Happy Teacher's Day

this morning we are blessed with good weather - no rain and no haze, and thus our ACES Day Mass Dance can be carried out at the parade square. this is my first time doing a mass dance at ADSS and omg, it is totally insane. insane in a good way. everyone are dancing and screaming their heights out. check out my facebook or instagram for short snippets of the video! 

this is also my first year celebrating teacher's day at ADSS. 

as per previous years, i shall now share the cards/letters that my students wrote for me. :)

"Thank you for being such an amazing Chemistry teacher. Your sense of humour, knowledge and dancing skills make chemistry extremely enjoyable. Thank you for always agreeing to my requests for practice papers. You are very efficient and have an extremely optimistic and enthusiastic vibe in class. Thank you for everything you have done for 3E1 and we will make sure to not let you down for our End-Of-Year. Happy Teacher's Day Mr Tan!" - from a cambodian chinese student, and my potential A1 student for Chem O Level

"It's been a pleasure to be in your class. Thank you for all the jokes and funny actions in class. You are one of the friendliest and most caring teachers I have met! Also, I really appreciate your caring and guidance in teaching us. Thank you for spending your time to help me mark worksheets and all the effort you have put in to teach us. I will continue to strive hard and will not disappoint you. I will do my very best to score A1 for chemistry in O-Level and continue to pursue my passion for chemistry in A-Level and uni. Thak you and Happy Teacher's Day!" - from a malaysian chinese student, my potential A1 student for Chem O Level, and also a potential top student of the cohort for O Level. she has the potential to get first class honours for uni. 

"To the world, you may be just a teacher, but to your students you are a Hero. 老师，辛苦了! 教师节快乐!" 

"It had been very interesting this year. I really dislike sports but you make it better. I hate volleyball at first but came to enjoy it. Napfa is the worst, but luckily it's over. Thanks for teaching me! Happy Teacher's Day!" 

"Thank you for your support during CCA. Thank you for being so dedicated and funny! Happy Teacher's Day!"

"Happy Teacher's Day Mr Tan. You are very funny and a super fun PE teacher. Good luck for your future." (machiam I am leaving the school right after Teacher's Day hahahahaha)

"Happy Teacher's Day Mr Tan. Thank you for your dramatic presence in your class, making it more fun!" 

"Happy Teacher's Day Mr Tan. Thank you for always giving the stern face during common test/exam."

"Hey Sup Mr Tan YY. My dance teacher in-charge and form teacher. You are both hilarious and strict! But still thanks Mr Tan." - she also wrote that she didn't want to write her name because she scared kena scolded BUT... there is only one dance student in my form class. HAHAHAHAHA. 

will share the pics in the next post! 

sunday post

i watched Hull vs Man U at 1230 am, and it was a super frustrating match because Hull put in a very strong defensive display and Man U totally cannot do anything for 90 minutes. 

it was until the 92nd minute that Marcus Rashford scored and OMG everyone was so happy, from the players on the field, the substitutes and coaches on the bench, the fans at the stadium, and the fans at home (me and some neighbours were yelling the moment the goal was scored). 

as a depressed man u fan for 3 years, this is finally something exciting that we are looking forward to. we have great players and a great manager with a great winning mentality. 

i actually signed up for this morning's 10 km army half marathon, but i decided that sleep is more important and the haze is not going to do any good to my lungs, so i slept until 8 am and missed the run. hahaha. 

this week we finally finished watching the korean drama Doctors. 

we are now watching W! 

bizarre drama with a superb plot. you can never predict the storyline at each episode. so much suspense! 

Happy Birthday Papa

today is papa's 63rd birthday! i think he still look 50 to me. at the age of 63 he is still going to work everyday and shows no signs of retiring. he is my inspiration and my role model. 

we brought him to Equinox at Swissotel for a buffet lunch, and Equinox also provided a complimentary slice of chocolate truffle cake as his birthday cake. thank you Equinox for the special afternoon! 

both my parents and my aunt are flying to seattle tomorrow. this is dunno their nth time going for a holiday. the highlight of their trip is taking a cruise to Alaska to watch the ice glaciers. so cool! have a good trip papa and mama~

Teacher's Day Dinner

tonight was the advanced teacher's day dinner, held at chevrons. initially it was supposed to be on 1st sept, but the SAC (school advisory committee) members are not free on 1st sept, so the dinner was brought forward to 19 august. SAC members are the ones who sponsor the dinner every year. but this year's dinner we used the school funds, and the SAC members sponsor the lucky draw prizes. 

