23 Takehana

This is my second visit to 23Takehana. We were on our way home and we stopped by Autocity in Juru for dinner.

The place was filling up with cars as we drove in. But Takehana was still quite empty. We were promptly served.

Other half ordered this. The Takehana Bento. It had all these mixed of sashimi, chicken stroganoff, unagi dofu and sushi. The set came with chawan mushi and a piece of jelly for dessert too.

If you aren't too hungry the set would be good for two. There are enough helpings to go around. Other Half said the tuna sashimi was buttery and nice.

I had this, the Teppanyaki Bento. It had everything... Fish, squids, prawns and shimeji mushroom in fried mixed vegetables. It wasn't spectacularly nice though. The mixed veg was rather peppery. Again this would do for 2 people. The reason I chose this was because everything in it is cooked! 8)

Our girl had the Wakayama Ramen. The meat was really tender. The order was an overkill. She should've just picked from our Bentos cos we really had to stuff ourselves.

London Olympics 2012

Went back home to see our parents during the weekend. I wasn't even aware that it was the Olympic weekend. The Olympics is one event which used to be a major highlight for me. But these days, there seem to be so many things that need my attention. But this time, it was Mom who got me started on it.

Mom who had never seemed to take interest in such things surprised me by telling me quite a bit about the Olympics. I was surprised when she said she intended to watch. I gave a non-commital answer as I had just spent 3.5 hours behind the wheels. But at 3.30 a.m., I dragged myself out from the bed. I turned on the TV, something which I have not done for eons.... Mom came out from the room and soon we were watching the Opening ceremony together. Off and and on, she would disappear to the kitchen to do the housework. Yup! Mom is never the one to sit still. For as long as I can remember, we could hear her working through the house in the mornings... And I think for as long as she is able, she'll continue to do that...

My favourite part of the Opening... lighting of the Olympic fire. Thought it was a nice touch, youths and unknowns. The future and the masses, ordinary folks like us. The Opening was a little hard to understand if you don't know your world history, compounded by our commentators who don't seem to be inspiring viewers with snippets of information which would have made things nicer and clearer. The UK has a long and complicated history, and it's also one that is woven into the rest of the world. We had to put up with the same bland delivery that has been the norm. Should have just used the syndicated commentators minus the voiceovers.

As in every trip home, we'd try to get our fix of familiar food... kampuan and wanton with foochow meatballs in loo-chek.

 

There were also other makan sessions. Took our parents and aunty for dinner at Happy Restaurant where I met our Transport Minister. We were a given a treat by him. In a small town that we grew up, most of us sort of know each other. The Minister's family is no stranger to ours. Yet as I watched him, I couldn't but help feel sorry for him because people are generally quite fed-up these days. I know I am.

Cendol... James' Cendol to be exact. James is not here these days.

This is his grandson. James is apparently in KL. He has set up business there, with a friend of ours from what I gathered. The cendol is doing well, as it should cos I think it's way better than the famous Kimberly Street cendol. Son was usually the one who would ask to go for cendol but this time, to our surprise, our gal requested for a bowl before pushing off.

 

Had a good time... As we grow older (and sometimes crankier) good moments sometimes become hard to come by because they get buried by the crankiness. But this was a good trip...cherish the moments.

 

I went home this weekend and watched the Opening Ceremony of the London Olympics..... with Mom!

Hair...

This is a hair cutting tool... and I think it qualifies as a collector's item. Still in a pristine condition, I still use it to cut my gal's hair. Yup, my girl still prefers her mummy to cut her hair. And I think that's awesome! An honour. Lol! At an age where most kids will want to go to the hairdresser, she still prefers me to cut her hair.... Not that I have not tried taking her to one. I did recently but she insisted that I do a better job.... 8)

The hair cutting tool above belonged to Mom. She used to learn hair dressing... and used it to cut our hair when we were younger. She gave it to me because she said I'd put it to good use. You can open it up and slide in a blade and can start thinning the hair. I think it's at least 50 years old, cos she bought it when she was very young.

