Gratitude.

I'm grateful for things good and bad that have led me here, and I am constantly moved by the warm, generous gestures of those around me.Today I got an unexpected donation from someone (you know who you are!). It is only because I took his class that I was able to articulate my interests and aggressively cultivate them. I hope he knows how much he's changed my life and also that of countless other students :)

Last Saturday was my last session at APEX (a group of adults both young and young at heart who mentor and tutor P6 madrasah students), and I got the most wonderful farewell speech, flowers, and gifts. All orchestrated by some of the committee members, and I was trying to not cry (too much) from being cluelessly overwhelmed.

And the nicest part of that Saturday was that my students didn't want to leave at all! We had worked on one act of a skit based on 'The Man Who Sold Words' because I just wanted them to relax since they've been studying so hard. After presenting it twice, they kept sitting around me even though I told them they could leave early, because they knew it was my last day with them. I pray they all do well in their exams and turn out to be bright, well-adjusted, and confident teenagers.

One of them reminds me of myself. He has the potential to go so far, but he doesn't see the need to study so hard. In the words of a professor to me in my freshman year, he's "bright but lazy". Those words stuck, and I am always thinking of them when exams come around. Even now I'm not likely to forget it anytime soon - the weakest have to work the hardest.