Saturday, October 29, 2005

Fare Thee Well

I am in a rather contemplative mood. To achieve this same mood, i recommend Porcelain by Moby or You'll be in my heart by umm..that guy who sang tarzan. Yep.

Anyway, it’s almost cruelly anticlimactic how this year ended. Honestly, I doubt even the lucid talents of the guest writers of The March Of The Penguins could make things any less unforgivably unexciting. Most of us have been together for what, at least four years? Some even more, their association stretching back to primary 3. Or even primary 1, or kindergarten, or in the case of our long-departed brothers sian/yao, the womb and all its associated embryonic fluids.

The point is, after all these years of companionship and camaraderie (haha if you cant beat 'im, join 'im), after all these glorious and ardous(and, more notably,girl-free) years, our silly days have come to an end with half of us on work attachment and the other half skipping school. With, the remaining (and arguably nonexistent) stragglers simply coming to school out of painful obligation or mindless routine, awaiting with bated breath for the school bell to chime its crescendo of liberation. Its quite...disturbing!

Anyhow, it’s been a good year. In fact, a good four years. Or six, or nine, or sixteen (okay, trying too hard here.) I daresay most of us will look back on this time with at least some degree of nostalgia, as well as a fair amount of regret. Maybe even the occasional bucket of warm, fuzzy tears. I’m not going to go into detail here because well, Far Too Many Things have happened. We’ve all been nurtured as hundred year trees and overflowing vegetable baskets. Or perhaps unashamed bottom-askers (pardon me, O level in three days :) ). We really do owe our friends, our teachers, and our school (and I mean favours, not a good, sound beating)

So, anyhow, remember kids, when you grow up, you must drink water and remember source. Therefore, all your cash are belong to us! *flashes Korean grin*. Ugh , four years in school and all ive learnt is leet :| And we wonder why other schools call us e-leet-ists. (oh.man.so...bad)

Okay okay. On a sadder note; I suppose that while we will remain as schoolmates, we'll be apart and in a new compound. Honestly, thats adequate cause for sadness! Doesn’t it strike you that we’ll never see the terribly mismatched pastel tiles of these classrooms ever again? Or, more importantly, that our crazy clingy motley crew will be unleashed unto the rest of the unsuspecting student populace, never to return to our spawn..point? (for lack of a better word) . Come to think of it, perhaps its precisely because we realize this that we don’t seem to be unduly concerned. (okay, my sad writing faiiils). Or, seriously, maybe its not masculine to let these things show. Maybe masculinity is more about big muscles with aromatically distasteful armpits. But I think I speak for the class at large when I say that we’ll miss one another. No one wants to admit it, but its quite (hopefully) how everyone feels! and we'll do so really soon. Really! Ahh, nevermind. *joins Tinky Winky in his jolly...frolicking*

So…I guess…this is goodbye then! This goes out to all of you, students, teachers, friends. Au revoir! Auf Wiedersehen! Zhai Jian!
-- In fact, i quite like that Chinese farewell. It literally means that we’ll see each other again.



And we will.



*terms and conditions apply.


nah, kidding.
(and bye jondorf! have fun in england)

6 comments:

Trebuchet said...

Calm down, toitle, and don't spam various staff mailboxes. Class assignments are still tentative; don't forget, we have another two hundred students or so (or fewer) coming in. And we'll need to know where not to put the ladies... *grin*

toitle said...

lol yeah but its always nice to know. and one email isnt spam!!

toitle said...

what a nice poem


Curiosity

may have killed the cat; more likely
the cat was just unlucky, or else curious
to see what death was like, having no cause
to go on licking paws, or fathering
litter on litter of kittens, predictably.

Nevertheless, to be curious
is dangerous enough. To distrust
what is always said, what seems
to ask odd questions, interfere in dreams,
leave home, smell rats, have hunches
do not endear cats to those doggy circles
where well-smelt baskets, suitable wives, good lunches
are the order of things, and where prevails
much wagging of incurious heads and tails.

Face it. Curiosity
will not cause us to die--
only lack of it will.
Never to want to see
the other side of the hill
or that improbable country
where living is an idyll
(although a probable hell)
would kill us all.

Only the curious have, if they live, a tale
worth telling at all.

Dogs say cats change too much, are irresponsible,
are changeable, marry too many wives,
desert their children, chill all dinner tables
with tales of their nine lives.
Well, they are lucky. Let them be
nine-lived and contradictory,
curious enough to change, prepared to pay
the cat price, which is to die
and die again and again,
each time with no less pain.
A cat minority of one
is all that can be counted on
to tell the truth. And what cats have to tell
on each return from hell
is this: that dying is what the living do,
that dying is what the loving do,
and that dead dogs are those who do not know
that dying is what, to live, each has to do.

Alastair Reid

Trebuchet said...

what a long poem...

Nova said...

Face it. Curiosity
will not cause us to die--
only lack of it will.

Poetic justification of spam. Very nice.

Trebuchet said...

All these young idealists, brought up on the dogma that curiosity is greater than the lack of it. Haha. They miss the point: the wisdom of discernment is manifest in the ability to decide when to be curious and when not, not whether to be curious or not.