two weeks ago the theme of the dinner was announced to all staff, and that is SUPERHEROES. because we teachers may seem to be ordinary human beings, but we are actually considered as SUPERHEROES. you can never imagine what we have to do everyday: subject teacher, form teacher, nanny, counsellor, data entry clerk, disciplinarian, motivator, etc etc etc. 

my very onz PE dept decide to become power rangers! so last monday we went to costume shops for recce. the costume shops we went to don't have power rangers costumes. and if we want to rent other types of superheroes costumes, it is not cheap. each set of costume is at least $50.00. and so we decided to DIY. :)

100 marks for our effort!!

for the past two weeks, the staff are also playing the angel and mortal game. tonight during the dinner, our angels will be revealed! 

here's what my angel got for me:

i can't wait to find out who my angel is! :D

and so the night had finally came. it's MORPHING TIME for the pe teachers! 

we look really good isnt it?! 

the female pe teachers

the male pe teachers

the incredibles! these are members of the Student Development Team. the guy in whtie shirt is our VP, Mr Chong. he won the President's Award for Teachers a few years ago. mai siao siao. 

the pokemons! with Ash on the left! they go and buy the costumes! super effort. 

it was really a fun teacher's day dinner. my first ever dinner with the workplace. the emcees (who are also teachers) were damn funny. laugh until my tears came out and my stomach super pain. 

i won a pair of gv movie vouchers for the lucky draw. but can only use the vouchers on mon, tue and wed, and cannot use on public holidays. zzz...

AND... i won the best dressed male, entertained all the teachers with my typical wushu performance, drawing lots of cheers and applause, and i walked away with 50 dollars capitaland vouchers. what a memorable night! :D

of course, not forgetting my angel! 

she's the maths hod, as well as the head of the workplace's assessment committee, ie all the internal exams and external exams are under her charge. so honoured to have such a 大咖 to be my angel! 

Photo Exhibition

the workplace's Lighthouse Productions (equivalent to AVA/info-comm) organised a photo exhibition. 

and my colleague told me that my picture was featured inside. so off i went to the exhibition to take a look. hahahahahaha. 

ta daaaaaaaaaaaa!!! the caption below it says 'Passionate Dancing'. :)

the original pic! 

and when i was speaking to the teacher in-charge, i realised that they store all the school events' photos at google drive. no wonder i search through the workplace's shared folder for so long and cannot find any photos. 

the typical derek seong move. 

the dab. i seriously dunno why is this move so popular and so famous. and all the kids are doing it. 

Joseph Schooling

it was a historic moment this morning at 912 am, when all singaporeans are glued on to the okto channel, to watch Joseph Schooling, true blue singaporean, in the 100 m butterfly final, against the likes of michael phelps and other strong swimmers. 

it was nerve wrecking watching him swim his life for 50.39 seconds and winning the coveted gold medal! #firstolympicgoldmedalforsingapore 

and right after that instagram and facebook are flooded with all the congratulatory posts for him. i am one of the singaporeans who posted on instagram and facebook too. 

let's relive the glory again! (photos taken from reuters, straits times and today)

wahhh sei so many 大咖 people in this pic. #tonytan #tanchuanjin #gracefu #ngsermiang #josephschoolingmother

National Day Celebrations 2016

this is my first time celebrating National Day at the new workplace. 

at the previous workplace, we have the parade at the school field, combined together with the staff and students of the neighbour primary school. 

over here, we are on our own. the sec 1s and sec 2s are seated at the parade square, whereas the upper sec students are on level 2 and 3 of the school building. 

the parade started with the different UG contingents marching into the parade square, followed by the national anthem, that was being played LIVE by the school band. 

after that our VP lead us in reciting the pledge, and honestly speaking, this was the loudest pledge that i ever heard from the whole school, throughout my 6 years of teaching. my VP is a very charismatic person and he really recite the pledge with pride and gusto, and all of us followed suit with the same pride and gusto. 

and we had the national day concert in the school hall. something special about the concert is... there is a special performance by a few teachers. and yes you guessed correctly, i am one of the teachers. hahahahaha. i finally clocked my first performance in the new workplace. :)

the boys!! 

the performance crew! it all started when Ms Chin, the lower sec Year Head, approached me a few weeks ago and asked me whether am i ok to dance with some teachers for the upcoming national day concert. this group of teachers have different races of chinese, malay and indian, so we want to showcase different genres of dance (chinese, malay and indian) and made it into a fusion item, to showcase ethnic diversity. 

we also had a few dancers among us. gadis and terence were in NIE DanzFusion. shi da was a float dancer in sheares hall. suba performed indian dance for her sister's wedding. so gadis was in malay dance when she was in primary school. we used the Lion King soundtrack, because gadis did a fusion item using song, and this song is apt because singapore is a lion city and so we are the lions in this performance. HAHAHAHA. 

