Recollect

I have a lot of students ranging from aged three to eleven years.  I usually teach at their homes after school.  Most of them are affluent, living in big houses furnished with expensive furnitures and appliances.  Some of them are from the middle-ranged but they still have big houses and plenty of material things.

When I was younger, I do wish for a real-sized piano. It reminds me of home. It was the number of hours I tried playing in my cousin's house even though they were against me using their piano.  The conflicts I had with my cousins and our immaturities at that time will always come back to my memory.

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The high tech CD players and booming sounds from their speakers remind me of home. My dad had a stereo set where we played LP records and listened to the songs of famous singers and later equipping the system with a karaoke component for all night singing.

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Nowadays, television screens are as big as the wall but it was the fun and agony of watching on our black and white TV screen that gave me a fine recollection of home when I was young.  My sister and I would take turns using a long bamboo stick to make the TV button steady as it was already missing.  Once we move, the screen will shut itself off. We watched our favourite cartoons with tired arms.  It was also where we saw our mum on television and learning she played bit roles in some movies.


And when I see a dog, or a pet snake or a chameleon that climbs a planted stick inside the aquarium, it reminds me of my childhood garden and pets.  My pet turtles would always go missing when floods come.  My daily walk with the dogs would be a disaster especially when they wanted to chase people or cats.

All these become remnants of what I remember back home but they are happy memories.  However, it is the familial relationships among my students that I yearn for.  It is the caring, the happy faces, the fights, the jealousy, and the love that makes me long for "home".