Oh man, I stink really bad.

Anyway, since everyone's blogging abt the show,
thot I cld say sth too.

I caught The Devil Wears Prada a few days ago with my girls,
yes...in the hell-to-pay-for red shoes.

I thot it is a realistic portrayal of the contrast between the life that all girls dream abt,
and the real life between that glamorous facade.

Everything comes with a price,
and often,
the pricetag is not worth the good itself.

I personally prefer the novel thoh,
the show is still...too much of a fairytale.

Anyway,
the show still managed to deliver the msg tt as pple grow up,
and begin to acquaint themselves with beautiful luxuries
with the symbols of status,
they ideally, of cos,
shd not,
be lured away from the right path into sin.

And Meryl Streep rocks my socks off!!

So, there's no complaint on my side.

*shrugs*

Speaking of growing up,
I had the greatest surprise on Monday.

A few weeks back,
one of the trainers,
Andrew, called me, askin me to help out with his program.

The thought "bloody hell" crossed my mind immediately.

U see,
between working 5 nights a week and studying 3 days a week,
I barely have time for myself.

Moreover, my last experience running a program with pri sch kids sucks to the core.

However, I just cldn't say "no" over the ph.

Call me a coward.

I just don't know how to reject pple when they talk to me personally,
esp when they are so nice abt it!!

So I offered my help.

It was an all girls sch this time round,
and as usual,
they were all gaga-ing over a certain someone's boyfren,
oh, and Lye's sons and nephews too.

Ok, I admit, I was one of those girls too.

Wat the hell!!20 liao still join the kids!
^%&%$%

BUT!!!!I was more cool and discreet abt it,
of cos.

Anyway,
that's not the main story.

Oh, ok, it's linked to the main story.

Because it's an all girls sch,
and the teachers are...almost all female.

The sch seemed to breed a strong feminist environment.
According to what some of the girls tell me,
talkin abt "boys" is prohibited,
they'd get a counselling session with the teachers if they ever tok abt boys.

Hello?Like not even Singapore Idol boys can?

I'm serious!!
Imagine my shock.
They were conditioned to think a certain way,
to behave a certain way,
to despise certain behaviours.

I did think some of the teachers are bitches who swallow little innocent kids for breakfast thoh.

I mean, what the hell were they thinkin socialising kids into a certain mould?

They shd understand tt everyone is different.

And hello? What's wrong with being interested in the opp gender?

With teachers repressing kids, no wonder there's homosexuals in single sex sch.

It's super irritaing,
esp when they try to interfere with my facilitation.

We were having our final debrief,
and I've been working myself into the ground to get them to open up to me,

hello?
yours truly went as far as to play catchin with them in order to build rapport can?
and yours truly got laughed at by her fellow facilitators when she returned all sweaty and breathless

of cos urs truly laughed right back at them when the feedback forms came back.

the kids were brillient,
the things they were tellin me,
I never knew 10 yr-old kids cld be so matured.

"So, share with me, one thing which u realise today"

"I learnt...teamwork"

"ok, tt's great!But cheh cheh is dumb, can explain to me what abt teamwork tt u learn today?"

They were callin me aunty initially,
wat the hell!Until I told them tt very firmly that I will not ans to that.

She smiled and very shyly explained to me

"I learnt tt teamwork is not easy."

"Why is tt so?"

"Because to work as a team, we have to be open. And it's very hard to be open if u don't like the person. I learnt tt when I kept opposing her, scolding her for not coorperating, I myself am not coorperating too, cos I don't like her, and like tt aircraft game, I shouted at her when she crushed the paper, when it's a very very good idea."

I cld hug her and kiss her till the end of time!!

"Tt's very impressive. Come, cheh cheh give u a sweaty hug!"

She flew into my arms.

Kids are just so open and lovely.

I don't remember getting such open response in so short a time in older kids.
In fact, their fave reply to me wld be to shrug their shoulders and tell me that they don't know.

Courage is sth tt disappears as we get older.

"What abt u? Share with me one thing u found really useful"

"The win-win thing."

"Ok, remember, cheh cheh is dumb, u haf to explain"

she giggled.

"I realised tt I am quite selfish. And it's true. When I wanna get sth, I always believe tt in order for me to win, the other person has to lose. I haf never thot of workin together to achieve the goal b4. Cheh cheh, I didn't know teamwork is so chim!!Everything can be teamwork!!Eh!I think I am tokin abt openness...."

she looks to me for approval.

"No, ur not selfish, ur brave for admitting that. and ur right, everything can be teamwork. Actually, openness is part of teamwork as well, don't be afraid of getting it wrong. There's no right or wrong here. Come cheh cheh give u monster sweet."

*smiles in remembrance* I cld tok abt their responses forever.

Among the many astonishing revelations I heard,
the one tt made me drop my jaw has to be the case of this girl trying to facilitate the girl whom the whole group is against.

The thing is,
like I said,
these girls are not allowed to tok abt boys.
And as it happens, there is this one girl who is more...verbal.
So she is tellin me abt her fave Joakim *pukes*,
and how cute someone's bf is,
besides tt, she's also very very very touchy,
(I shall not elaborate, but I was kinda freaked out)
and quite uncoorperative.

So this other girl,
started to very seriously tok to this uncoorperative girl.

"Why do u choose to behave like that?"

"I don't noe. I'm just lidat wat."

"No, U haf a choice. Like I had a choice. I can be mean to u, and ignore u, but I can also try to tok to u, and try to understand why ur behaving this way. I'm choosing to be open minded"

The uncoorperative girl kept silent and began playing with the stones on the floor.
I just sat watching them.
They were so wonderful I didn't have to even butt in.

"If I try to be nice to u, will u try to be nice too?"

She kept silent and shrugged.

"If u go on like this, nobody will like u. Don't u know tt the whole class hates u?"

She nodded. Still silent.

I was holding my breath.
The girls were doing what we call "clearing" all by themselves!
I was waitin for the other girl to breakdown.

"Girls!What are u all gossipping abt? U all r supposed to do the worksheet u noe? So write down wat u learnt!"

The girls started to drop their heads and began to write on their worksheets,
meaningless terms like "help each other","be focused", "strive for perfection"

I was struggling to contain my anger while the teacher nodded her head in approval
and threw them somemore stupid terms like

"have a goal"

"determination and perseverence"

"knowledge"

I wanted to strangle her!
I wanted to poke her beady eyes!

She actually nodded her head in approval of such superficial platitudes!!!

Her, and her american accent.
Her, and her shriek of

"OH!Look what he msged me?!!" as she turned to the other female teacher and burst into excited giggles.

Talk abt double standards.

*utter disgust*

As the kids learn abt themselves,
I realised tt,
as adults (or young adults),
we often disregard the things kids say,
cos we ourselves have this stubborn belief that just because we have greater life experiences,
we are superior to them,
thus, we are always right.

We always tell them tt doing this is wrong,
that is wrong,
but have we ever given them credit for doing what is right?

When we tell them tt it is wrong,
are they really wrong?
Or are we just basing the justification of what is wrong and right by our own narrow standards?

We refute them.

We discredit their views,
and in doin so,
robbing them of the respect that they so deserve as well.

Talk abt respect.

Have we truly respected them?

Their intelligence?
Their candidness?
Their unaffectedness?

Althoh we do have greater life experieces,
I think we often forget that,
because of these life experiences,
we also build up a wall of pride,
and it is this fortress that blinds us to our mistakes,
this thing that disallows us to admit and acknowledge our weaknesses.

And I think,
this alone,
make them even bigger than what we are.