Letting it go
Tessa Wong wrote an article in the papers a few days ago about how asking someone "which school were you from" reeks of elitism and is blatantly myopic. Her argument is that the person she was then is no indication of the person she is now, especially when she would have done and experienced more things since (I paraphrase, of course).
My opinion has always been that your teenage years are the formative years of your life, where you learn the values, morals, and even habits that will stay with you for the rest of your life (or if not, a damn long time at the very least). While I do not make it a point to ask people I've met for the first time where they're from for the purposes of schema-ing (yes, another word I just verb-ed), I have been able to guess, more often than not with a fair amount of accuracy, which school they came from. Apart from a personal prejudice against a certain school (to borrow a phrase from one of my juniors: "The best is yet to be. Wait long long"), the "quirks" and traits that allow me to identify their sec school are just that: quirks and traits. It may be in the way they speak, how they carry themselves, etc, but it's just that and nothing more. Certainly not indicative of whether the person is good, bad, nice, or all-round asshole. Stupidity and assholism are universal, I always say.
But I digress.
The point of this whole post stems from a recent and, I'm ashamed to say, not uncommon line of conversation I had with DRN about sec school acquaintances. True, there were people I liked and certainly didn't like in school. There were people whom I respected and others I wouldn't have given the time of day to. But that was more than a decade ago and such opinions, no matter how strong they might have been then, are best consigned to the past where they belong. An asshole then could very well be a good friend now and vice versa. God knows we've all changed a lot since, and with the whole "do onto others" thing, I wouldn't want someone to judge me on how I was like then. I'm fairly certain I'm quite different now and I'm also quite certain I didn't change as much as most people.
Maybe the person I didn't like then was going through a rebellious stage. Maybe he was just being cheeky. Maybe he took longer to mature. It shouldn't and doesn't matter. At the end of the day, if he was a sec school mate, he was an SA boy and, really, how bad could that ever be, eh?
P.S. and a side note of thanks to DRN for once again showing me how I can be a better person. Your patience, unceasing generosity, and understanding of people are an inspiration. I think between getting smacked by you and NDR (my other moral compass) whenever I goof up, well...ouch. :P
My opinion has always been that your teenage years are the formative years of your life, where you learn the values, morals, and even habits that will stay with you for the rest of your life (or if not, a damn long time at the very least). While I do not make it a point to ask people I've met for the first time where they're from for the purposes of schema-ing (yes, another word I just verb-ed), I have been able to guess, more often than not with a fair amount of accuracy, which school they came from. Apart from a personal prejudice against a certain school (to borrow a phrase from one of my juniors: "The best is yet to be. Wait long long"), the "quirks" and traits that allow me to identify their sec school are just that: quirks and traits. It may be in the way they speak, how they carry themselves, etc, but it's just that and nothing more. Certainly not indicative of whether the person is good, bad, nice, or all-round asshole. Stupidity and assholism are universal, I always say.
But I digress.
The point of this whole post stems from a recent and, I'm ashamed to say, not uncommon line of conversation I had with DRN about sec school acquaintances. True, there were people I liked and certainly didn't like in school. There were people whom I respected and others I wouldn't have given the time of day to. But that was more than a decade ago and such opinions, no matter how strong they might have been then, are best consigned to the past where they belong. An asshole then could very well be a good friend now and vice versa. God knows we've all changed a lot since, and with the whole "do onto others" thing, I wouldn't want someone to judge me on how I was like then. I'm fairly certain I'm quite different now and I'm also quite certain I didn't change as much as most people.
Maybe the person I didn't like then was going through a rebellious stage. Maybe he was just being cheeky. Maybe he took longer to mature. It shouldn't and doesn't matter. At the end of the day, if he was a sec school mate, he was an SA boy and, really, how bad could that ever be, eh?
P.S. and a side note of thanks to DRN for once again showing me how I can be a better person. Your patience, unceasing generosity, and understanding of people are an inspiration. I think between getting smacked by you and NDR (my other moral compass) whenever I goof up, well...ouch. :P
