A picture of the shoplots near Uptown Damansara nabbed from the Internet. We used to study and stay in a few blocks of the same shoplots...
Greetings earthlings. Time to start reminiscing again. Continued from the posting
Remembering the "A" Level college days. How I got the nickname Fly! made a week ago. Before that, just take note. A friend commented that we did our college orientation week at Section 6 in Shah Alam, not Section 2 as mentioned in the posting. This friend also noted some happenings involving other friends which I have totally forgotten... and it's when I looked back at the article did I remember, we shared the same orientation and temporary rooms with the TESL (those slated to take up university level course for Teaching of English as a Second Language) guys and girls. So that amounts to around 600 of us having to suffer the week there as the TESL people far outnumbered the A Level folks by having twice our number!
Anyway, soon enough the orientation was done and it's time for some serious fun. While the TESL guys had to stay behind in Shah Alam, I think at Section 18 or something, in some PKNS flats (behind fences to boot!), we the A Level people got to move to Damansara Utama where the regular shoplots there became our classrooms and dorms. Not only there's no fences around, there's plenty of entertainment and night-life to boot including pubs and snooker parlours!
This was where our college life got a real fine kickstart and the whole popularity game (chasing girls and getting to enjoy the skirts, know what I mean and such) got off to a whole new level. But first, let's get down to earth. Let's get to the soonest arrangement upon reaching there, of settling down in a room and becoming room-mates for at least the next one year or so...
I think's there's a total of nearly 30 rooms for the guys and slightly less for the girls. Hmm. Perhaps that included the rooms for the seniors, the guys and girls of Batch 6 while me and my mates, the class of 1988 are of Batch 7.
OK. I got into room 51 C. The inmates were (let me just mention the nicknames unless there's none ya) Nash, Fique, Atoque, Adik, Amirul, Apeq, Jim, John, King, Mangor, Salleh, Tonga, Rashes, Zain, Mutt and. Hmm... I think Paqua was also in the same room. OK, that makes 17 of us right? Unless I've forgotten someone, please tell. Anyway, on the whole every room in the A Level PPP/ITM college at Damansara Utama housed about 15 to 20 inmates. So there...
That by the way is the division by rooms. The next was division by classrooms...
Overall, the A Level people could be divided into the arts and science stream students following the system from school followed by the choices made for our intended degree program and how we fare during the SPM examinations in Form Five. Except for those chosen to go straight to the United Kingdom under the BTU (British Top University programmes), we were practically the cream of the crop of the whole Malaysian educations system and that's no exaggeration! Among us where the best from the top residential schools like Malay College in Kuala Kangsar, Perak and Kolej Tunku Kursiah in Seremban, Negeri Sembilan or the top regular schools like Victoria Institution in Kuala Lumpur and Sri Aman in Petaling Jaya.
I myself was among those called for the BTU interviews. Not that my SPM results were great... I got a total aggregate of 14 while most of those who got called made aggregates of 6, notwithstanding the fact that I hardly studied for the exams. In fact after fighting with dad, I ran away from home during the SPM itself but managed to attend the exams while bunking at a friend's place in Muar for several days!
Perhaps it was my good results in Mathematics that qualified me to be called for the BTU interviews. Nevertheless I didn't make the final cut but getting called for the interview means you would at least qualify for the A Level PPP/ITM program without any further processing, that is you would automatically get to do the A Levels locally before flying overseas.
You see, the standard of those who made the cut for the BTU interview was so high that anyone regardless of how well they did in the interview would qualify to go straight for studies in Canada if they chose to do so! Remember, this was in 1988 and they were just starting the programme. So anyone who volunteered for Canada would make it immediately. Still, as far as I remember none of us, about 50 plus or so who were called for the interview (or was it closer to 100 people?) wanted to go there. All of us wanted to go the UK.
Oh... now I remember. After getting my SPM results, I actually applied to go to the United States to do either Mathematics or Engineering but got called up for the BTU interview instead. So having failed in making the cut, I got into the A Level programme soon enough...
Now, as I said before, except for the BTU guys, we were all the cream of the crop. We were considered a step above the rest that should any of us fail in our exams at any stage during the A Levels programmes, we would automatically qualify to study at ITM (now known As UiTM)!
Oh, what about those who studied under the American degree programme (preparing to go to US) or the Australian programme? Well, it's not too much too say that in the popularity and intelligent stakes among those preparing to go overseas, we were considered the best! Then there's the TESL guys who were preparing to study locally under lecturers from overseas but that is another story...
Back to the division by classrooms. So we have the major division of arts stream versus science stream. The arts stream people were basically divided into those who studied for accountancy and those for law. The science stream into civil, electrical engineering and such. In between were those who opted for the odd subjects such as acturial science and I am among the odd ones. I think apart from me, there's probably only 2 or 3 who intended to take degrees in Mathematics!
The choice of subjects divided my roommates into a few classrooms. If I remember correctly, the ones in the same class with me, class J were Mangor, Tonga and Jim. Anyway, the college population immediately gells into groups. Some were people who have known each other since early school days, some clicked with each other during the orientation days and after...
I noticed among the best well-known guy groups were the ones with Auk (ex- Alam Shah boarding school boy) with his roomates and surrounding groups of ex-MCKK guys (known also as Koleg boys) and ex- SDAR (Sekolah Datuk Abdul Razak Seremban if I remember correctly!) guys. Then there's us the 51C guys. Yes, we were quite popular especially among the girls...
With that I end this second installment (or is it third?) of "Remembering the 'A' Level college days". For the next one, I think we will talk about the out-of-college exploits including those at the discos and what happened with the girls... as and whenever I feel like it ya, cheers! :]
And so we arrived at the coastline...
A few yards to the right and there's this hut with some people resting around. Apparently they've camping there for the last 3 days or so. That's where we learnt, we have arrived at the parts of Tanjung Tuan known as Pulau Intan!
An interesting looking tree...
Now, Pulau Intan could be literally translated as "diamond island". If this is Pulau Intan, then where's the island? All we saw was an extension of land from Tanjung Tuan. Or perhaps this area is an island during high tide? Hmm...
Whatever, we decided to press on...
Climbed this small hill...
Hmm... It's pretty high actually...
My buddy cum cameraman Zaidi @ PerpatihTulus found something interesting on top of the small hill...
Oh my God! It is a lonely grave out on no man's land!
The inscription says here lies a certain woman who died in 1960... Hmm... Why buried here? That is the mystery...
My cousin Nizam wanted to explore the area further...
Ah. The end of the land...
And down there lies the furthermost tip of Tanjung Tuan!
Of course we had to go down there. Here is a view from there... Of the main hill of Tanjung Tuan with the historical lighthouse on top. Cheers! :]
