Age Does Not Matter
Two decades ago i was such a broken kid with nothing in her hands to pursue for the future. With the death of my mother in her age of 40s, it collapsed my plan to build a future in life with her as my centre of the universe. At tender age of 12 I had to stired away the direction of my life from something into nothingness.
These gloomy stages stopped until the day I met my English's teacher. If you were from my era than you recalled clearly that English subject would be given only after a student was in 7th grade. At that time i was so awestruck with the way my teacher taught us. I felt the hollow inside my heart was started to be filled in with a reason to go on with life. That Allah had given me another purpose in life by learning something that in the end would help me in freeing the bars inside myself.
That was the first eyes' opener experience that I got by learning English with *Ibu Cantik. I had to write her name that way because of my short memory's problem. My brain gets mix up easily about faces, names or numbers. But i could tell you all about her. Ibu Cantik who was my saviour in need.
Ibu Cantik was such a prim and proper lady. She exhibited the meaning of dress for success till the end. Maybe that was one of my reasons to respect her besides her ways in teaching. She never underestimated us for not knowing the new things or new vocabularies, though she might loose her patient when we did not submit the assignment without good reason. She gave us the reasons to love this foreign language from her love toward it. Somehow it shown clearly whenever she spoke in front of the class. She was always in time to teach us. No matter it was rain or dry, she would be there to teach us with her regal pose.
At that time I just went gaga with her antics attire; stood in front of the class every single day with a long sleeve button up white starch blouse tucked inside her long skirt. With her straight posture supported by a pair of ankle boots and a twist hair accompanied her appearance, I felt like coming to the stage of *Little House in The Praire movie's set.
And if you thought her appearance would make the naughtiest student wet their pants, it was not wrong. She did give a new meaning of discipline and punctuality. But somehow her antics and straight forward ways in teaching gave me a new hope to be like her. Maybe not in the appearance or teaching, but in the way she gave me new purpose, hope and reason to fight for my future. I wanted to give a purpose for students or people in learning English.
In her senior age, Ibu Cantik was succeed in transfering her positive energies toward a young teen like me. In her profesional ways she gave us her students some insights in life about working with your heart is equal with profesionalism.
Now after some years I learned and made people love English, I felt that my debts to her might not be ble to be with anything. I owed her a lot for my life now. Allah The Merciful did give me a second chance in life to meet an inspirational person like her. Unfortunately my Junior High school now was closed and to trace her whereabouts was a little bit difficult. Though it was not impossible.
And after some times dealing with my profesion, I experienced a stale stage with my amanah. Luckily I met Qq. A young woman from Jombang who gave me a lot of lessons in life as much as someone within my age could give. Qq was a daughter of florist in one of traditional markets in Jombang. With the up and down situation in the market, and 4 siblings including her to support, it was almost impossible to gain everything easily. Thus why she groveled and struggled to get all the scholarship in studying in UNESA while she was working subhanallah.
I met her when she was still in UNESA. She took her lessons there while working herself in the same LBB that i worked with when i took my profesional's hiatus from working in famous English Institution. Qq's beauty might not be as sophisticated lady in appearance like Ibu Cantik, at that time. But they do have a lot of things in common. They love what they do. And they do anything for it. She oozes the willingness to share and cleverness in abundance. So we stick together until now.
For now I just try as much as I could to spread her love toward English and encourage people to love it also. Since with this language i feel free to explore my pains, happiness and dreams though those things might be taboo in Bahasa or in Javanese language.
Notes :
* Ibu Cantik - A beautiful lady
* Little Housse on the Praire - a TV's series by Michael Landon and melissa Gilbert. Its about an American's family life in the 1870s - 1880s.
