The Past Week

It's been such a long time! I hate it that a lot of my recent posts have started off that way. Well, so there are some valid reasons.

My company organised a careers retreat for senior secondary school students last week. For 1 week, I slept in dorms like I was in school again. Okay, I was never actually a boarder when I was in secondary school and this was a pretty nice school by most standards. The boys and girls' common rooms had air-conditioners and a TV with DVD players for the students. The dormitories and dining rooms also had ACs, so we were living quite well.

I don't often get to spend time with young people of the SS1 - 3 age, so it was an interesting refresher of how things were back in the day. At night, I'd be kept up late by the never-ending chattering of the girls. They talked about school, school-work, clothes, parents and boys (well, perhaps that is somewhat similar to what a lot of grown women I know talk about).

In the morning, it was quite hard work to herd the girls to morning exercises. While the girls would struggle to get up at 7 am and eventually schlep out of the school grounds for a run/walk, the boys would have been up apparently since 6 playing football.

The students represented some of the smartest science students in the state and it was very awe-inspiring to be around them. They were outspoken and ferociously intelligent and asked extremely incisive questions of the speakers who came to talk to them about careers. Although I am, in some cases, (ahem) almost twice their age I felt in some ways quite humbled by them. I wish I hard worked harder at school and had more confidence in my abilities. I loved how they viewed life as an open book, with so many pages yet to be written on - in short, filled with unlimited possibilities and a lifetime of adventures. I frequently have to remind myself to look at my life in the same way.