Measuring Time

RIVER VALLEY ENGLISH SCHOOL


CANTONMENT SCHOOL

Called me an extrovert or what but i was a very sociable kid when i first started primary school education.My parents especially my father insisted that his children be educated around the neighbourhood so that little transportation expenses are incurred and so that he need not bother my mother to send the children to school under no circumstances.

My eldest brother was enrolled at the River Valley English School which was to my knowledge very far away from our home and thus he had to travel early to school. Later on my father had him transferred to Kim Seng Primary School, although i didn't know the reason for that transition. He later settled permanently at Cantonment Primary School which is located along Cantonment Road, and only a 10 minutes walk away. My elder sister however was first admitted for her primary one education at Outram Primary School and later transferred to Cantonment School in the middle of the same year.
Thus the tradition began where all the subsequent siblings will attend the same primary school in the following years of our time. As a matter of fact,it was the easy and fast way to get registered to a nearby school as you need to have a brother or sister studying there as a criteria for admission. I believe this prerequisite is the norm in all government or government aided schools in the country.

I remembered vaguely on my first day at school but i still remembered about the rest of the year in primary one. It was a joy and a great experience notwithstanding the little pressures that one has to get over the many more months later in the year. Getting up early in the morning to prepare for school was a dleight. There was freshness and brightness in the air. I knew that i will meet my friends at school as there were very few at home. It was like a playground of sorts except that you have books to read and tests to sit. I had no front teeth and i remembered one girl calling me "bogeh" which i didnt mind at all.It was a joy to be in school and arguably i was not concerned about such shortcomings.

My class teacher was Mrs Rasanayagam. She was a big sized woman who wore sari all the time, and it could be that she was so proud to be dressed in her national costume, as what we like to call the attire. She would have been the only woman in the whole school to be wearing a sari and i also realise that she was the only Indian teacher too. Incidentally too, the school principal was also an Indian. His name was Mr D Retnasamy. He has a very smiling character but he was also firm in his duties. We usually would listen to his speeches in the mornings when he has to make some important school announcements. On the othe hand, Mr D Retnasamy will always come to school in a full white attire, both shirt and pants alike and that is what i call a uniform, like a hospital uniform, i think so.His neat hairstyle was always fresh as they glistened with the cream applied on to the centre parting style of his crown.

Mrs Rasa as we all fondly called her (may her soul rest in peace) was a wonderful woman teacher. I was so lucky to have her as my first teacher in this world as i have learnt a lot about what school and studying was all about.
She had some grey and curly tresses on the sides of her hair and it was tied to a bun at the back of it. It was so neat and she would wore earings too to match her hairstyle. Her saris were plain but colourful but not too loud. What i remembered was her powder "smell" or more appropriately , whenever i speak close to her. At times she will wear her glasses when she reads us her story books or perusing some letters and notices that was sent to her by the school's office boy. That office boy was Chinese and he had a Christian name which i cannot recalled but i think it was Jeffrey.
Mrs Rasa could be regarded as a very strict teacher as she was sometimes very hot tempered but only to those pupils who makes her angry due to their poor studies and comprehension of what is being taught.
I came to write naturally with my left hand when the first writing lessons started but as soon as Mrs Rasa found out the improper writing flair, she knocked my hand with a ruler so that i will write with my right hand instead. As such, everyone who wrote with their left hand(including me) automatically began writing with their right hand. It was a scary experience in the beginning to see the teacher going round the desks observing the procedures, which came with hard knocks of the ruler concealed behind her back . That was our first learning experience. She was a very fierce teacher and everyone would be frightened of her.

Sometime towards the end of the year in Primary 1, i contracted mumps, which is a very common epidemic among children and was on medical leave for more than a week. Lucky for me as the exams were over and when i came back to school, it was almost like the last week of the school year.
I had bought my Primary 2 school text books and was happy that i could read them well as i like the reading subject very much. I even read out a page or 2 to my Mrs Rasa to which she was impressed with my ability and courage.

I had many new friends as far as i could remember in the first year at school, their names read like these but some did not continue in the same school the following year :

1) Vivien Seah - daughter of the Senior Assistant
2) Ng Kum Chuen
3) Mohd Feroze Khan
4) Ronald Pietrowski
5) Satiah bte Rahman
6) Noraini bte Saim
7) Mahmud bin Madon
8) Mohd Fauzi
9) Mohd Rozeland
10) Seetoh Kok Lim
11) Mohd Tahir Ismail
12) Kamariah bte Sulaiman
13) Halimah bte Aziz ) brother & sister
14) Zaharin bin Aziz )
15) Meor Mohd Affandi bin Hariri
16) Fatimah bte Abu Bakar ) brother & sister
17) Mohd Yusof bin Abu Bakar )
18) Matnor bin Mohd
19) Leong Yoke Yin
20) Nooraini
21) Rahmah bte Ahmad
22) Mary Tan
23) Koh Poey Yin
24) Lim Beng Choo
25) Norehan bte Yunus
26) Hazizam Aris
27) Osni bin Osman
28) Zaleha bte Osman
29) Gurdip Singh

