The inevitable had to happen, I must admit.
When I decided in 2006 that I wanted Arif to have a taste of boarding school, Arif didn't object though I was sure that he was in two minds. (See my entries: This Used to be my Playground and From Aulong to Pengkalan Chepa, From Hussein Onn to Merbok).
I thought it would be for the better. Him having too much privilege at home was not good for his long term future. He needs to be independent, and I thought a dose of reality (of life outside his protective shell) would do him a world of good.
I thought I could force him to abandon the love of his life once I get him out of KL, and into a remote Northern town. I thought they would never be in contact again.
But I could never comprehend that his love for pizza is just way too strong.
So I relented; I knew that I could not separate them apart, no matter how much I tried. But I could not get Pizza Hut to deliver to him daily at his school. Not matter how much I tried. I dangled money to the Pizza hut managers; just deliver Pizza to him to his school. They can name their price and I will pay up - in advance. No question, no bargaining.
Sometimes money can't buy you everything!
He had grown too thin the eight month he was there. On the fourth day of fasting, upon noticing him at the front row during an assembly, his principal Puan Rohana remarked, "Arif, this is only the fourth day of fasting. Why are you already so thin?"
She didn't know he had been fasting since joining MRSM.
(The story was related by Puan Rohana to the writer.)
I asked him why his exam results were not that great. "I could not study," he confessed. "Everyday I was thinking about what will be my next meal."
I don't know where I went wrong with him, for he would not eat anything else but pizza.
Someone suggested that we must have not fulfilled a vow. Hmmm, may be. I don't know; I don't remember. I am sure we did make a vow if God were to give us a child. But I thought we had slaughter a goat, while he was a baby.
If there were anything else, I may have forgotten them already.
I thought it must have something to do with Calgary (HYSIM User Conference, Banff 1990). May be 'terkenan' kut in Calgary.
So it had to happen - I decided that his SPM is more important than having a son sharing the same alma mater as him.
So when a former teacher called me up last week, I told her of my decision. She laughed. I told her at the very least, he survived it for a year. "He didn't quit after two month," I justified to her.
"Yeah, and my niece only survived for two month at Taiping," she told me.
When I related it to another teacher of mine last Friday during the office warming, she was not surprised. She had told Arif and I, during last year open house at Hussein Onn, that the situation has changed much from my time in the 70s. "There are so much facilities at home nowadays," she told me, "that boarding school may not be the answer to everything in life."
She should know. She was the principal at MRSM Jasin and she brought up Jasin from the brink of disaster ("Teruk MRSM Jasin, Man," a colleague Khalis Abbas used to tell me, "kes polis pun banyak.") to the pinnacle. Jasin was the numero uno school during her tenure.
One of her student told me that Cikgu (Dr) Fatanah commanded them to take vitamin pills every morning. "I didn't," Cikgu told me, "The counsellor did!"
She was just being modest. She is credited with bringing up Jasin. She was even awarded a Tokoh Maal Hijrah for her contribution. She should be awarded a Datukship too for turning around an ailing school - much like turning around a big corporation, only harder.
She told me that her study indicated that our students need Vitamin B complex to strengthen their body and mind. Otherwise they got tired easily.
"So that was your secret, Cikgu?" I said, bright-eyed.
"Only part of it, Rahman. That was just one of the ten factors affecting a student's ability to study," she said.
Good enough for me. B complex it is for Arif from nowadays onwards.
I am sure if I sit down with her for another ten occasions, she would tell me all the secrets.
2008 is going to be a difficult year for me. I need to sit for my SPM (again), together with Arif, after taking it for the first time 28 years ago.
I hope with the availability of pizza again in his life, he would show me his true worth.
Even at a day school.
EPILOGUE
I have no regret luring him to boarding school. Looking from a few hundred pictures that he had taken at MRSM, it looks like an experience I would not able to give him at home. He has more friends there in one year than may be his entire schooling life in KL. He has slaughtered and clean up chicken at his homeroom teacher's home. That's is not something I would be able to give him in Hussein Onn.