Hair cutting (or dressing). I've been doing it for both my kids. Son only started going to the barber in the last 2 years. His secondary school had strict hair length which had to be adhered to. We got one of those trimming tools and Other Half was the resident barber.

For my gal, save for the one time that I took her to my hairdresser and another time when sis-in-law trimmed her hair, every single haircut has been done by the mummy. My kids aren't too fussy about all these nitty gritty stuff. Today, I just realized that I have been doing this for over 20 years! When I stopped cutting for the elder one, there was the little one. And in realizing it too, it dawned on me... memories are made of such mundane things as haircuts.

And this little tool... it has become a family heirloom, silent as it may be, but has passed through 3 generations!

More on Educational Failure

H is one of my many students. He is in Form 1. One look at him and you know that he has learning difficulties. He should not be in a normal school. He should be in a special needs school. At the beginning of the year, when he did come to school, he would sit at his desk quietly and do nothing. On some very good days, he would do my work.... but those are rare moments. His classmates tell me that he doesn't do any work for other subjects.

He can copy, I noticed. He scrawls but his writing is legible. Trying to get him to work is a battle of wills, one which I feel is a waste of time (though I'm still at it) because he totally wears you down. And there are others. He reads poorly and current arrangements won't improve things for him. Allowing him to do as he pleases is bad cos Other students see that he gets away without doing work and they follow suit. Another kid, F will do the same. F is not as weak as H but of late he's getting to be like H. And lately both have begun to retort. The hormones have started kicking in. 8( Often times, they will try to wear the teacher down by just refusing silently not to do their work. School has little meaning for them. And at the rate it's going, I don't think it's going to have any meaning for them any time soon. I have another group of Form 5 students like that too... Even the school counsellor who is supposed to be a Kaunselor Cemerlang refuses to have anything to do with them...

So what can we do. There are 30 kids in the class. Every single one of them has major problems with their 3Rs. One girl used to get almost every word wrong when she copied from the board. She has improved somewhat because I hound her for every word.... But she is still very slow. Teach them the word 'Hi' but when the next day comes it will go back to being 'he' again. 30 kids who can't count or read properly. I find myself playing the role of a remedial teacher increasingly. The next class before them isn't that far ahead either. Somehow, somewhere, we have failed.

It used not to be this bad when I started teaching 20 over years ago. And I do not know whether it's because they've been dumbed down by all the crutches.... and lack of required attention or even commitment from the system. Maybe it's the teachers. Then it could be the parents. But whichever excuses we want to pick, I think we're producing an awful lot of educational failures.

Why do they even come to school? Why do parents send their kids? When you send your kid to school, you send with the understanding that the school will polish them up and turn them loose, with the right attitude and skills. These kids deteriorate as the years go by. Many would enter Form 1 with that innocent look and leave in Form 5, probably having played truant, smoked, slept in class, failed most subjects or be just plain recalcitrant.

For those of us self absorbed people who think that they are not our problems... well, think again. These are the future snatch thieves, Mat Rempit and what have you not. When one leaves school without skills necessary in today's complex world, needs and desires will tip us over into the forbidden zones... and that is when educational failures become menace.

Educational Failure

I think our education system is a failure... I don't know. Maybe it's just at my school. The recent reshuffle of English classes for Form One has been a nightmare. After 6 months of working on one set of extremely difficult kids, and settling into a manageable routine, midway through the year, they decided that students needed to be divided into sets.... based on their scores in a Diagnostic Test.

And so, I find myself back where I was in the beginning of the year, with more students and worse attitude problems. It's amazing what 6 months can do to impressionable kids. They can be really incorrigible. And this is where schools fail and we produce educational failures.

Marginal people think marginally. Marginal thoughts are seldom sensible. And so when you allow marginality to thrive, you get a lot of worse than marginal behaviour. Students holler to each other in class. They stand up and walk at whims and they don't do their work. When other students walk past, they hoot like monkeys. How did we allow them to get to this state?

