A chapter ended today and another will start soon. Like tens of thousands of seniors around the country, Nic graduated from high school today. In a 2-hour ceremony at the packed school football field, we sat under the hot sun and watched as CalHigh's graduating seniors marched onto the field in their gowns and mortar hats, the girls in white and the boys in black. In his speech, the principal gave a litany of honors CalHigh has won and surprise surprise surprise, CalHigh was ranked by Newsweek as among the top 5% of about 27,000 public high schools in its annual survey.
As first timers, we did not know what to expect but I certainly was not going to let the family miss the experience. So leaving Nic and Val at home to get ready, the three of us packed the camcorder, picked up Daynon from the Lai's home, drove through McDonald's for some take-aways and then discovered when we reached the school that we had left the tickets at home in the excitement!
In typical American fashion, the ceremony was noisy, somewhat irreverent and all about cheering the graduates as each person is called to the podium. Lots of yelling and whistling and horns blaring as the seniors went up to receive their diplomas and pose for pictures with the principal. It was quite a challenge trying to capture all the moments with the camcorder because of the crowding where we sat. Still there should be enough pictures to memorise the day.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Sunday, June 08, 2008
Exciting Events
Hooray, I don't have to go to Houston this week. Workshop was cancelled and now I can concentrate on learning my new job and attending to administrative stuff. Tedium yes and essential. Also will not miss the mentoring conference. Need to step up my role as a mentor. I am beginning to feel like I am one of the mentees instead of one of the mentors.
I must confess I am getting terrified of the new job. It appears more and more each day like I stepped into a gory mess of indecision, uncontrolled growth and political lobbying. Better get my arms around it soon or it will be the end of me and my career here. But I have little help and even less guidance. Gotta find my own way around and really learn how to network with the upper management types and polish up my influencing skills. Trouble is I am still double-hatting and it is time consuming and distracting. Help me guardian angel!
So we went to San Jose on Friday night to eat Cajun crawfish for my bd. The Man did not seem to like it much - like most Americans, he thought it was too much work for very little payback. True. But the fun is in the messiness and the peeling and the sucking and of course, the Cajun flavor. The kids and I had fun. If I can find another Cajun crawfish place nearer home, we will definitely go often. Travelling some 26 miles for dinner even if it is what I had craved is kinda ex considering the price of gas these days. I went for the hottest flavor and the Half Man was breathing smoke after a while. Good thing the drinks were bottomless so they both got refills. The shrimp ordered by the Man was good too. When the family comes in December, we should try it out but crawfish season could be over. I need to learn more about these kinds of local goings-on. Still getting to know the ol' US of A even though I have more years here than any place outside of the little red dot.
Brought my team midweek to a baseball game at AT&T stadium in SF. Our last hurrah so to speak. First time to a Giants game and they lost 5:3 to the NY METS. Still we had great food and great fun. The team enjoyed it and the time we had together. I shall miss having a team to work with and look after. Flying solo here on will be a strange experience. I've always had people under me.
This is the final week of school for the kids and Nic will be graduating from high school. She is challenging to talk to. There are activities the school has lined up and she won't talk about them and she won't participate. Like Grad Night and today's baccalaureate blessing thing at the church next to Bridges golf course. These are all part of the American experience and how many Singapore kids get that kind of exposure? Still talking to her always end up in a contest of will and I am too tired and too stressed for these sorts of matches. Between worrying about the new job, carrying on with the old, picking up after the family at home and trying to make sure I stay on top of school happenings and school grades, I am beginning to feel like I am being swept along by a gigantic tide and floundering hopelessly out of control. Things are controlling me, I am not taking charge.
I don't know what we will do this summer now that YY and UJ are not coming. I checked and it looks like Palm Springs in July is not such a good idea - with temperatures in the 100's, I don't think we will be able to do much except swelter in the heat. So I postponed it to November when the weather is more friendly. This leaves us with no plans whatsoever for summer. Maybe we will just take nearby trips and get to know our neighboring counties a little better. And no more Sunday tennis at Amador Valley High since Chinese classes have also ended for the Half Man.
I have some pics that I will post later.
I must confess I am getting terrified of the new job. It appears more and more each day like I stepped into a gory mess of indecision, uncontrolled growth and political lobbying. Better get my arms around it soon or it will be the end of me and my career here. But I have little help and even less guidance. Gotta find my own way around and really learn how to network with the upper management types and polish up my influencing skills. Trouble is I am still double-hatting and it is time consuming and distracting. Help me guardian angel!
So we went to San Jose on Friday night to eat Cajun crawfish for my bd. The Man did not seem to like it much - like most Americans, he thought it was too much work for very little payback. True. But the fun is in the messiness and the peeling and the sucking and of course, the Cajun flavor. The kids and I had fun. If I can find another Cajun crawfish place nearer home, we will definitely go often. Travelling some 26 miles for dinner even if it is what I had craved is kinda ex considering the price of gas these days. I went for the hottest flavor and the Half Man was breathing smoke after a while. Good thing the drinks were bottomless so they both got refills. The shrimp ordered by the Man was good too. When the family comes in December, we should try it out but crawfish season could be over. I need to learn more about these kinds of local goings-on. Still getting to know the ol' US of A even though I have more years here than any place outside of the little red dot.
