JYSim on JYSim
Inspired by the biography ‘Nicholas Sparks on Nicholas Sparks’
The most vivid image I can remember for my childhood is of stumbling down the rough tar roads at the teacher’s hostel behind CLHS. Majority of my friends never knew that Dad was a teacher in CL Private when I was small, and poverty had driven him to accept the nearly-broken-down hostels behind my ex-school. As a kid I had spend most of my idle time strolling along the soft grass surrounding my house. Numberless times I fell, cos my legs are a little deformed since I was born (another thing most friends don’t know).
When I was 3 I fell from my tricycle and broken my arm, got dengue when I was 9, and aside that I’ll be down with fever every December.
JYSim will never be a nice-looking guy you expect him to be. Firstly, one of his teeth is dented, and though he’s on the waiting list to do braces in the government hospital, I think it’ll never be his turn until he’s 21 or so. Secondly, his mouth is not symmetrical, and when he smiles it’ll never look like Julia Roberts on a print ad. And thirdly, he’s not tall enough.
Secondary school was fun, though stressful all the time. You find yourself buried in books though a part of your mind tells you that you can as well spend the whole afternoon watching television and finishing the whole box of cereals without milk. JYSim will never believe that even politics existed in sec. school and he was definitely not up to it.
And though he did high school quite well, he’s still uncertain of what he wanted in his future life. Everything seems all right as long as you have a friend or two with you. One thing to be certain though: he can’t live without a proper internet connection, he’ll always fight for humanity, and AFS has implanted a oh dear, what’s that word? …semangat in him, that is peace is a dymanic concept threatened by injustice, intolerance, and inequility. No longer is he afraid of being in company with people of a different skin colour, and no longer is he worried about adapting himself in whichever part of the world.
Upon graduation he learnt that studying is not the only thing for a student to do, and though he frets sometimes about not being able to go to college, he never regretted participating in the exchange to Italy. To those people who forgot to send in their applications (you know who you are), four words - if only you’ve joined.
Happy CNY. I can’t wait to come back to M’sia
