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Saturday, July 08, 2006

~ 8:19 PM ~

Well here I am rotting in front of my computer as usual... and since I got nothing to do... I might as well provide some information on some recent events in school. Please read this only if you have a lot of time because seriously its the longest post I have ever done.

I am not sure whether Jay sent that sms to everyone, but if he did it I am sure everyone have seen it by now. I am neither disgraced nor ashamed to admit that I was one of those who were harshly punished, in fact I am proud to do so because in the process of accepting the punishment, I have found out just how rotten and inefficient our school system is.

To those who were not there to witness the exact situation, allow me to elaborate. On that Tuesday afternoon, the few of us just had lunch and were headed back to level 6 to prepare for the first presentations. The tutorial rooms were all being locked up due to the fact that the common tests were going on. It was around 2p.m. and one of the groups had a presentation at 2:30. Hence they wanted a final rehearsal and also to listen to any suggestions any others might have. We headed out to find any of the Block P tutorial rooms and found out that all were full from level 5 to 7. We decided to head back to the lab to do the final rehearsal as it was already 2:15 by the time we finished looking.

After they had finished presenting we were preparing to go off when a certain deputy director came in and chanced upon us in the lab. Well the first thing he said was: Wah you all convert this into a study room? And he asked us to leave before leaving the room. We started to pack our bags but before we could even do so, he came back in again with another lecturer and started asking us why we have not left yet. Excuse me sir, when you want people to leave, it is only COMMON SENSE that you allow them just a few mins to pack their stuff before leaving, and considering that we had some papers on the table due to the rehearsal. Dun tell me when a boss fires someone he really chases them out immediately and his personal belongings are all still at his desk? Why dun you clean up after us then?

We thought that was the end of it, but Mr Nosey went ahead and complained to the various supervisors that he caught us sitting around in the lab. And so we were called to a meeting with the lecturers. The first thing they did was to bombard us with lots talking which sounded to us like some alien language because frankly we are all too confused as to what they were talking about and I shall explain this later.

One point they emphasized was that we signed an acknowledgement form at the start and allowed them to punish us if we were to commit any mistakes. The problem now however is we were caught for sitting on the floor in the lab (there were not enough chairs during the rehearsal for everyone). BUT in the rules and regulations paper, no rule or regulation stated that we were not allowed to sit on the floor in the lab! In fact I also recall on the first day that the lab safety officer said that as long as we were not doing lab work we were allowed to stay in lab. Some people may be throwing darts at our pictures now and saying: DO YOU HAVE COMMON SENSE ITS A LAB! All I can say is read the whole story before you decide on throwing the darts.
After bombarding us, one of the lecturers sarcastically said: can you tell me how I can prevent students from congregating in MY lab?

So its now your lab? Sorry I didnt see the labeling.

Responding to her inquiry one of my fried gave the suggestion that maybe one tutorial room could be reserved for all project students so they could go there in case they needed a room for whatever reason. Not only did they not accept the suggestion, they did not even finish listening to what my friend had to say and cut her off rudely. One other lecturer also said that we could have gone to the library to book a research carrel, and just when we decided to tell her about the time restraint she said something that just made us shut up literally because we felt it was stupid to say anything more.

Even if the library was full you could have gone to the swimming pool.

Yep so now you understand the common sense part. It did not seem fitting for us to talk anything about common sense to someone who did not have it at all. At that point we felt that it was really pointless for us to say anything at all. We just decided to shut up and let them ramble on. And they did so with glee as it must have really looked to them like we were SO guilty for what we have done by keeping quiet.

And so we were banned one week from the lab and they wanted to deduct 20% of the marks. But let me ask some questions first. Is a punishment so harsh fair for a mistake committed that no one even knew was a mistake? Call it miscommunication or whatever you want. Now all we are saying is that the rules DID NOT mention sitting on the floor was an offence. AND DO NOT START THE COMMON SENSE THING AGAIN because I have already pointed out to everyone just how useless common sense is when facing people who have none.

Also, as lecturers, I think you should have some basic human conscience since you have been through MOE training. Because shortly after that meeting we began hearing rumors that the director had caught us PLAYING GAMES in that lab. If you like spreading rumors so much you can very well go be an entertainment reporter because I certainly think you have got the talent for that. By accepting the punishment you have given us does not mean that you have to right to continue defaming us and make us look like an incorrigible bunch of teenagers. It seriously makes you look more childish than ever.

And also now I want to clear one more thing. Accepting the punishment does not mean we admit we were wrong. As a matter of fact, many of our classmates who found out about this all had one reaction:

Was that a mistake?

Accepting the punishment had only one purpose for us, and that was to prevent further and worse abuse of their power which I am sure they will continue to do so had we retaliated. As the Chinese saying goes, take a step back and the sea and sky widens up for you. So now in conclusion, what I want to point out is that, if you have lecturers who really care for you and not just their own asses, good for you. If you happen to run into unreasonable ones with no common sense, its just better to shut up because speaking up will only make them humiliate you more and spread more rumors about you. It can really ruin your life.

My advice now? Stay happy and dun bother what they have done. Because now looking back on what happened, it really seemed to me that we were the mature ones and they were the childish ones.