Other teachers i knew & heard about :
Ms Devi
Mr Haji Ismail bin Tahir
Cikgu Zawiah bte Malique
Mr Ho Wai Mun
Mt Kong Poey Yin
Mr Ho ( husband of Ms Lee )
Mr Sharma Lal Chand
Ms Kwa So Yuk
Mr Teo Chwee Kiat



I could only remember some of the names of my Primary One classmates and of the above, some might have already passed away as i have been told and i was deeply saddened by it. Some of them have also continued to be my schoolmates in the same school until my secondary school years. Some brilliant guys even dropped out of school after their Entrance Examinations but many pursued their education in their own ways according to their success after the P.S.L.E.
That was when we were all children, but it will be more interesting to find out what happened later on when they became adults. It will be interesting to know that too !
Over the primary years, i had some new additions of classmates due to their transfers into my class, and these include :
1) Wong Hong Boon, who also became my schoolmate at secondary level
2) V Rajakumaran, an Indian boy who spoke very fluent Malay
3) Sofia bte Othman - A Malay girl who stayed for only 2 years and later transferred to Malaysia in Primary 3
4) Leonard Lawrence Hwatt - A Eurasian who hails from Penang who came in at Primary 4
5) Mohd Zahari - who came in Primary 2 from Pearl Bank School and a good sports runner.

At the same time, we also had influx of transfers of students from the B class to the A Class making examinations performances more competitive and challenging amongst all of us at Primary 5 & 6 levels.

6) Tan Swee Guek, joined at Primary 4 level, and she also spoke good Malay despite her vernacular subject being Chinese.
7) Othman bin Sulaiman who joined us at Primary 4 from Rosyth School, who is also my neighbour at home. He went to Cantonment because it was nearer home now.
8)Ahmad Tarmizi - who joined in Primary 2. I think he is from Malaysia. Neat and soft spoken boy and always polite although i suspect that he stammers while speaking.

9) Sukhdev Kaur - a Punjabi girl who joined us at Primary 2
10) Jaswinder Kaur - another Punjabi girl who joined at Primary 4.
11) Kultip Singh - who joined at Primary 5. He was quite a smart boy. He joined Bartley School in Secondary 1.


Sukhdev Kaur made me laugh in class especially when she reads passages from the book in the Malay class.
Her reading had the intonation of a singing style that i could not help laughing each time i heard her recitation.


Over the 6 years in primary school, i had 2 teachers who taught us twice meaning to say that i had only 4 teachers as my class teacher :
Primary 1 - Mrs R Rasanayagam
Primary 2 - Ms Kwok Pui San -( former student of Fairfield Methodist Girls School)
Primary 3 - Ms Wee Swee Lian ( former student of Fairfiled Methodist Girls School)
Primary 4 - Ms Kwok Pui San
Primary 5 - Ms Lee Lay Boey - ( former student of Methodist Girls School )
Primary 6- Ms Lee Lay Boey


I was told that the above teachers taught my class twice because they like the students very much due to their good behaviour and commendable results.

New Information :
Today, 31 May 2008,i surfed the internet again to search for the whereabouts of Mrs Rasayanagam. I saw the son's photo in the google images and he was depicted as Dr Rasanayagam who was active in the SATA organisation.(He is now 80 years of age.) I decided to call the number in Dunearn Road and a lady answered my call, who is apparently the daughter in law of Mrs Rasa. This Mrs Rasa told me that my class teacher passed away in 1997 at the age of 90 years old. A short conversation ensued as i pay my little tribute to the greatest teacher i ever had.God Bless Mrs Rasa's soul !

New Updated Information : 2nd June 2008
I called up Mahmud bin Madon, my primary 1 school mate ! He picked up my called with sheer astonishment and great enthusiasm.
Although he could not really recall me ( whether by name or face- since its been so many years down the history of our lives).
He spoke about Zaharin Aziz & Halimah Aziz the brother and sister pair that was also in the same class as us. Both Zaharin & Halimah left Singapore for Malaysia after their Primary 4 level education.
Mahmud is currently on long medical leave after a fall at his workplace and injuring his wrist which was badly fractured. He is attached to SATS at Changi International Airport.

I also spoke to another ex colleague of mine, Yow Kok Shee who was in the same class in Primary 5 & 6. We became very good friends because we had the same hobbies eg collecting stamps, coins, matchboxes as well as music.
It started when out teacher, Ms Lee asked us to collect the most matchboxes as part of our reading assignment in class. My group consisting of Halim, Kok Shee and myself went out of our way to gather as many matchboxes as we could. I realised that there are so many brands of match boxes out there and in our searches, we found unknown labels as well as imported ones. Our group collected the highest amount and i think we got a small token of money from our teacher for that effort. It was so enjoyable and fulfilling.
Later on, i pursued my hobbies seriously as a numismatist but only for 2 years. Kok Shee had a wider collection of coins and notes as he had a sister who worked in England and often send him the foreign currencies and also bought him an album especially for it.During the weekends, i will go to Kok Shee's house at Hoe Chiang Road and we will walk to Clifford Pier at Collyer Quay to meet the sailors from overseas to exchange our money with them. Imagine an 11 year old boy doing sales talk at that time. I remembered the French sailors with their red bob on their caps.