Brought my team midweek to a baseball game at AT&T stadium in SF. Our last hurrah so to speak. First time to a Giants game and they lost 5:3 to the NY METS. Still we had great food and great fun. The team enjoyed it and the time we had together. I shall miss having a team to work with and look after. Flying solo here on will be a strange experience. I've always had people under me.
This is the final week of school for the kids and Nic will be graduating from high school. She is challenging to talk to. There are activities the school has lined up and she won't talk about them and she won't participate. Like Grad Night and today's baccalaureate blessing thing at the church next to Bridges golf course. These are all part of the American experience and how many Singapore kids get that kind of exposure? Still talking to her always end up in a contest of will and I am too tired and too stressed for these sorts of matches. Between worrying about the new job, carrying on with the old, picking up after the family at home and trying to make sure I stay on top of school happenings and school grades, I am beginning to feel like I am being swept along by a gigantic tide and floundering hopelessly out of control. Things are controlling me, I am not taking charge.
I don't know what we will do this summer now that YY and UJ are not coming. I checked and it looks like Palm Springs in July is not such a good idea - with temperatures in the 100's, I don't think we will be able to do much except swelter in the heat. So I postponed it to November when the weather is more friendly. This leaves us with no plans whatsoever for summer. Maybe we will just take nearby trips and get to know our neighboring counties a little better. And no more Sunday tennis at Amador Valley High since Chinese classes have also ended for the Half Man.
I have some pics that I will post later.
Sunday, June 01, 2008
Soliloquy
It has been a while. Much has happened but the time and inclination were not conducive. Schools are winding down and with all the finals over, the stress levels has leveled off a bit especially for the high schooler. It has been a challenge with one particular subject and I cannot begin to describe the sense of disbelief at what was happening and why.
Anyway, that's a story for another day.
Meantime, we had the school award ceremony for all the seniors who either won some award or other or some kind of scholarships. It does seem like there are a fair number of these around and it is entirely up to the kids to go apply for them. I cannot comprehend why most kids won't even lift a finger. There's money for the taking and from the looks of it, it does not seem all that insurmountable to qualify. Many of them may be too busy working at Safeway and other joints or just disinterested.
And there was the final Spring concert at CalHigh for Nic. I have been busy with the camcorder but the videos are too large to upload. I must find time to organize all these memories. They are all on the iBook but filed away in no consistent way. Unstructured data - that's a term that's gonna be my nemesis or my center of gravity, depending on how well I do my new job. Oh did I say I have a new position? That gives us a new lease of life in staying here longer.
Was in New Orleans en-route to the offshore platform and on the way back. City is still recovering from Katrina. Some parts like the French Quarters are pretty much intact - they were barely touched by the flood - but other areas are still bad. We did not see much since we were basically just passing through but I did see some abandoned homes. We spent half a day with GreenLight, an organization devoted to changing out lights at homes in New Orleans to CFL. It is an interesting concept - the small organization gets donations of CFL lights from companies like WalMart and get volunteers to change out the lights in homes to reduce the carbon footprints home by home by home and in incremental steps help reduce electricity consumption and therefore global climate change. Hopefully, this movement will catch on and spread to other cities.
Summer holidays are almost here and soon the schools will all be in recess. No one is coming this summer so I guess we will have to entertain ourselves. If my new job does not take up a 110% of my waking hours. Soon Bean will be here if only for a few days and before you know it, we will be sending Nic off to college and I will be looking at large school bills again.
Will post more soon. Adieu!
Anyway, that's a story for another day.
Meantime, we had the school award ceremony for all the seniors who either won some award or other or some kind of scholarships. It does seem like there are a fair number of these around and it is entirely up to the kids to go apply for them. I cannot comprehend why most kids won't even lift a finger. There's money for the taking and from the looks of it, it does not seem all that insurmountable to qualify. Many of them may be too busy working at Safeway and other joints or just disinterested.
And there was the final Spring concert at CalHigh for Nic. I have been busy with the camcorder but the videos are too large to upload. I must find time to organize all these memories. They are all on the iBook but filed away in no consistent way. Unstructured data - that's a term that's gonna be my nemesis or my center of gravity, depending on how well I do my new job. Oh did I say I have a new position? That gives us a new lease of life in staying here longer.
Was in New Orleans en-route to the offshore platform and on the way back. City is still recovering from Katrina. Some parts like the French Quarters are pretty much intact - they were barely touched by the flood - but other areas are still bad. We did not see much since we were basically just passing through but I did see some abandoned homes. We spent half a day with GreenLight, an organization devoted to changing out lights at homes in New Orleans to CFL. It is an interesting concept - the small organization gets donations of CFL lights from companies like WalMart and get volunteers to change out the lights in homes to reduce the carbon footprints home by home by home and in incremental steps help reduce electricity consumption and therefore global climate change. Hopefully, this movement will catch on and spread to other cities.
Summer holidays are almost here and soon the schools will all be in recess. No one is coming this summer so I guess we will have to entertain ourselves. If my new job does not take up a 110% of my waking hours. Soon Bean will be here if only for a few days and before you know it, we will be sending Nic off to college and I will be looking at large school bills again.
Will post more soon. Adieu!
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