Timetabling woes and other stuff

Today might just rank as no. 1 of The Top 10 Most Pointless Days of 2005. Let's see...most Tuesdays are usually pointless anyway. It's the day I spend more time waiting for classes to start than actually attending something useful. Here is my normal Tuesday timetable:

0740-0840: Geog lecture
0840-0940: Lit tutorial
0940-1110: break
1110-1210: ct
[which is a sort of form teacher's period for all the admin and occasional enrichment things]
1210-1340: GP
1545-1800max: Geog lecture

Today's pointless timetable:

0740-0840: Geog lecture
1210-1340: GP

That's it. Yup. I've to wait 4hrs for a lesson. Yay. The 2nd geog lect was cancelled because the tutor is sick. Ah well. I've got the whole day to do revision and homework. I expect I should somehow feel happy...hey...there is also free internet!
Right. somehow I had an ominous feeling that today was going to be a day of pointlessness.

See. My day began with this announcement at assembly: "I will now read out to you students a message from the principal of a certain sec sch...So went on the message...blah blah blah. It was abt some J1 from my JC who had yanked two misbehaving sec students back to thier school to be dealt with. The mesage ended with a grand and ostentatious praise of this J1 - 'I congratulate him on his moral courage..." in the hope that all of you should emulate him and bring glory to our JC. Oh yes.

I cannot help but think that the congratulatory email was slightly out of place. Praise for reporting on misbehaving students? I've this impression that it is like praising someone for being nosy. It is silly to magnify the litle things in life. If we were to go on glorifying the little things in life whose true merits are dubious I shudder to think what will happen to us. Oh let's trumpet gloriously on about our 'clean & green' environment. May I know why it is so clean and green? Oh. It's because no one dares to litter for fear of that $10000 fine.

Things like reminding others of proper behaviour and disposing litter responsibly are things that are EXPECTED. Just because someone reported the students doesn't mean it is right because the sch think it is. I just can't help thinking that the J1 should have just told off the students. Was there really a need to report them? Of course there is the issue of the degree of misbehaviour - was it just being noisy? Or vandalism? Or something worse like harrassing the public? Whatever it was, punishment does not change such behaviour overnight. Instilling fear only makes one cynical and rebellious. And maybe, that's what I am.