Understanding The Drama In Life

Quarantine Day 39 Yes the MCO has been extended again for another 2 more weeks (29th April till 12th May 2020). I pretty much expect this when the Prime Minister made the announcement couple of days ago. That's fine, I think by now everyone is used to it, at least to me. My work load isn't reduced, if that's what you're thinking. My work is in fact, more than usual. Meetings online, do some research for suitable homework to be assigned to the students, managing students' feedback in the blog I created meant for their work, checking emails, daily text messages regarding work keep flooding in my school mobile (even after working hours) and on top of that, attending an online English course from 6th April to 31st August, 2020 with teachers around the nation and with some officers from the department, completing all the tasks and assignments given by the coordinator...and the list goes on. Busy? Yes and so does everyone. Personally, working from home can...

Quarantine Day...lost track of the days now... The government has prolonged the lockdown, or to be more specific MCO, Movement Control Order as they call it here. Whatever it's called, lockdown or MCO, the government is doing the right thing. Schools especially, should not be opened yet, not now. Even though some companies are allowed to continue with their business, strict measures have been taken to ensure the employers/employees are free from the deadly virus. I am beginning to enjoy my staycation at home. I imagine myself being a retiree in the next few years. This is how I am going to feel, sometimes forgetting the dates and days. Now, I have ample time to explore few things; things I wanted to do before but couldn't due to time constrain. I try out new dishes, bake 2 kinds of cake in one night, cook a lot till my kids tell me to stop because they have been eating a lot these days, spend more time reciting Al-Quran, listen to more talks and preaches which amazing...

Quarantine Day 14 I was browsing my Facebook page earlier. Man...things people do when they get bored! Some are creative, they came up with their own hilarious dance video. And there was one teacher who sang beautifully, dedicated to her young students. Some posted cooking videos, which I find them very helpful in providing me some ideas on what to cook these days. I stumbled upon a music video today, a kids' song. Pretty catchy. As much as it is humorous, the song delivers a very important message to young children; that is to stay clean by washing your hands frequently. This song brings me back to my early teaching years. As far as I can remember, we have been teaching our students about cleanliness at a very young age. And not only we teach, we also make sure they practice what we have thought them.  Anyways, here's the song. It's fun, I know kids enjoy it and as for the adults,  I treat this song as a reminder to how important cleanliness is to us. Co...

Quarantine Day 13 Life is funny. Before all this chaos, I used to complain a lot. Mostly about the amount of work and the deadlines and the endless meetings. I used to complain how my legs hurt due to too much walking and standing. I used to complain about how naughty and noisy my students can be. Normally, one week of school break feels like a blink of an eye. Time flies so fast when we're having fun, that's what I always say to myself. And now, when I can be at home for another 2 weeks, I feel like it's taking forever. I am not alone. Most of my friends keep sending messages in our WhatsApp group saying how we miss each other, how we miss doing things we used to hate before, how we miss eating and laughing at our pantry, how much we miss entering our classes, how much we miss complaining how exhausted we were at school...and the list goes on. Everyone is getting restless. Sitting at home for too long, doing work online is not a thing for most of us. The be...

Quarantine Day 11 Today my husband and I are quite busy trying out the new program "Eye Level On Air" for our students. Due to the Movement Control Order, starting this April, teachers will do online coaching. I am not that hi tech, to be honest I don't really favor this kind of platform to coach my students. I have been battling with myself, trying to adopt and adapt to this method. I know I have no choice. I have to go with the flow and learn to love this way of teaching. Maybe after awhile, once I get the hang of it, I should be fine. Tomorrow we will have 5 students for a start. I hope everything goes well.  159 new cases reported today and the death toll is at 27 now. For a small country like Malaysia, that is a big number. And the number of cases are expected to rise higher in mid April. The government is building makeshift hospital as a precautionary measures just in case there are more cases. And it is expected to be ready by tomorrow. And recently...

Quarantine Day 10 Today is Friday. And today is the second time Friday prayer is cancelled due to the pandemic. Yes, everybody is talking about the pandemic daily, we hear nothing from the news in all channels but this painful issue. My routine is like any other days in the quarantine period. Wake up in the morning, prepare breakfast, disinfect the whole house, busy replying messages and do some clerical work online. Then comes afternoon, cook simple lunch and pack some food for my son before he goes to work. His factory still has to run, otherwise there will be a shortage of dairy products, and that is not a good thing especially during this time. At 3:00 p.m. today, Malaysia's Prime Minister has announced a handsome RM250 billion Prihatin Rakyat Economic Stimulus Package which benefits all Malaysians. It is intended to help the people who get seriously effected economically. As he had mentioned earlier, no group will be left out, no one will be left behind. True enough...

