Jarod Yong

As I help my family spring clean & decorate until late at night, I'd like to proudly share with you what my students gave me for Chinese New Year. The Chinese characters & tiger are elevated with polystyrene. Recycling! I like! A pop-up card! My favourite!! This boy innocently put a Nirvana logo on the card. Lol. Wait till he finds out what the company does... or does he already know & meant something malevolent? hmm... This one has a meaningful message. From a Form 4 student who benefited from my PMR Mentor Programme last year. My colleague & house mate, Cikgu Chieng, got his students to make Chinese new year cards for the teachers celebrating the festival. As you have seen, the students produced very simple handmade cards but they mean a lot to me & I will be proudly displaying them like trophies at my home in Kuching. If you're reading this, dear students, thank you & I am so happy to have received your gifts. To me, Chinese New Y

This is what happens at my jungle school when the main pump breaks down & there is no water coming out of the pipes. Anybody feel like drinking boiled river water? Even after 6 years, I still gag at this but, when you're desperate, you really have to man up. If it rains, we get to collect rain water which is clean & good for cooking. While it is raining, I do everything that is water intensive like washing towels & bedsheets. Also, I store rainwater in a large container in my bathroom for emergency use. If it doesn't rain, we bathe in the river. I do my laundry at the same time. Thank God for the river. I carry 2 buckets of river water back to my quarters for kitchen & toilet use. I don't cook with or drink river water if I can help it. We really don't know the value of the simple things we take for granted until we have to live an extended period without it. So, do be thankful for all the little things you have. While you're at

I've been wanting to write this little bit of humble advice from an ageing man who is still hot but finding it increasingly challenging to keep his belly from bulging. This revelation came to me while having dinner with a lecturer from IPG Batu Lintang (you rock) but I can't remember her name (I suck) during a CPD course (of which I have already written a blog post but will probably publish it next week). I asked her a question & she gave me an amazing 50 carat gem of an answer. Simple but powerful. Just the way I like it. I've applied it this year & will apply it for the rest of my career. Be it in teaching or marriage or business. And the best part is, I'm going to share it with you right here. Even if you are not a teacher, this will still be helpful to you. Let's say, your an excellent teacher. You've descended from the heavens with an IQ of 1 million. Your students love you & they work hard in your classes. They improve their grades (& you