OH sorry sorry sorry, I didn't know you are the father .. ""

" I AM THE MOTHER LAH !!! "

oops ..

Gareth

Gareth came to us when he was in Sec One. (This was how he look like) I heard he didn't do quite well for his PSLE and his self esteem hit a new low after that. When I first met Gareth, he was looking down most of time, quietly sitting at one corner eating his whipped potato from KFC. I would try to break the ice but failed at least half a year. And he would have that same whipped potato week after week before his tuition class. Finally one day he offered to share his little weekly prized possession with me. Thats when he started to open his little world to us.

He is actually quite a funny guy. Like his favourite pastime is actually counting money. And there was this day when he asked me who gives us our signature ??!! So I asked him who he thought would actually gives us OUR signature. Gareth says its the government because they gave us our identity card, so therefore they would give us our unique signature as well. Interesting analysis .... Gareth also thinks Singapore Pools Pte Ltd is in charge of the chorine, the life guards and the cleaniness of our swimming pools.

Once he asked me to photocopy this paper which I thought was a school programme sheet for some school function thing. When it was done, he was reluctant to get it back. It was only when I read the content of that programme sheet then I realised that he was one of the prize winner for the school speech day. Gareth had came in tops for Maths for the entire Sec 1 that year.

Come June 04 and he will be leaving for Australia to continue his Sec 3. Why? Cos his parents thought he would be more independent and more mature if he stays there on his own. I hope they are right.

He's a real sweet kid.

We will all miss him. So will his tuition buddy Samuel Lee.

Photo of Gareth

This is Gareth. Going over to Perth to continue Sec 3. More about him later. Today just testing with inserting photo. Yay ..finally got it done!

Parents Havoc

Bad day at the centre.

Case 1 : First thing in the morning got call from this Indian father who couldn't pay his children's 3 months overdue tuition fees. Once again, I was softened by his pleas and allowed his two kids to attend 'just one more' lesson before he pays up the balance. This pleading has been going on for the last 4 sessions. wa lan eh .....

Case 2 : Indian mother registers her P2 child for Maths. Later found out we were doing revision. Complains we just give out exam papers without teaching. She rattles for 10 minutes without full stops or commas, why I never tell her in advance what we are doing. Harlo ???? SA1 just round the corner, of course doing revision lah ....I have full faith in Janice (the Maths teacher). She's doing a great job. But still had a pow wow with her later just to make sure things are in order. This other parent sitting by the side overheard our conversation and gave her full support and thumbs up for Janice's work. Cheers for aunty power !!!

Case 3 : China lady came to register for her Sec 1 kid for English. She came over last Friday already and went through an 'ínterview' with me. Questions asked during interview :

1. How long has this centre been around?
2. How come I never heard of this centre?
3. Why there's no classes held at #04-08 TODAY (Friday) and only at #04-01?
4. How come you all don't advertise?
5. Then how come you all got so many students?
6. Where are your students from?
7. How come you don't know where ALL your students come from?
8. Where are your teachers from?
9. Why are there different teachers for different classes?
10. Why? Why? Why??????

This mother insisted on joining this Sunday 1.30 class which is full. And its because this class has some students from the reputable school. Ask me why cannot put in an extra table. Think what, I open restaurant izzit? Told her to take the other time slots. She said the other kids are from neighbourhood schools and likely to have bad influence on her son. WTF !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Nevermind, Sunday showed up 10 minutes before 3. Asked to look at the 1.30 class. Saw two empty seats, run to me and ask AGAIN why her son cannot join this class. Told her the two students are absent from class today lah !!!! I almost going to strangle her liow, but because too many students standing around, manage to regain composure. Wanted to tell her to bring her son elsewhere cos this one sure potential havoc case one. ok. so finally enrolled her son for 3 pm slot. Ophie came out to zap the notes for the new boy. China mother's eyes followed Ophie to the Xerox. At his time Haddad's hands were tied up with the other machine, students and teachers were changing shifts. China lady walked up to me, " Why is your teacher photocopying notes at this time, why didn,t she zap before hand ???" WA LAN EH !!!!! I almost required CPR ...

First Alumni Lunch

Labour Day today. Today is the first official VTC Alumni lunch. The members : Jia Hui, Crystal, Song Yu, Steven Ong and of course our good old Porky. Went to Pan Pacific hotel and decided on Japanese Buffet at the Keyaki. Jia Hui came a little late cos had to support VJC funfair and Steven got a punctured tyre so was super late. We were a little worried that Steven may appear in his singlet and super sexy shorts. This guy used to run from Bedok to Parkway for his warm-up exercise before his usual 'run' at the East Coast Park. And I found out Steven's nick is 'Mei Tui' or in Malay, Chantek Kaki. Rumour has it that girls would drool when he's jogging at TP. Brudder brudder ..

Anyway the food was great, but service is terrible or most students would call it sucks. The waitress has a attitude problem. I think they deliberately left out some of our orders. Pei Kee thought all the waitresses are Japanese.Should bring him to Hooters ...

Song Yu had to work at John Little. Her job was just to buy stuff and check out the cashiers' attitude towards customers. Donno who invented a job like that. But somehow the cashiers got wind that people like SY are planted all over the store today. Thats why we offered to go on her behalf, not bad for $6.50 an hour. We all parted at 3. Jia Hui left for choir practice and Crystal had nowhere to go cos Johnny boy is not free. Steven had to meet up with his buddies and Pei Kee followed me home for a X-box session.