We are told to use reasoning... they don't work long. Without fear, they don't last. Experts always argue that there is no one approach for all, no shoe fits all. Well, reasoning is also not the shoe that fits all. Some kids will climb over your head if you try to reason with them. And that's what I am getting with this last set of the form. And now that my own class has been infused by untrained elements from the other classes, I find myself staring at a hopeless cause. Should I just throw in the towel and let them rot? After all, I see most teachers doing that. It's fasting month now... in a while many of them would probably be busy focussing on selling bras to cookies in the staff room.

Last year I had the same thing happening to me. One teacher retired and they dumped all her bad classes on me.... unsettling me from my classes which I had been teaching for 4 months. A good head would have assumed the responsibilities herself... but these days, heads are seen mostly taking the easy stuff for themselves.... Another reason why we are producing educational failures.

At one meeting, one suggestion even came up that we make questions for school tests easier so that the students' marks will look better. With everything recorded online, such scores contribute to the general score which is used to rank a school. Try imagine what school heads would do.... to get their schools noticed so that they get noticed. And for PBS (the reason why we have different sets for English now), we are supposed to have a file labelled the 'Showcase File'. Bah humbug! This is where we put the evidence that tests students for placement in bands. Show off.... At the same time, we are told that all students must at least clear Band 3. Reality check! Not all students can get onto that Band 3 bandwagon. So how? What the bosses aren't saying out loud and clear is we must place them in those bands.... Cos all these contribute to the ranking of the school, I guess. Good ranking, they look better. You see, sadly, many heads take their positions as the launching pad to the next one. What many care about is basically the window dressing more than the reality.... Then again, maybe my perception is skewed and our education system is producing great students...

Educational failures, where getting somewhere is not about the hard work that is put in. It's about window dressing, knowing the right people, being the right race and so on. Oh ya! The ISO thing too. And how not.... Cos most of us are products of a failed system too. A failed system that implies apartheid is okay... and one that uses religion to sanction it.

But if one thinks one is immune because one is in the group that has the upper hand, well think again. Educational failures does not just mean they are academic failures. These are the ones who leave schools with no skills, safe for being disruptive and callous. They are going to contribute to rising crime rates. They are the ones who will contribute to social problems. We cannot afford to churn out educational failures. It's time to take a look and do right.

Empty Nest

Most parents today go through empty nest syndromme. Our nest isn't quite empty yet but our boy has finally taken the step into the next phase of his life. Uni life has beckoned. And in a while, he'll be his own man, independent of us. We've shared the first part of his journey. This is the intermediate... where we'll guide him less... where he'll live away, on his own and make most of the decisions for himself.

Other Half commented soon after we sent him off that our house felt a little emptier. Am thankful for our Lil One... who isn't that little anymore, come to think of it. She was really sad her bro was leaving her. Cried buckets. For the past two years, they've been roommates.... One of the things my gal kept bugging her bro in her sms to him were questions about who his roommate is. I guess in her mind, she is his roomie and she misses her bro.

We told him do his STPM instead of sending him off to college like most of his friends. Having him around for the extra 2 years was good. Bro and sis had a chance to bond in a way that might have been quite improbable had he gone off earlier. And it was also a time of healing for many misconceived perceptions and thoughts. It gave us a chance to move on, on a very pleasant footing. He'll be missed at home.

In recent years, I've seen many turmoils in many families. Kids have everything these days but it strikes me as odd that many of them feel that they don't have everything. Parents are in a rush to send their children out to study, to graduate as soon as possible, to grab as much as possible.... Parents work hard to provide for their families. And I don't blame them. Private education is expensive. And public universities are so difficult to get in if you are not a Bumiputera. The recent STPM has again shown it so. It's heartbreaking to see and hear of so many who did well but were not given courses of their choice. Some, like my boy didn't even get an offer too.... and it's not that he had not done well enough. It's just that the system is so skewed and ingrained with racism. But we had already decided long ago not to send him to a public uni.....