When I decided in 2006 that I wanted Arif to have a taste of boarding school, Arif didn't object though I was sure that he was in two minds. (See my entries: This Used to be my Playground and From Aulong to Pengkalan Chepa, From Hussein Onn to Merbok).
I thought it would be for the better. Him having too much privilege at home was not good for his long term future. He needs to be independent, and I thought a dose of reality (of life outside his protective shell) would do him a world of good.
I thought I could force him to abandon the love of his life once I get him out of KL, and into a remote Northern town. I thought they would never be in contact again.
But I could never comprehend that his love for pizza is just way too strong.
So I relented; I knew that I could not separate them apart, no matter how much I tried. But I could not get Pizza Hut to deliver to him daily at his school. Not matter how much I tried. I dangled money to the Pizza hut managers; just deliver Pizza to him to his school. They can name their price and I will pay up - in advance. No question, no bargaining.
Sometimes money can't buy you everything!
He had grown too thin the eight month he was there. On the fourth day of fasting, upon noticing him at the front row during an assembly, his principal Puan Rohana remarked, "Arif, this is only the fourth day of fasting. Why are you already so thin?"
She didn't know he had been fasting since joining MRSM.
(The story was related by Puan Rohana to the writer.)
I asked him why his exam results were not that great. "I could not study," he confessed. "Everyday I was thinking about what will be my next meal."
I don't know where I went wrong with him, for he would not eat anything else but pizza.
Someone suggested that we must have not fulfilled a vow. Hmmm, may be. I don't know; I don't remember. I am sure we did make a vow if God were to give us a child. But I thought we had slaughter a goat, while he was a baby.
If there were anything else, I may have forgotten them already.
I thought it must have something to do with Calgary (HYSIM User Conference, Banff 1990). May be 'terkenan' kut in Calgary.
So it had to happen - I decided that his SPM is more important than having a son sharing the same alma mater as him.
So when a former teacher called me up last week, I told her of my decision. She laughed. I told her at the very least, he survived it for a year. "He didn't quit after two month," I justified to her.
"Yeah, and my niece only survived for two month at Taiping," she told me.
When I related it to another teacher of mine last Friday during the office warming, she was not surprised. She had told Arif and I, during last year open house at Hussein Onn, that the situation has changed much from my time in the 70s. "There are so much facilities at home nowadays," she told me, "that boarding school may not be the answer to everything in life."
She should know. She was the principal at MRSM Jasin and she brought up Jasin from the brink of disaster ("Teruk MRSM Jasin, Man," a colleague Khalis Abbas used to tell me, "kes polis pun banyak.") to the pinnacle. Jasin was the numero uno school during her tenure.
One of her student told me that Cikgu (Dr) Fatanah commanded them to take vitamin pills every morning. "I didn't," Cikgu told me, "The counsellor did!"
She was just being modest. She is credited with bringing up Jasin. She was even awarded a Tokoh Maal Hijrah for her contribution. She should be awarded a Datukship too for turning around an ailing school - much like turning around a big corporation, only harder.
She told me that her study indicated that our students need Vitamin B complex to strengthen their body and mind. Otherwise they got tired easily.
"So that was your secret, Cikgu?" I said, bright-eyed.
"Only part of it, Rahman. That was just one of the ten factors affecting a student's ability to study," she said.
Good enough for me. B complex it is for Arif from nowadays onwards.
I am sure if I sit down with her for another ten occasions, she would tell me all the secrets.
2008 is going to be a difficult year for me. I need to sit for my SPM (again), together with Arif, after taking it for the first time 28 years ago.
I hope with the availability of pizza again in his life, he would show me his true worth.
Even at a day school.
EPILOGUE
I have no regret luring him to boarding school. Looking from a few hundred pictures that he had taken at MRSM, it looks like an experience I would not able to give him at home. He has more friends there in one year than may be his entire schooling life in KL. He has slaughtered and clean up chicken at his homeroom teacher's home. That's is not something I would be able to give him in Hussein Onn.
Rahman,
ReplyDeleteArif is such a lucky boy to have you as his parent. You cared for him so much.