Tag Archives: Weekly Update

2017 Secondary 2 Week 9 Update

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February just flew past like a wind, I felt!

School is on for the two of them and this coming week will be the last week for this term. Next week is their term break and then on to term 2. Both will be busy with camps this week, so that should also go past fairly.

Yesterday we went to GG’s school for a Parent Teacher meeting as well as a talk from the school about the Secondary 3 streaming. It basically just reinforced to me that this is a really crucial year, especially to someone like BB who only has Science in his head. The other day when I asked him what was his Plan B if he could not get double or triple science as he wants, his response was a blank stare! He just has not thought of a life beyond science and engineering. So for someone like him, this is a super crucial year!

That’s all for the week from my side. Have a happy Sunday folks!

 

2017 Week 8 Weekly Update

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They say when it rains, it pours! As if the stress of looking for a job is not enough, I also have additional health issues to deal with. A couple of weeks back, I did an eye and foot check-up as part of a primary care package. When the reports came out, they want me to go for additional tests as the results from one eye is slightly out of whack for one disease. According to my doctor, it could be nothing, but it could also be something. I went to get a referral to the hospital’s ophthalmic department and it has been fixed for next month.

S’ mum also was sick this week, so since neither S nor his sister could manage to take her to the doctor, I did it. This meant I was out of the house almost all the days of the week, which also brought my daily steps up significantly. I still haven’t touched the 10,000 I planned for any day yet, but baby steps!

I took the children out yesterday since we’ve not been out in ages. The original plan was to see a Bollywood film, but the movie I wanted to see was rated NC16 here. This means that only those who are 16 and older can see the film and they check IDs before you enter the theatre. So that plan dropped and then we decided to go to a regional library since we hadn’t been to a library since November when our local library was closed for renovation and followed that up with a spot of shopping. Retail therapy is great – haven’t shopped in ages and it felt so good…

Have a great week people!

2017 Secondary 2 Week 8 Update

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BB has his common test this week and also got back his Math results. He was quite confident about doing well this time, but when the marks came out, he realised he didn’t do as well as expected. He lost 7 marks to careless mistakes! Now I wonder what his other papers will show up….

GG also got back some marks, she has done much better than expected, except in Maths, which she didn’t do as well as expected. But then, this is the first exam on taking Maths on a higher level, so I am hoping she will do better in the mid-year exam.

I also went for a breakfast and tea session with BB’s school principal in the latter part of the week. There were approximately 40 parents there and what I realised was the overwhelming fear or perhaps the dread that technology has for parents. Most of the questions was relating to cell phone usage by children and the sometimes excessive Whatsapp and messaging as well as the social media usage they had. One takeaway I also had was that I was absolutely right in putting limits in BB & GG’s phone usage as I realise that if I didn’t do this, they would go absolutely out of hand, as some of the other parents have mentioned.

Anyway, planning to take the children out later today, so hope you all also have a good weekend!

2017 Week 7 Update

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Another week and time for another update. Nothing really happened this week except that I walked out of an interview. It’s the first time I did this. 

What happened was that I had applied to two positions in this organisation – one a fairly junior one and one a senior one (more suited to my experience). In the beginning of the week, someone called me asking me if I was still interested in the position and during the call, twice or thrice repeated the question. I found it a bit strange thinking that unless you were interested, you wouldn’t apply, right? Then I realised I had applied for two positions and when I read the job descriptions, I was sure I was being considered for the senior one as the junior one was really very junior. So I prepared for the senior position and went down for the interview. 

There, I found around 4-5 people already waiting and found it weird that they called so many people for an interview at the same time. That was red flag number 1. We were asked to go into a meeting room and there I found that with the exception of one other person, all the others were very young, maybe just out of school or perhaps trying for holiday jobs. That was red flag number 2. Then the HR person came and introduced himself and said it will be a group interview (red flag 3) and I was thrown back to my group discussion interviews after I had graduated, eons ago! Then he asked if anyone knew what the job entailed and mentioned a few things. At this point I knew I was wasting my time and decided to leave. I told the person that since I had applied for more than one position and since their email did did not specify the position, I came here thinking it was for the senior position. I then left there chalking this all up to another experience in the job search process. 

Actually I am this close to just giving up and becoming a SAHM. Interviewers and recruiters who speak to me say I have a very strong resume and experience, but I really don’t know why this is not translating into a decent job. Am I doing something wrong? Perhaps, I need to re-evaluate my search strategy. Lots to think this week.

Hope you all had a much better week than I had. May the coming week be better for all of us! Happy week….

2017 Secondary 2 Week 7 Update

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A very blah week for the children. GG’s common tests were on almost the whole week and she has been studying quite hard for it. She even woke up at 4:30 am one day to study since she can’t stay up at night. 

BB’s common test starts from tomorrow and unlike GG, he only has 5 exams while GG had almost 8. He will sit out the Mother Tongue paper since his school does not offer Hindi. Compared to GG, he has a more lackadaisical attitude towards his studies. He’s more of a “I’ll study at the last minute”type and this really pisses me off. I foresee more showdowns with him as the year continues and especially when he sits for his O levels!

Have a wonderful Sunday!