Quarantine Day 9 How do we cope with this pandemic? I feel trapped. Being cooped up indoors with no place to go but to the living room, dining, kitchen, bedrooms, then back to the living room again and revisited the entire house all over, makes me a "traveler" inside my own house. Listening and watching to news are depressing, all you see is death all over the world. Malaysia alone has more than 2000 cases now with 23 deaths, as we speak. I think by the time when the pandemic is over, there will be an increase in mental health problems. People get depressed, bored, lonely, felt like there's no more contact with the rest of the world. Today, my friend texted me telling how stressful she was. She is "trapped" in her hometown with her two kids and sadly her husband is not with her. She said she didn't bring her work along and that she is worried once the school reopens, she won't be able to finish her work on time. I was taken aback and could feel...

Quarantine Day 8 It was a busy day. Get up in the morning, prepared breakfast for the family. Did a new dish today and all of them loved it. Good. Cannot afford to be picky these days. Family happy, mama happy! Okay, now what's for lunch?? Think hard mama. I have to be quick, need to get ready for online workshop at 11:00 a.m. Lucky me!! My other half offered to help cook lunch today. Thank God and thank you baby for understanding. The workshop was good actually- "Interesting ways to create love for reading". However, the speaker focused only on younger students aged toddlers to 10/11 year olds. Too bad. I was online only for about 45 minutes then I left after seeing my other colleagues signed out. It's not that the speaker was bad but her ways and techniques cannot be applied to high school students.  So, hopped on to other work that needed immediate attention. Oh my...I felt like I don't have enough hands, handling 2 mobiles and a laptop at the ...

Quarantine Day 7 So I had to go out today. We've ran out of cat food. Poor cats, they had to starve for several hours before I could get them their food. The street was empty, unlike usual days. All shops were closed. No makeshift stalls by the road side either. Not many cars on the road. I felt weird driving in the broad day light on the street that is used to be busy at all hours, and now it was practically empty. I felt like I was driving into the twilight zone. Anyways, the emptiness is a good sign. After 7 days of MRO, people are becoming more aware now, so they stay indoors.  Since I was already out, I thought why not get some of the essentials; bread, some fruits and vegetables perhaps. Upon entering the store, I had to go through body temperature check. And of course, all the shoppers were provided with sanitizers as well. That's good to see they take extra measures to contain the pandemic.  Everything was good. It seems that the food supply...

All work and no play, makes Jack a dull boy Quarantine Day 6 Homework. Homework. Homework. Today the school Whatsapp and Telegram group are flooded with messages, teachers busy uploading homework materials for their students. The students are suppose to complete their homework either in their exercise books or online itself. And mind you, these homework are not only from English Language but from many other subjects as well; Maths, Science, History, to name just a few. Is it really necessary to bog your students down with abundance of homework? Personally, I feel it is not necessary at all. Before the school holidays, we have assigned them quite a few homework to be done at home. And now, due to the MRO, again you want to give them more? I thought this is the time for us to spend time with our family members. This is the time for us to reflect and learn something from all that's going on around us. If all this while parents have been super busy with their work a...

Quarantine Day 5 It's only 11:30 p.m. I was in the living room earlier trying to watch a movie, instead I find myself skipping through all the channels. None of the shows seem to fascinate me. I find sitting in front of the tv these past few days is unappealing at all. My other half is already sailing across the lala land.  And here I am struggling trying to catch up to him in his dream...but to no avail. So, here I am. At times like this, when everyone in the household is fast asleep, I feel like the time belongs to me. So peaceful and quiet. No tv, no sibling fights between my two grown-up kids who sometimes behave like 5-year olds whenever mama is around. (However, I still embrace these moments, so I don't mind them filling the house with fights and laughter). Tomorrow is suppose to be the first day of school after the mid-semester break. Unfortunately, the break is prolonged until the end of the month due to the pandemic. Everything is a chaos, everything has cha...

Quarantine Day 5 I can't believe that I am actually browsing this page that I have abandoned exactly 6 long years ago. My life has been great, alhamdulillah, since I left writing. I am not saying writing is bad for me, but I was a little off back then and most of my writings/poems were depressing ones. I felt writing was like an escapism for me. Besides now I have been super duper busy with my work, my family, my new husband...who is now not so new anymore. So how and why am I here today? Yes, nothing much to do right now. I am trying hard not to sleep too much actually. Done a little reading, cooking, cleaning, tired of watching tv for too long...so I am pretty much free right now. Due to the pandemic Covid-19, the country is under Movement Restriction Order since last Wednesday. Today is the 5th day. 9 more days to go. However, if the situation is still critical then the government may have to prolong it. That means longer school break, longer time at home which I kinda e...

