13 September, 2003
A Day for CIP (Community Involvement)
23:11:23 | School Life | 
Had to crawl out of bed at around 9:30am today, which is considered quite early for me especially on a lovely Saturday Morning. I wonder what had possessed me to sign up for CIP during the holidays, but that is the only thing I can do in order to meet up with 6 hours requirement set by the Ministry Of Education. Erica decided to join Swee Hua, Hui Hoon, Hui Ting and I, for the first time and it was really enjoyable having her around.
The area we were assigned to as Tanah Merah, but the place was deserted when we got there. So we headed to Bugis where there was plenty of competition. Students from Serangoon Junior College, Chung Cheng High and Cedar Girls Secondary School were also involved in the flag day, and so many of them had chosen Bugis as their location. They had practically covered every spot of Bugis by the time we got there, but Erica and I found a nice spot beside a temple where there were relatively fewer volunteers to “fight with”. We worked and worked until our tins were completely full to an extent that my arms hurt just by carrying it.
Majority of the people who I had approached were generous. However, a selected few just dao-ed (Translation: To ignore and shun) me when I approached them. There was one point where I approached this rich-looking lady who was carrying an umbrella. She daintily opened her handbag, slowly removed her wallet, made a big show of displaying her credit cards, took out a 50 cent coin and daintily placed the coin in the tin in a way where her fingertips wouldn’t make contact with the tin (and me). Then, she glanced at me, batted her eyelids and pranced away from where I was.
Gag me…
However, I was rather ill prepared to answer any questions regarding the association which I was collecting donations for. Here is the conversation between another lady and myself.
Lady: What is this for?
Brenda: This is for the Singapore Heart Foundation.
Lady: Singapore Heart Foundation shi lai zuo she me?
[Translation: What does this organisation do?]
Brenda: Ta men shi lai zao gu na xie you xin bing de ren.
[Translation: This organisation helps to look after patients with heart problems (What I was actually trying to say)]
Lady (puzzled): Xin Bing???
[I wondered for a moment and realised that "xin bing" actually meant "heartbroken patients"]
Brenda: Oops… wo de yi shi jiu shi lai zao gu na xie you xin zhang bing de ren.
[Translation: I meant, to look after those patients with heart failure]
Good grief… This is a warning signal which tells me to brush up on my Chinese ASAP!
C O M M E N T S (8)
Good grief… you messed up big time! Haha… nevermind… can read, write and speak more chinese to improve. *wink*
Speak more Chinese?
Good grief… I would just embarass myself more… :x
Heeheehee…
“Heartbroken Patients” LOL!
No la… chinese not that bad :p Just need to improve! That’s all
lol.. i guess you should have done some “research” beforehand, yah? lol.. when i did flag day, i was doing for some anglican hospital.. and i was totally “blur” about what they did.. X_x” thank goodness not many people asked me.. or else i would have just died on the spot. :P
Flag day is tiring man!! Bugis tends to be a popular area, I agree…I remember how the last time I did Flag Day I practically had to smile all the time and ask sweetly, “Excuse me, would you like to make a donation?” Hehx :P
Yup! The key thing is to smile more. Then people will feel more compelled to donate :p
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LOLc that convo with the ladyfs funny!!! Ugh I have to brush up on my Chinese too or I wonft be able to communicate with my aunts and uncles when I go back to Malaysia and Sfpore!