The shifting sands of the Sahara are now but a distant memory.
And the bruises on Miss Loi’s butt from the camel ride have finally recovered.
All that’s left now is for Miss Loi to reflect on her long journey three weeks ago, when she rented this rickety car
and took her tentative first steps into a whole new world, like a Sec One student’s first day in a new secondary school.
A step into the vast unknown …
where things were a little different.
She found herself drowning in a sea of strangers
and missing the food back home,
On a journey along a road that can sometimes be winding,
sometimes rocky,
and at times fraught with obstacles.
A journey where she crossed the highest mountains,
traversed the deepest gorges,
and passed ancient cities.
A journey where some days were cheerily colourful.
Some days spectacular.
And some nights … umm … cold.
A journey where friends were made,
and seemingly insurmountable dunes, looming before them like a series of y = ax1/n (a > 0, n > 0) curves, were conquered.
Only because Miss Loi picked the ones with the lowest values of a and n 
And whenever Miss Loi contrived to get herself hopelessly lost,
an oasis was always nearby to cool her down and help her figure out the right direction to hold the map.
Now that we’ve come to the sunset of our journey,
it’s time to take a moment to think about your journey from Sec One to your O Levels, before some of you prepare your supply of tissue paper for today’s 2pm ceremony:
How many mountains have you conquered?
How many gorges have you traversed?
How many stretches of rocky roads have you travelled?
How many seemingly-insurmountable dunes have loomed before you?
How often were you lost?
How many times did you turn back and walked away when you encountered each of the above?
And after this may you find it easier to look your most loved/hated teacher in the eye when it’s your turn to stand before him/her, since the final judgment would’ve then already been passed by you, for the only person who can really judge you on Judgment Day is yourself.
In any case, no matter what the outcome is, be comforted that you have simply done your best and let this be a celebration of an end to an epic journey since Sec One.
And in true Jφss Sticks tradition, Miss Loi shall repeat the same thing she said last year, last, last year and last, last, last year:
One exam simply does not determine your entire future and what you do in your lifetime.
For there’s still a long road ahead, where taller mountains, deeper gorges, rockier roads and softer dunes await all of us.
P.S. That last photo is actually a sunrise pic.
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Miss Loi is a full-time private tutor in Singapore specializing in O-Level Maths tuition. Her life's calling is to eradicate the terrifying LMBFH Syndrome off the face of this planet. For over 19 years she has been a savior to countless students ... 
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2009 GCE O-Level Results – True Faith
(5)The chorus of this New Order song filled their minds as they paused before their school gates, some dressed to the nines in the latest fashion statements that mocked at their school rules, others with freshly highlighted/rebonded hair (that would’ve fail the most lenient of hair checks) flailing gently in the afternoon breeze.
Those gates … which were once seemingly bathed in a dazzling light of hope at the start, gateways to glorious paths that were paved with gold.
Those same gates … which in the past 4-5 years had somehow turned into ugly, dilapidated entrances. Entrances to years of poor grades, and years of always panicking before exams, …
years of failures, …
years of having ‘never passed before’, …
years of condemnation, of threats, of suspensions and of ‘being nearly kicked out of school’, …
years of ‘hopelessness’, …
years of living with a terrifying disease, …
years of F9s, E8s, D7s, and constantly changing tutors, …
five years of chronic underachievement, …
and for several Special Ones, years of suffering lethal combinations of the above (mentioned here as Miss Loi is SUPER PROUD of your achievements as a result of your efforts in the face of immense adversity)
.
.
.
And so on a certain Monday afternoon, these students, 59% (of all 2009 double-Maths students) / 94% (of all 2009 single-Maths students) of whom first pounded on The Temple Gates months ago to ‘proudly’ present Miss Loi with their F9/E8/D7 failing grades …
… now proudly faced their (ex-)school gates, with *77%/87% of them having achieved at least a 4-grade jump, and *78%/73% attaining a Distinction and a minimum grade of B4 respectively, and with 100% having attained their passes and improved on their grades.
*% of 2009 double-maths batch / % of 2009 single-maths batch
These students, The Children of The Temple, most of whom were unwanted, unloved, uncared for by the subject (or was it the other way round?) and most of whom managed to ‘fail with flying colours’ Miss Loi’s stringent (anti-industry practice) entry test (to the chagrin of all straight-A students in disguise who were found out and turned away), now suddenly find the same gates before them glowing like they did 4-5 years ago.
As they walked/strutted/sashayed their way towards the radiant, blinding light that is their White Gates of Salvation, gateways to their new paths, their futures that are now paved with gold, it’s been a pleasure for Miss Loi & The Temple once again to have played a part (however small & last-minute) in your epic journey.
At the end of the day, however, it’s through YOUR OWN EFFORTS that you reap what you sow.
To those of you who may be regretting this and that or still feeling emo about “if only I had done this and that …”, do understand that, regardless of the results that you have, the game has once again been reset/rebooted/restarted and that everyone from the top scorers to those with the poorest of the poor grades will start with a clean slate once more, for mighty kings have become paupers and paupers became kings and foreign mercenary cyborgs will head home, thus
For your future is always in your grasp and it’s up to you to make the best of it, though sometimes you just needed a bit of LASIK surgery to see that the gates and paths before you have always been bathed in light and gold.
P.S. This long overdue post should have been done a week earlier but things have been crazy ever since Miss Loi came back from her trip