The pus from blister came about from intensive soccer training yesterday which I pretty much enjoyed. The feeling of satisfaction from being able to manoeuvre the ball fluidly past a few opponents combined with not tripping over my own foot successfully lifted my spirits for the day. However I just felt something missing. I enjoyed playing the game it was so good but I felt empty somehow.

I remember being enthusiastic for soccer trainings in JC and reaching the pitch extra early on days with and without trainings.

I remember that when I contemplated skipping school to sleep in the thought of training always managed to perk me up to drag myself to the bathroom. Even when I skipped school I would still turn up for soccer trainings at 4pm. I thought it was for the love of the game but it was obviously not. The camaraderie amongst the teammates was so strong that we tried to spend every breathing moment with each other. Haha It sounds like I’m exaggerating but I swear we loved each other like.. we’d get married with each other if we could.

In fact, some of them proclaimed to be boyfriend-girlfriend or wife-husband or threens.

Its really a shame la that we don’t meet up anymore.

Sigh. I bet people reading this is super bored already I’ve written about this so many times.

Anyway I think I’ve written about Sheryl the inspiring leader before.

The one who has a super big heart that fills up so much of her thoracic cavity I wonder where her lungs go.

Recently I got to know this girl called Ling better who’s something like that too.

We worked together for this project titled, “what it means to be a nurse” which I learnt more than what it means to be a nurse. When I first spoke to Ling I was mildly annoyed by how she kept spewing self-righteous statements asking people not to do this and not to do that. I wondered to myself why she kept doing that? Was she trying to show that she was morally more superior that everyone else?

During that process of working for the project I learnt that she truly believes in what she says and the purpose of saying things was out of kind-heartedness. She kept stressing that the point of the project is not to compete with others and earn the highest points. That would be a bonus on top of our own learning which was way more important.

It is what we learnt during CME in primary school. Despite knowing that we should not pressure ourselves to perform because we don’t want to look bad in front of other groups, a little large part of us shallow creatures still glanced sideways to see how the other teams were doing. Maybe it was just me, only one shallow creature.

Anyway just two days before the final presentation, Ling, the best speaker in the group and among the 4 of us presenting, decided to pass her slides and script to M. To give him a chance to contribute.

Let me tell you something about M. He’s a really funny and nice boy but he is a boy. When you’re running a presentation rehearsal using a projector and you see the screen moving, he’s the boy who, oops, had been playing with the switch.

I have nothing against him except that this was our final presentation and we’ll be graded from the presentation and nothing else. No report or anything like that. 30% based on the presentation hence any screw up on that day will result in a heavy penalty on our cap.

As much as my jaw hit the floor with such force that I grew ulcers all over, my respect for Ling just increased and kept growing la. I love her so much for being such a big person. Big because (my vocabulary is very limited) she didn’t just pass him the script and abandon him there. He was a terrible speaker, please pardon me, who couldn’t stop shifting his weight from left foot to right foot. A bit like how an accordion pumps.

The amazing thing about Ling was her trust in him that he could do better. She kept coaching him about how he could speak better and engage the audience and improvised methods to help him. She is one person I think will make a fantastic nurse. Her ability to see beyond people’s flaws to reach out to help them become better people is just something everyone should learn. How can one person possess so much goodness?

It makes me think about a lot of things too. Like my attitude towards people with less good attributes. I agreed with myself a long time ago that I would not be obsessed about being friends with people who are good-looking or being in the popular crowd. (This is true! Look at how my friends look like. Just kidding!!!! Good-looking friends don’t disown me after reading this k.)

How about a person with less good attributes eg intelligence and EQ?

Do you judge them to be lower level human beings hence stay away from them? Or do you, like Ling, look pass these flaws, believing that there must be something more in them, and give them a chance? If you choose to stay away from less intelligent people, are you similar to people who stay away/ make fun of/ tease ugly people?

Disclaimer:

M is really a nice guy, he’s the one who buys lunch for us all the time! I’m sure he contributed to the group in a way or another, its just that he’s extremely playful.

♥Bid Farewell