Chinese Language
"She is more than a language teacher; she's an educator as well". The title of Today's paper: Infecting her boys with the Chinese bug.
During the formative years in sec school, Ms Yong Chai May (!) was my class Chinese Teacher. Most of the time, my class would fool around, but not in her lesson. Junda also happened to be among her favourite students. There was an embarrassing instance involving the person himself, but I shall not divulge into the details.
When we were in Sec 3, during the first day of school, we would wait in eager anticipation for the teachers to be called out. This usually meant that the head prefect would announce which class the teacher would be in. Very obviously, we cheered (and applauded) when the guy announced that Ms Yong won't be our form teacher. Let others experience her unique method of teaching.
Actually, Ms Yong is an extraordinary person. Even though she teaches Chinese, I dare say that her English skills are not to be trifled with. Often, she would quiz Eugene Chiam about some English Literature. Like "Chiam Dao Yuan, what is the difference between Sense and Sensibility ?" And other Jane Austen books which I have not read. -.-'''
But Ms Yong isn't the biggest influence in my life (for Chinese). During my upper sec days, when I was put in an 'international' class of 4B, my Chinese was atrociously, horrendously bad. 4B was a class when more than half of my comrades are from PRC, with a few Vietnamese and Filipinos.
Mdm Tong Ying Xian was the Chinese teacher in charge of my rowdy class. Often, David and Alroy would be the class jokers. Like how David wrote ".....fu ke ni..." in a public letter. Ultra frustrating to do Nanyang Girls, St Nicks, RGS and the Chinese High papers. In which I would barely scrap pass 50. Sometimes 49 due to a quo bie zhi. (wrong word).
Up till Prelims, my Chinese was literally garbage. Whereas peers like Ivan were busy trying to get a few more marks (and the PRC trying to get squeeze A1), I was lamenting the sad fact of C6 in my Chinese paper. My depression was made worse due to the fact that I am in a PRC class. Scores of my comrades were scoring A2. Naturally, we became the "top" class in Chinese and our HCL Prelims results were published for the whole damn LT to see. Something like:
1)Zhao Qun. 75.8 A1
2)Xiong Xi 73.4 A2
3)Wenyang 72.3 A2
4)Li Zhao Chu 71.3 A2
Where would my name be?
....
...
25) Cai Deming 51.0 C6 (Arghh, right at the bottom, thanks man for publishing it in front of the LT)
During those last few months before O levels, I (together with those rowdy gang) had last minute remedial lessons. Mdm Tong Ying Xian must have taken pity on us. She persisted in teaching us even though we thought our Chinese results were a foregone conclusion. Really at that time grab Buddha's foot. We were coerced to read through the infamous "Ci yu shou ce" (at the end only ten miserable words came out) and "Cheng yu shou ce". My eyes were finally open when she gave us the correct format of writing essays and public letters. Now I know why I always score 9 out of 20; it's all due to wrong format!
Abba God must have provided his grace for me during that HCL paper. He must have been there setting the paper as well. Because it was much easier compared to previous years. For the first time (in a very long time), I was not expecting just a mere pass. All I remembered was that I went home a happy and relieved boy..
A year after, Mdm Tong was one of the two teachers that I desperately want to thank during Teacher's day. But alas, she was nowhere to be found, as she had returned back to China...:-(
Note: I purposely did not put my final HCL score. All I can say is I owe a debt to Mdm Tong. :D