It has been 2 weeks since the whole nation of the world, Malaysians specifically, was shaken to the heartbreaking news and to the most tragic aviation catastrophe and until today, the disappearance of MH370 still remains a mystery. I was speechless upon receiving the news that morning. All of a sudden the days seemed somber, it was like the weather was portraying how I was feeling at that particular moment. My heart goes out to the poor passengers and crews of the flight and to their families. The first thing I did was to find out from a friend of mine who was attached to MAS, if the captain of the flight was someone I know from my hometown. Not long, she told me he was not the one. I felt glad for his mom, but still not glad enough to brighten my day afterwards. I cannot imagine how the passengers and the crews involved must have felt at that time. Here I was on the bed, staying up late as usual, browsing and enjoying my reading that night when at the same moment; the...

I saw her limping and when I asked her why, she reluctantly told me that her mother accidentally ran over her feet as her mother dropped her off at school yesterday morning. She cried in pain and all her mother could say was to go look for the teacher-on-duty for treatment. Leaving the poor child in pain, she drove off to the office immediately. The busy mother has literally handed over her responsibility to the teachers in school. Ironically, this is nothing new for us among the teachers but still my heart bleeds and feel sorry for the poor girl. What other affairs can be more important than to attend to your child's needs? I am beginning to question myself. Have I given enough to my precious ones? The money, praise be to Allah, I am pretty sure it is suffice. But the quality time spent with our loved ones and the attention provided. As a working mother, the demands at work sometimes weary me out. At the same time, my precious ones still crave for love and attention from their...

This video clip was born because I have been missing my son so much lately. He's been away in a boarding school down south, approximately 2-hour drive from KL. Hopefully this clip serves as a time capsule where I can preserve the love that I have for my two children for eternity. Even though one day I will no longer be on this earth, my love for them will always continue on. I want them to know how much they mean to me and how much their presence have brought joy and happiness to my life.

~The front gate to Michael Jackson's residence in Hollywood, LA. During the Hollywood tour, I noticed that his house was the only celebrity house which had fans waiting for him outside the gate. According to the tourist guide this happens practically everyday~ It has been thirteen days since Mikaeel or better known as Michael Jackson has left us. Fans or no fans, everyone including me, were shocked to receive the news of his tragic death. If I were to know that he was going to leave us for good, I would definitely climb the gate of his house in LA when I was there last month. I would run to his door in hoping to meet him in person, would request him to sign my autograph book or anything that I could possibly think of within that short period of time before his bodyguards could chuck me out of the house compound. I am not a big fan of MJ compared to others, but I truly appreciate some of his songs, the ones in the 80s especially. Today, he will be laid to rest at Forest Lawn. I beli...

Being a country once dominated by the colonial powers, Dutch and Japanese respectively, literary and cultural development in Indonesia come hand in hand with nationalism. There was a degree of captivation and interest of the native population, the Western-educated native aristocracy in particular, to Western institutions, cultural styles, and political ideas. Pramoedya Ananta Toer’s “This Earth of Mankind” highlights the reality of Dutch colonial government in Indonesia, which was driven with contradictions between the desire to control the locals and the desire to bring them progress, as well as the portrayal of women in the society through the lives of Minke and Nyai Ontosoroh. Minke is a young intelligent man who struggles to seek his identity in his own land that places his native people at the bottom of the social hierarchy in the Dutch East Indies. He believes that he belongs to his people when he utters, “I had no European blood in my body.” (Toer: 20) However, he who had rec...

“Paradise of the Blind” is a wonderful tale of three Vietnamese women struggling to survive in a society where the women are expected to offer highly respect towards the men and Communist corruption crushes every dream. Through the eyes of Hang, a young woman in her twenties who has grown up amidst the slums and intermittent beauty of Hanoi, the tragedy of her family is revealed as land reform rips apart their village. When her uncle Chinh's political loyalties replace family devotion, Hang is torn between her mother's appalling self–sacrifice and the bitterness of her aunt who can avenge but not forgive. Only by freeing herself from the past will Hang be able to find dignity –– and a future. The story begins in Russia in the 1980s, as Hang, a young Vietnamese woman, travels by train to Moscow to visit her uncle. As she travels, she recalls incidents from her childhood and adolescence in Hanoi and also tells of life in her mother's village during the communists' disastr...

This picture is awesome. Can't help to post it here in my blog after receiving via email from a friend who has deep passion for photography. Thanks Shah. Even animals can express their love beautifully...

Wrote this during the long, boring meeting at school today. And I mean reallllyyy longggg....and really, really borrrinnggggg..... Blank! Scribble mindlessly on a piece of blank white paper coming from a blank head! Cursing endlessly hour passes, clock ticking, doodling, blabbering, heart pounding, This meeting... doesn't seem to have the ending!! ~swan princess~