gadis choreo-ed the malay dance and hip hop dance. suba choreo-ed the indian dance. and i choreo-ed the chinese dance. actually i did not choreo. i simply used derek's dance steps from the shadow item in 2012. his steps totally blend in with the lion king soundtrack!  

actually i was very worried that i will not be able to perform today because my asthma got triggered again on saturday night. it was worse on sunday and darling can hear my loud wheezing in the car. i used my ventolin inhaler like 10 times on sunday and darling found out that it had expired on july 2016. -.-'''

so i decided not to take the risk on my health and i went to see the doctor. and the bill cost me $56!!! darling said sunday go see doctor 比较贵. shag man... 

luckily i felt much better on monday morning but before the performance i took two puffs again on the ventolin, just to make myself feel more assured. 

pictures with the beloved ADSS pe department after the concert!

and right after that i went back to my previous workplace to play netball with my ex students and ex colleagues. #YOLO

weekend post

saturday was filled with aesthetics related activities. 

in the afternoon i brought my dance club to esplanade theatre to watch 'Sleeping Beauty'. for free! the workplace is offered this thingy known as the Keppel Nights Scheme and we get to watch certain performances for free. so for 'Sleeping Beauty', we get to bring 40 students and 3 teachers. 

before the performance, i bumped into yoke kay, my nuscd junior. after the performance, i bumped into ong yuying, who happened to be seated at the same level as me but right at the other end. it is always nice to see dance friends and i had a short catch up with both of them. 

the performance was super long. 2 hours and 10 min, including a 20 min intermission. after the performance i was super hungry, and i am so glad to have kay lee roast duck and char siew for dinner, together with very nice peng kueh. and then i rushed to sembawang cc to support my workplace's band and drama performance. they are performing for the national day dinner. honestly i dun like performing for national day dinners. the people will focus more on the food instead of the performance. after i done it once in 2013 with my show choir, i tell myself, NO MORE PERFORMANCE for national day dinners. 

this morning i went to fooshin house with darling and my parents in law. foo shin's house need some adjustments in the electricity wiring, and he engaged my father in law, who is an electrician. before going to his house we had this very good white kway teow at a kopitiam near fooshin's house. ahhhhh~~ talk about life's simple pleasures. 

after that we went to bugis to buy 630 dollars worth of health tonics for darling. the boss provide us value added service by sending her kah gia to help us bring the bags of health tonics to bugis+ carpark where i parked my car. so thankful for the kah gia's help. there was really too many health tonics. 

tomorrow is my first time being involved in national day celebrations at my workplace! and there is something special happening! will update on the blog once it is over! :)

sunday post

this morning i went to singapore conference hall with darling to support my workplace's band at a national band competition. 

they are supposed to perform at 915 am. we reach the CBD area at around 905 am. only to discover that today is car-free day for CBD, so alot of roads are being blocked, and i made detours and detours. darling later found out that singapore conference hall carpark is also under renovation, and drivers are advised to park at international plaza... 

finally i parked the car at international plaza, and we walked to singapore conference hall and we reach singapore conference hall at 945 am. and of course the band students have finished performing. HAIYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. 

i apologised to the kids for missing their performance, and i promised to turn up for their next performance. 

i was here 5 years ago, for the previous workplace's 25th anniversary celebration. OMG i look so slim and so... youthful. 


5 YEARS LATER... ...

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多一份男人的成熟与沧桑. HAHAHAHAHA. 

B-Dazzled 2016

from 2012 to 2015, i was involved in B-Dazzled as the teacher in-charge. 

this year, i am involved as a member of the audience. honestly i do feel a sense of emptiness. during this time of the year, i will always be fully occupied with the preparations, attending countless rehearsals, motivating the students, working with the instructors to bring out the best in the students. this year there was none of that. 

b-dazzled has really moved a long way. in 2012 when it first started, the festival was held at an auditorium in ACS(I). in 2013 and 2014, it was at ucc hall. in 2015 it was at star theatre. this year, it was at Resorts World Sentosa! much credit must be given to the directors of Singapore Show Choir Academy, John Khoo and Deniece, for making the festival bigger and bigger each year, and organising the festival at such prestigious performance venues. i only get to perform at ucc hall during my undergraduate days, and my kids already perform there at the age of 13. 

