Was really too tired to cover yesterday's events by the time I got home, but anyway, went down to supposedly help out with the Fmss GB hike. They were to 'road-hike' from school to various check points, with the final one at Sentosa, most impt requirement being that they covered a minimum of 15 km (This being an activity to procure their Excursion badge). So I donned my trusty Neckermans and went down to school in the drizzling rain. Thank God for the rain, although it made the initial part of the journey wet and cumbersome (we were trooping along the pavements decked out in ponchos at one point), it served to provide a cool setting for most of the hike.

Frankly, all I did in the end was tag behind the group I was assigned to - 4 girls, 2 teachers, and 2 junior Sq 7s. We walked from Commonwealth to Margaret Drive to Alexendra Rd to Zion Rd, reached Checkpt #1 Liang Court/Clarke Quay, took a 15min break before moving off to SGH, Kg Bahru, World Trade Centre, and finally Palawan beach on Sentosa. Whole journey took 4.5 hours. Whew! Not that I minded having just done nothing but follow them. Easy work, plus I'm outdoors at the same time. Besides, had never went on a hike of this sort before, good to try new things once for experience!

However, was pretty aghast when I first looked over at my assigned group and discovered 2 of my ex-students were on the team. I rather resent any form of reminder of my time relief-teaching back in Fmss, and ex-students are, well... the most blazing, in-my-face representations of awful reminders.

Everytime I see one of them, I can only recall the times I'd spent screaming at them. Gosh. I hated that. Step into class, try to conduct lessons, reprimand those being disruptive, chase them for long overdue assignments, leave the class thinking murderous thoughts... Out of 5 classes, 2 were ok (the 'better' classes, though that's where the smart alecks resided, sheesh). The other 3... I yelled at them more, sent hoardes of them out of the classroom, threw teacher-tantrums (by refusing to teach until certain responsibilites were carried out)... *shudder* So much for all that hope of building rapport with the students and making light-hearted jokes with them - that pretty idea flew out of the window by the 3rd week. (Yet the irony was I found the students of the Normal stream class I taught the most lovable, even after all that yelling.) Admittedly, many of the disasters incurred was due to my being underprepared at what to expect, and having to teach English and history... Awful subjects that I'm incapable of teaching. Someone ought to slap a ban on me from ever teaching History. Or English. By the time I got the hang of things, the damage had already been done and most of them got the idea that I must have made it my life purpose to smile as little as possible... So anyway, it's not too difficult to understand why I dislike seeing them again. Utterly awkward feeling. And yet, there I was, facing a 15km hike with 2 ex-students, BOTH of whom I'd slashed out at before. Not forgetting I also had horrible impressions of them. I couldn't jolly well run away, could I? Because it was their responsibility to figure out their own route, the seniors being there only to ensure safety, there wasn't a real need for me to talk to them. Which was a relief. But I did in the end, during the break. Small talk about the funny bits in Finding Nemo, how the rest of their classmates were... Surprise surprise! It wasn't too bad. Angela (a monitress whom I'd made a scathing remark to her about how she could ever been elected) actually responded, and unreservedly, at that. *wry grin* She probably has thicker skin than Sook Ching, a girl from one of the smart aleck classes whom I'd once caught listening to her discman during class. *tuts* Difficult to understand how after a year since those tiresome days, I still get involved in some school activity or another, bringing me into contact with the ex-students.