Man…..I probably deserved it.
Looking at how my elder son is now in a Private School, I didn’t need this teacher’s Chinese school methods of teaching anymore. So, lasts Saturday, I suggested to her that we end the sessions. She said that I needed to give her one month’s notice. But to me, since it wasn’t working and school started already, what I did was try to negotiate with her.
“We come to a compromise lah. You give Joshua 4 more lessons instead of 8 and I pay you half month fee, can?”
She said, “But you should tell me earlier lor. This way, how can I survive now? I have to look for other students to take up his place”
I paused then said, “I am sorry about that but we came to the decision quite suddenly. I think half a month is OK to look for new student to take up your slot”
She seems a bit angry at this point. Can’t blame her but you cannot blame me as well mah. Joshua hates her teaching style which includes a bit of a ‘Woi! Concentrate! I ask you to write here lah, not there! Why can’t you listen to me wan?” If she continues to teach Joshua this way, then I would be wasting my money, Joshua wasting his time.
So, I negotiate lor.
Then she said, “OK, I compromise with you lah. I give your son 4 more lessons but on condition that you pay me today”
“Erm….OK”
I kow-tim pay her liao and after the lesson, she just ciao-ed like that….without informing me or anything like that. Usually she will tell me that she’s done and is leaving.
Today, Saturday, I call her after lunch which is when the tuition is supposed to happen lah, rite? After an hour went by, I suspected that I got screwed sideways liao. Instead of using my normal handphone to call her, I used my second number to call her….the personal number that I try not to reveal to anyone especially for work purposes. Hee hee hee….
She picked up the phone.
“Hi! Miss Ng. Are you coming?”
Toot. Toot. Toot. She hang up wor!!!!
Tiu. (Cantonese for fuck)
Breathe, Marsha, breathe……
I was kind of a little sad when I read the news about this - there will be no live-in Indonesian maids in Malaysia anymore . There are pros and cons to having a live-in maid, as with everything else, but for us, we enjoyed more pros than cons. Back then, when my kids were little, we brought in a family of maids to help with...well, just about everything, and we were like two families merged into one. They ate what we ate, we sleep, they sleep, we shop, they shop, they joke, we laugh, we joke, they laugh...for me, the maid I hired was more like a sister and side-kick to me. For that few years, I was dependent on her to mind-read my schedule and when I need or don't need help. She picked things up quickly and we ended up having lots of moments whereby we were in sync. Today, two of them are on my Facebook and we were gleefully chatting over Facebook Messenger since they've just discovered the wonders of the Internet and Social Media. Since we were more like partners in crim...
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