School STARTS Tomorrow!

This year, the school term is starting a week earlier.... Not only that, school day will be 30 minutes longer now. When they first announced it, lots of hoo-hah from the angmoh moms and moms of little kids. I, on the other hand, welcomed it in a way. Okay. Granted. The traffic is the killer. But I think the kids do need the extra time to cover everything in the curriculum.

Starting tomorrow.... I have TWO in the Secondary school. No more visiting the Primary school. S1 will now be in Year 10, i.e. he will be taking his iGCSE examinations in May/June 2013. And my S2 starts Year 7.

I had to run to the bank to pay their school fees last Friday (deadline is Monday. Otherwise they charge interest! Darned school!). I have to say that I have never carried so much cash in my life! At the counter, the guy was like "did you confirm?". I was like "Ah??". And he said that above a certain $$ have to confirm. Confirm what I don't know. Then he went off to ask his superior if he could proceed with the transaction. I had a whole list of errands to run and I certainly was not going to carry the $$$ USDs in my handbag! Thank goodness his superior said okay.

I tell you... only in this country that they are soooooooo particular with the notes. They will only accept the USDs in a certain H series and up. And the notes must be crisp. No folds. No tears. No blah blah blah. The guy actually CARESSED every single bill. No joke.

I had a note that is really 'charnn' and that one they totally did not want it. No need any CARESSING. After CARESSING 204 pieces of the notes, he said that I had TWO bad notes. I was like "so what does that mean?? Those came directly from Citibank". They were surprised that Citibank had BAD notes. Seriously, the notes look okay and crisp. But like I said, he was CARESSING it like nobody's business... and found that the little silver strip on the side is 'broken'. So what it means is that I have to pay USD 3 per BAD note. Damn cut-throat. So... I had to pay an extra USD 6 for them to accept the two pieces of BAD notes. .... ONLY in this country that the USDs must be like newly-minted.
In America, even if the note is damn 'charnn' and had SHIT, also good as gold.

I tell you ah... I damn 'simm thia' man.... especially when I am not exactly satisfied with the academic quality of the school. Pay so much, and still not as expected. *Sigh*
We told S1 that since we are paying school fees now, perhaps he should think of going to a better school in one of the countries that the Ah Ees reside (England? Australia?). But he doesn't want to, of course. His friends are all here... plus he is still a bit young, hor?

Anyway, there are two more terms of fees to pay. And each time I have to do this, I will moan and groan.