Good stuff. Haha I'll write a real post soon

Hand back ‘Saint’ schools to the La Salle Brothers

(From the Star, Thursday, June 18 2009)

YOUR report “An end of an era for La Sallians” (The Star, May 1) stirred deep emotions in the hearts of those who had studied at the 50 La Salle schools in the country. The exit of Bro Paul Ho, the last Brother Director from St Xavier’s Institution does look like the end of an era.

But Old Xaverians and Old Lasallians do pray that Bro Paul’s retirement would not be the end of the involvement of Christian Brothers in Malaysian schools. At the recent Yayasan La Salle Board meeting on June 6, former UPM Vice Chancellor Tan Sri Syed Jalaluddin, an Old Xaverian, made a passionate plea for the Christian Brothers to stay engaged in Malaysia. The meeting was chaired by Tan Sri Kamarulzaman Shariff, another Old Xaverian and a former Mayor of Kuala Lumpur, who mandated Syed Jalaluddin to sketch out a road map for the coming years.

Old Lasallians like Syed Jalaluddin and Kamarulzaman value what the Brothers have done and wish that they can do more. Unfortunately, the congregation of La Salle Brothers worldwide has shrunk. F

ewer and fewer youths in the modern world are prepared to embrace the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience for the sake of educating children from impoverished families. The Brothers have to conserve their manpower and deploy their resources smartly.

The present thinking is that Old La Sallians who have friends in high places should convince the Government to hand back two schools, St John’s Institution and St. Xavier’s Institution, to the La Salle Brothers to manage and administer. At the same time, the Government should convert both schools from being sekolah bantuan modal into sekolah-sekolah bantuan penoh.

Schools like St John’s and St Xavier’s have shown that they have withstood the test of time. After all, St John’s has produced Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak, the present Prime Minister; Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein, Home Minister; Datuk Sri Nazir Tun Razak, the banker and younger brother of Najib and Raja Nazrin Shah, the Raja Muda of Perak.

St Xavier’s has produced Karpal Singh, the opposition leader; Tun Hamid Omar, the former Lord President; Tan Sri Nor Nor Mohamed Yakcop, the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department.

Both schools can be depended upon to make proper use of the financial resources and enhanced powers given to them. They should be challenged - at the right moment - to bring back the academic and extra-curricular excellence that they had enjoyed in the past. These include competency in the English language, both written and spoken.

I believe making St John’s and St Xavier’s fully-aided schools and mandating the La Salle Brothers and the respective boards of governors to administer them is the answer. Taking both schools private sounds great in theory but in practice, funds would have to be raised all the time. Fees have to be charged and revised upward regularly.

Those students who cannot pay would have to be barred from attending classes. The La Salle Brothers would not be comfortable with a fee-based regime. Their philosophy is to provide education to those who need it, not only to those who can pay for it.

Syed Jalaluddin’s mission is delicate and important. As someone who had studied in a La Salle school and who had worked as a Vice Chancellor of a public university, he can bridge the communication gap between the La Salle Brothers and the politicians and civil servants.

He can get a dialogue going. For all you know, he may find an ally in the person of the PM since Najib is an Old Lasallian.

Dr GOH CHENG TEIK,

Kuala Lumpur.

Work

ahhh I've not written anything in ages, I fail.

I've just begun my research position on scene recognition and computer vision in movies, and I have new found appreciation for people who maintain full concentration 9-5. Keeping focused for like 8 hours straight with like a mini break for lunch is no easy feat - and it doesn't help that I work in the common area, so no checking emails/facebook/the french open or things like that.

On the bright side, even though I have a night class + assignments a couple days a week, I can come back home and actually not have a back log of things I need to clear, which is a very refreshing change.

Federer is going to win. And the Lakers?

Leading is nothing more than having a list of names to pray for

Sorry I've been MIA for the last couple of weeks, it's been a mad hectic buzz of activity.

Actually have a rather lengthy post about my reflections of the past overly unsustainable semester haha, but it's only halfway done haha.

Anyway, thank you all for your prayers :) I am absolutely confident that there was an underlying peace despite the obviously horrid consequences of losing a computer, and I know that peace came as an answer to all your prayers. Just got my computer back two days ago -- I couldn't recover my data, but I have my most important stuff backed-up, so I can live with that :)

Just wanted to post some very quick thoughts.