Empty nest... Among my own friends, many took flight and sought greener pastures elsewhere (and they were among the best and brightest lot) because of our skewed policies. They left behind empty nests and many longing hearts. As a parent, I would want very much for my kids to be near me, especially as we move along in years. But as a parent too, I too would want them to realize their potential and dreams. It's unfortunate that the country of their birth does not ensure that...

Empty nest - families should stay together or at least nearby. Many kids grow up without the benefit of family interactions; with cousins, aunties, uncles, grandparents and so on. Such interactions would have benefitted all...

MBMMBI

This is the acronym for Memartabatkan Bahasa Malaysia (or is it back to Melayu again... they keep changing the term) Memartabatkan Bahasa Inggeris. This is supposed to replace PPSMI, teaching of Maths and Science in English. Plus we now have PBS or school based assessment for the Primary and Form One students. Exams are going out of the window. No more PMR in Form 3 soon. The only exam for secondary school will be SPM.

So going by the changes that our education system has been undergoing, and can be seen undergoing, one might be forgiven in thinking that our education system is truly keeping up with the changes in the world. But most will agree that our standards have jatuh a lot. Some even label it chronic although the Minister of Education says otherwise.

We are trying to keep abreast. Facilities have gotten better. When PPSMI was started, billions were spent on curriculum content development and equipment. Free laptops, projectors, rewiring of classrooms, etc, etc. But much of the money spent never saw a day of use. Power regulators sat in classrooms gathering dust and casings for projectors became bird homes. But the underlying reason was PPSMI had no chance basically because many teachers were incompetent in English, due to the dumbing down of English over the years..... in the name of nationalism. Actually whole generations are now cacat in English.

Then PBS AND MBMBI... Glam sounding acronyms. I feel PBS actually is a good move cos it takes the pressure of exams away. Learning can be fun again.... that is if teachers are truly motivated and change with times. But that is so not happening. A relative was just telling me her son's teachers seems to be taking lots of leave. Kids come back and tell their parents all kinds of tales about their teachers, most of them dealing with issues like not teaching, boring, lazy, etc, etc.... I think not all teachers are like that but from the stories that I gather from parents, the latter group seems to be in the minority these days.

And why not... recently, in my school we had to reshuffle the students for English lessons. Students were divided into sets, according to their mastery of English. The thing is I realize that students are sometimes sacrificed due to incompetent management. It just amazes me how quick certain people are at coming up with excuses why these 'sacrifices' are needed. Sacrifices which are required because of their own lack of imagination and perhaps incompetence. I wonder if it's okay for their kids to be in victimised as such. Kids get eaten up by their environments. That's on one end of the spectrum. On the other end, when the same people find that legalities suit them, they play by it, even demand it. I label this hypocrisy or cakap tak serupa bikin. That's why we must play by the rules more than go by consensus, musyawarah, if you want the arabized version. Cos musyawarah becomes a liability when the group is made up of birds of the same feather. Take a hint from the ongoing 'water crisis' in Selangor.

And oh yes... One more thing. If you ever wonder why kids are so lazy to think these days... I think this is why. Rearranging students into different sets mean teachers are privy to each other's work. And guess what? Sometimes you might find students' books not marked. But when they are, their answers are mostly correct. If you bother to check further, you might discover that teachers discuss most of the questions with them. So if I'm a marginal entity, why think when the answers will be given eventually? Everyone wants it easy. And some students tell me their teacher does not require them to do their corrections too.... of course they could be lying to get out of a sticky situation. Go figure out what kinds of values our kids are getting from their role models at school.... Monkey see.... Monkey do. We're getting lots of em....

One more thing. Easy come, easy go. Critical thinking, reading and writing... they are not skills which will just drop onto your lap. They require much hard work. MBMMBI, there're lots of lessons there, not just for the students but for the parents too..