presenting to you, mr john khoo! if you find him familiar, he is the one who proposed to his wife at changi airport two years ago, in the form of a flash mob, and the flash mob director is none other than deniece. the wedding proposal video gathered a million likes on all kinds of social media, and the proposal was even featured on straits times as well as local magazines. that aside, he is a really dedicated and passionate instructor, and my TPSS show choir kids had the honour to learn from him on a few occasions. he taught them vocals for a short duration in 2012. in 2013 tampines polyclinic finished its renovation and there was an official opening, and they engaged us to put up a performance, and the GOH is the minister of health, mr gan kim yong. john did the vocals arrangement for the performance, and the kids put up a great performance. in 2015, john came down to TPSS again to give a vocals lesson before the SYF. 

i also caught up with mr dayan, who was our vocals instructor during the first half of 2012, when we first converted from traditional choir to a show choir. mr dayan is now a English and Geography teacher at a school in the west. i also saw ms safy, our dance instructor. she was telling me she felt very sad that TPSS did not participate in b-dazzled this year. 

did not manage to see deniece because she was in the control room doing the lightings for all the performers. r

arshad took part in b-dazzled solo this year and got into top 5! we are all so proud of him. arshad graduated from TPSS in 2014, and he was one of my core performers. he sings very well and can beatbox too!

and the OCA winners gather together again. ms chua (the one in the middle) has now gone to SST and has become one of the teachers in-charge for SST Show Choir. honestly i dun have a liking for SST Show Choir because of their teacher overall in-charge. she made a nasty remark about me on facebook without getting her facts right and i was really upset about it and i told deniece. deniece clarified with that teacher and the teacher apologised for her mistake. i shall be magnanimous about it and let it go. 

this year there were 15 schools participating. peirce secondary school has improved ALOT. regent as usual, did not disappoint. most of the schools need to improve much more so that the whole show choir scene in singapore can move higher to the next level and get recognised by Arts Education Branch. 

i can't help it but i really miss my TPSS show choir students... :'(

453 SAR MR Parade @ National Stadium

for those who dunno, MR means Mindef Reserves. so if a person MR, it means that he has finished his 10 cycles of reservist, and he don't need to do reservist anymore, unless he chooses to roll over to another unit or to brigade. the 10 cycles of reservist consist of 7 high-key ICT and 3 low-key ICT. a high-key ICT must be at least 8 days, and normally is until 3 weeks. a low-key ICT can be as short as 3 days. 

to mark the end of our 10th ICT, we have the honour to have our MR parade at National Stadium. why are we so lucky and so special to have it at the National Stadium? the only reason i can think of is that the chairman of ndp 2016 organising committee is Brigadier General Kenneth Liow, who is also the Chief Armour Officer. since we are an armour reservist unit, so therefore... everything falls into place. 

hence on 16 July 2016, 453 SAR will have the MR parade together with 428 SAR. all the NSmen are allowed to bring our family members and friends to witness the parade. 

the CSMs and the ushers have to reach at 730 am whereas the rest of the people can reach at 830 am. so my initial plan was to ask darling to wait outside the stadium while i go into the stadium first. and then my RSM knew that i am bringing darling, and he told me to draw another pass for darling so that darling can be seated in the stadium first. i am so touched by his kind gesture. when darling was seated, he asked darling to change her seat so that she can have a better view of me. hahahaha. 

a wefie before the start of the parade! 

the contingents on the left are from 453 SAR and the two contingents on the right are from 428 SAR. 

i am standing right behind the Support + HQ contingent, as the contingent sergeant major, holding on to the pace stick. the pace stick is a symbol of authority for all the sergeant majors, as the master of parade, drill and ceremony. 

once the parade is over, photo taking time!! 

with my OC, CPT Lo Whee Siang. we knew each other when we were instructors at School Of Armour, and both of us were in the Armour Road Relay Team (for officers and specialists). we also did duty together when he was the Duty Officer and i was the Batallion Orderly Sergeant. who can expect that after the we ORD we will work together again in camp, for the next 10 years. thank you for all the guidance and the wonderful partnership! :D 

my 4 x signallers. this 4 signallers... i dunno what to say about them. when is time to nua, they really nua to the max. but when it is time to do work, they will deliver, for example taking over signal store, mounting signal set onto vehicles, getting the comms ready. hence i think that they are still good soldiers. hahahahaha. 

this is a priceless picture of all the CSMs plus the RSM. from the picture you can guess who is the RSM (the one who look the oldest hahahahaha). he will be retiring in 3 months time. i find him a bit hot tempered, sometimes a bit naggy and honestly i try to stay away from him as much as i can. but i will never forget his contributions to the unit, his advice for me when i was still an inexperienced CSM, and his high standard of discipline for all the commanders and men of 453 SAR. 老 cik, happy retirement, and thank you for all that you have done for me and the unit. :D

feeling a bit nostalgic, and hence tomorrow night i will be meeting the support company command team for dinner!