my Sharona and hopefully not lost in translation

I couldnt help but bop my head to the beat of Ma ma ma myyyy sharona on Red 104.9 on the way back from work. The drivers from the opposite side saw me and suddenly bopped their heads too (I know, it sounds so like a Ben Stiller movie or some 30rock episode but that really happened, seriously..).

The day started with a gasp (takut lambat) and a smile (sebab belum lambat.. lagi..). The usual salam ritual with my parents for blessings and I was off to work. I wanted to make today a kick a** day. so I was hyped up with a lot of positive energy around. The morning class with the degree students was alright. Teaching 15 students in a class is manageable (when 14 of them are female students.. and I was singing Paula Cole's where have all the cowboys gone?).

After class, I was approached by a some sort of a Sabahan student who wanted to see me personally for some personal reason. After hearing his story, I said it was okay to enter my class. See, he has a low grade point average and judging from the way he speaks, I guess he is a changed person and is willing to work hard. As long as he has the will, I will too try my best to help him.

The interesting part of the day started in the afternoon with my foundation students. For this semester, I have 6 foundation students consist of 3 Malays, 2 Indians and 1 Chinese. Very muhibbah. I have even planned for them a treasure hunt or some sort of Explorace as one of their assignments. But as I entered the class today, on top of my Muhibbah students, I saw 3 international students. I thought I was in the wrong class. so I stepped out of the class for abit and later on realized that WAS my class. Ok, so no big deal. just 3 Sudanese students. So I had a brief ice breaking session with them and then came another 2. It felt really international when 3 other Sudanese joined the class. Turns out all of them changed courses so that they had to take Statistics.

I have to say, I enjoyed today's class. It was some experience. Studying with international students is very much different as to teaching them. They might get lost in translation. However, I could see that they concentrated in class and were really active compared to our local students. They even made casual jokes with me and actually understood MY jokes :) [ok, you should understand that it is very difficult to crack a joke with students without being offensive but friendly yet accepted and proper ones] And suddenly, from being very much muhibbah, we were very much international.. They also mananged to guess my age right (darn it).

After explaining to them. I asked, "Fahim tum?" and they answered "fahim tum" kot?
And again I asked "la musykil ?" So they figured, I could speak arabic (thanks to my dad's perseverance in studying Arabic, I can throw a couple of phrases). And one of them started to speak Arabic to me.. And I confidently nodded while saying "Na'am.. na'am"
I could see that he figured I was just saying that when I saw him turning to his friend and said something with a question mark kinda tone. And by the looks of his gestures, I think he said "did she understand what I was saying?" ahahaha... And apparently my name is a precious stone or pearl in Arabic if pronounced Durrah.. How cool is that ?

At the end of the class, one of them came up to me and said,
"Very nice lecture. Thank you Miss". No amount of bonuses or part time income could compete the feeling of having a student saying that to you. Indeed very rewarding. It may be a simple phrase but it means a lot to a person. And sometimes you might see your lecturers make that straight face but deep down inside, you have no idea how you make his/her day by saying that. I guess it goes the same way if you express your gratitude to someone. It makes them feel appreciated. So I resolve to say Thank you and mean it more often now :)

Perhaps what I was thinking in my head earlier while driving to work was right. Life is journey. You never know what's ahead of you. You can prepare yourself. Sometimes when you take a turn, you hope for no bumps and no jams. But even when you endure a jam and or bumps, you can always enjoy the journey with some great songs to make you feel happy, wonderful thoughts and never the least, prayers to keep you safe, Insya Allah.

Wish me luck for my challenging challenge this semester.. again.. The class was fun and I hope to maintain that environment for the whole semester and for as long as I am in this industry, InsyaAllah.. Guess I'm gonna have to add up Arabic on top of German language now.. hehehe I enjoy learning languages :)

Winona Ryder, her haircut and everything else in Reality Bites is just so cool.. Enjoy Ma ma ma my sharona.. this had resulted in me bopping my head for about a minute.. you might bop to it too hehe