1. I was talking to my cg leader from freshman year, and she said being a cg leader was nothing more than having a list of names to pray for for the entire year. Very piercing reminder to any of us who have any positions of spiritual leadership.

2. Am slowly beginning to understand the dynamics of Christian growth. Looking back over the semester, I realize the periods of growth for me were when I reached the point of complete trust in God and His will for my life - and not my own efforts/grades/eloquence - and saw Him work; or when I struggled to submit certain areas of my life, and subsequently learnt to give it up. And conversely my periods of dryness were when my prayers lacked faith, and thus even when God worked there was no realization; or when I didn't search my heart for sin or was living in denial and wasn't actively seeking for renewal.

And it really isn't that our relationship with God is dependent on Him working miracles, but that our relationship with Him active ongoing conversation, rather than a monologue - if we don't give Him room to speak into our lives, we have no right to blame Him for our stunted or non-existent growth.

3. Will be serving in a cg (or family group as we call it here). Am really excited, for much personal growth, but more than anything to learn to love and have a servant's heart. Which is why I brought up point #1 :)

4. Hehe if you have time to kill and want a good mentally-stimulating online game, I recommend Desktop Tower Defence.

please pray

hey guys
I'd really really appreciate if you could remember me in prayer -- my computer just crashed :( I was scanning something on my printer, then it suddenly turned off, then my computer froze and gives me error messages at startup. sigh

Really really hope I'll be able to recover my data. I usually back up my stuff, but for some reason the last backup somehow didn't quite work, and because I overwrote previous backups I definitely don't have a good working copy of a lot of things. And ask any college student, their life exists on their hard drive :( and I have my finals beginning tomorrow, so it's not quite the best time for such a thing to happen.

but amidst it all, I choose to be thankful:
1) that I still had some data backed up. and that a lot of work I've done over the past few weeks have been either submitted online/sent to other team members via email, so I can slowly re-piece together my work.
2) that this didn't happen last Sunday night. if not I'd be absolutely destroyed, because I had a final project due last monday and that I was up all night for (red bull gives you wings)
3) that I don't have anything immediately pressing that I need my computer for
4) that my roommate has an extra computer and is extremely gracious in letting me use one of his
5) that I have the extended warranty, so even if I need to replace my harddrive it should be free. and I'll get a lot of extra technical support in service and in software when I call in tomorrow
6) and above all else, that I know God had a purpose in this. to either remind me of how vulnerable I am and how much I need to depend on Him; that my life isn't sustained by the things of this world and my material possessions; that if i think I can keep my life going on my own strength and hard work all it takes is for a small hardware error to occur that could wipe out my energy and enthusiasm.

so I guess please pray that I'd be able to recover my data, but more so that in this time I'd learn to find strength and sustenance in God.
thanks:) you don't know how much I appreciate it.

One more week of lines and lines of fixed width fonts

Sigh. I have two more final projects due this upcoming week, and my life will be filled and dominated by lines and lines of code. Lines and lines of codes that look and feel just like these -- monotonous, devoid of any emotion or feeling.

But the end is nigh. Yay.

Haha writing human words and sentences in this font feels so robotic and fake.

Replies

to rachel ooi & benedict: thanks! it took a while but i'm definitely up and about now :)
to javern: hahaha i'm glad you caught it!
to josephine: hello! hope life's treating you well
to maylyn: i know! sigh, sad. yea indeed -- you too! let's keep trusting.
to alan: thanks man! it's not been too great but it's almost over
to arjan: hello! you too
to carol: thanks! finals are still more than a week away though! that's the sad part haha.
to ry: heh. err i guess you can equate a doctor giving a bad prescription with a banker (or in this case a finance student) making a bad financial investment? and thanks for the encouragement rach! really appreciate it

Sleep

I've been absolutely swamped -- will reply comments soon!

In the mean time, here are two profound and true things to ponder.

Sleep is for the weak.

Sleep is a symptom of caffeine deprivation.

Haha. Story of my life. Just that for me caffeine doesn't quite work, I run on adrenaline. But the end is nigh -- I'll get to sleep next Monday. Can't wait.