When were we in Sec 3 again? Five, six years ago? It feels like it was only yesterday that we were still in SAS, enjoying the wild, rebellious teenage years 
I think the teachers hated 3B. We were such a notorious bunch. But most of us have turned out pretty well, I think. Haha. That picture was taken a few days ago when we visited the school, and found our old classroom empty. The current class was probably in the lab or something, and we quickly took advantage of the situation to snap a few pictures for nostalgia’s sake.
Most of the teachers who taught us are still around, although quite a few have left already. It was great catching up with some of them, and we interrupted a few classes. It used to be that we were those students sitting in the class, and saw former students come to the school to visit; it’s a role reversal.
The school looks so different now, after the renovations. It’s a lot nicer, granted, and it’s like, we could really have used some of those changes when we were still in school! There are new labs, the library has undergone an upgrade, the staff room shifted, the school hall’s tiles changed..
Mrs. Anil roped us in to talk to her primary 5 kids about where we were now, and just sort of give advice on what they have to do if they wanted to choose their future career paths. So there we were, standing in front of 40 primary 5 kids.
As we went down the line and introduced ourselves, talked about what we were doing, and where we are now, I looked at their faces and thought, “Gosh. That was me – once upon a time.”
I look at their faces and think back to us, when we were in primary 5. What did we know of then? We were carefree and innocent, living under our parents’ discipline, protected and sheltered. We knew nothing of life. We were just a bunch of 10-year-old kids growing up, only just learning to find our feet, and barely begun the journey of self-discovery (or losing ourselves) in the process of growing up.
I look at their faces and thought of all the things that they have yet to experience in life… dealing with friendships, that chasm that sometimes comes between even the closest of friends (yeah, that person you call your best friend in primary school?); dealing with parents, and eventually learning that they sometimes really are wiser and better than you after all; first relationships, the trivial ups and downs of the teenage life… Seriously, some of those things we agonized over back in high school – were they really that important??
I guess coming back each year, and just catching up with everyone, seeing how everyone has grown in their own way, changed (for better or worse), makes you realize certain things every time.
There’s an innocence that we can never return to anymore. That little girl sitting in the classroom ten years ago could never be able to fathom the same girl sitting right here, typing this out now, ten years later.
But this girl is thankful for everything she went through, whether it was a good or bad experience. This is where I am now, this is the person I have become. I might change ten years down the road, who knows – but I know the person I am right now.
And I wouldn’t want to change that for anything else.
