We didn't go to school for almost a year...

A chat with Mak Tam and Atie, my cousin Imad's wife at Mak Tam's place last night brought back memories of my primary school days. Originally, I went to Mak Tam's place hoping to help out with preparation for the coming 'kenduri sambut menantu' for Imad and Atie. Turned out they had ran out of  "Al-Mathurat Sughra" for the goodie bags, so the goodie-bags-packing-process was put on halt last night. And I ended up chatting with Atie and Mak Tam

Together with my younger brother Abang, we missed almost one whole year of formal education when I was 9 and he 8. That was due to the bitter custody fight between my parents at that time. When ever we were in Sungai Petani and Ummi sent my brother and I to Sekolah Jalan Sekerat, Ayah would come and pick us up from school and we would gladly followed Ayah back to Kulim, to stay with our grandparents, Tok and Tok Ayah.

And when ever we attended SRK Tunku Abdul Malik in Kulim while we were in Ayah's or Tok and Tok Ayah's custody, Ummi would come to our school and practically 'kidnapped' us - hands held tightly and mouths almost gagged by adults, since Ummi was almost always assisted by cohorts, teachers and all - back to Sungai Petani.

After several episodes of these 'kidnap' incidents, Ayah stopped sending us to school, while simultaneously fought for custody of our youngest brother, Adik, in court. Both Abang and I were 'of age' and could state our preference to stay with which parent after our parents' divorce was finalized. Both of us chose to stay with Ayah. But when Ummi kept 'kidnapping' us from school, used her position to influence some friends in the state Education Department to bar us from attending schools outside Sungai Petani and all, Ayah thought for the sake of our welfare and 'stability', it was better to let us be homeschooled. It was not an easy decision.

However, being the busy contractor that he was, apart from buying numerous revision and exercise/activity books for us, Ayah did not spare that much time to homeschool us. And we couldn't really depend on Tok, Tok Ayah or the TV Pendidikan to be tutored at home.

But alhamdulillah, both Abang and I did not do too bad when we re-entered formal education again a year later, in SRK Damansara Utama. We missed almost one whole year of formal education, but we caught up quite fast. Never mind that during the 're-adjustment' period I once got 19/100 for my English test because I could not differentiate using 'a few' from 'a little'. I remember answering "A little children were playing in the field" and "Add a few sugar in the mixture". No wonder I only got 19, eh? Ha ha.

Anyway, I digressed.
Alhamdulillah, when we moved to PJ, we were blessed with a great support system - a stable family (finally!) after Ayah married Mak, good teachers at school, good tutors and simply great new friends.

And I will forever be indebted to a particular good friend named Ismarita Ismar...

*to be continued