Monday marked the last day of them calling me “CHER!” and “Ms CHERRY!”. Frankly, I kinda miss them calling me that.

For 3 years…I had been seeing them through. They are my very special cohort, whom I have shared my ups and downs and travelled to many places with. They were the “shy and quiet” monkeys when I first met them during the first day. Now they are LOUD, BOLD and CONFIDENT. So confident that they called themselves monkeys. Will so miss their lame jokes..-_-

My “monkeys”..

My girls..

I was the usher standing beside the podium throughout the ceremony but I also had the chance to “send them off” one by one.

(picture taken by guiwen)

This year, the graduation ceremony was also very special to all of us, especially for Kevin and his mom. Kevin was my student for these 3 years and unlike other students, he had muscular dystrophy syndrome since 10 years old and was told that he can’t live past 17 years old.

I met Kevin during his O level result presentation. That time, I was only visited the secondary school for course counseling. There, I saw him receiving his O level certificate from the headmaster and I was impressed. Never did I expect to see him joining the school later on and chose to study my course.

Today, he received his diploma in front of thousand standing and clapping audience. I broke to tears on the stage (though I kept telling myself to stay cool since the rehearsal and even prepared tissue in my pocket). Millions of memories flashed before my eyes. That 2 minutes seemed like 3 years to me. I secretly wiped my tears on the stage and really hoped no one saw me in that awkward state.

After the ceremony, my boss came to me and said:“Wow lady, you got some tears going on there huh?” I spotted the tears!!

Gosh I was so embarrassed.

I went to congratulate both of them after the ceremony and gave the mom a hug. She thanked me and started to tear. I also cried again.

It was exactly how we met 3 years ago, his first semester at school. I wasn’t his lecturer during the first semester yet. I met his mom when I was queuing for food at the canteen. While both of us were waiting for our food, I turned and greeted her:“Hi auntie, how are you?”

In return, she greeted me with tears. I was dumbfounded. I didn’t mean to upset her by a simple “how-are-you”.

There and then, she told me her stories and I was speechless. She is one of the greatest mom I have met in my life!

Subsequently, I taught him several subjects. He loves 3D animation very much and I was very impressed with his will and passion to learn. From able to move both hands slowly down to 3 fingers, yet, he persevered. In fact, he completed his work way before his peers did.

During his final year of studies, he was not able to travel to school as frequent. Home visit and tuition became an alternative for us. Seeing how strong-willed he was to get up from the bed and struggled to sit and clicking up in front of the computer really broke my heart and encouraged. I always went home with many many thoughts.

After searching my entries in these 3 years, I realised that I did blog about him on several occasions. Time flies…

Angels in Disguise

My job

The “Make-a-wish” charity event

Several news articles also featured his stories. Click here to view.

Some people said teachers impacted lives. But I must say, all my students impacted my life in every way. Who I am today partly also because of them. My students changed me.

Posted under Life documentaries , Work | [2] Comments