My experience of being in a new school....

It’s tough being a new student in a completely new school. You’ll find it hard to adapt to being in a new environment, especially in an environment so conformist that you just can’t conform to it. I’m different towards the attitudes of the Sri KL students. In my old school SMK Sri Cempaka Cheras, the students are basically people ranging from peace-loving hippies to self-thinking individuals. Most of them discover music from Myspace than hitz.fm, and some of them would know how to beat a game of Halo 3 in just three hours

But would you get the same type of students here in Sri KL? Here, the students listen to mainstream bands like Maroon 5 and Chris Brown rather than indie Myspace musicians like Hadouken or Talib Kweli. Is that a good thing? Well, Maybe. Or maybe not. I have yet to find one Sri KL who listens to Hadouken (And if you’re interested to listen to Hadouken, go their Myspace page now!).

But to me, that’s not a bad thing. Infact, some students here have introduced me to new music like heavy metal and electronic dance music. One student in my class is such a Metalhead, that he inspires me to dig into some heavy metal music from bands like Black Sabbath & Slipknot, while another fellow classmate of mine has such a hard on for DJs like Tiesto and Armin van Buuren, that I completely devoted myself to dance music, and now I have listened to my favourite DJs like Pete Tong, Paul Oakenfold, Alex Kidd and Aphex Twin. I have also learned the Melbourne shuffle, a dance I was pretty much a stranger to before I went to Sri KL.

But today I’m not going to keep on talking about music. I want to continue to talk about being a new student in a new school. And the most important thing about being a new student is getting friends. And getting friends is easy, and conforming to a circle of friends is also easy. But maintaining yourself inside that circle is like the US Army being in Iraq 5 years after the fall of Saddam. It’s really tough, and the tougher it gets, you have no choice but to give up and quit.

You see, when you’re in a new environment, you’d have to surf the waves without falling. And I’ve fallen many times. I’ve embarrassed myself, I made myself look stupid, act rude in front of people, and it’s a really depressing experience. You felt disgraced and looked down upon for your actions.

And so, I’ve decided to quit the circle and be alone for the next few months. I don’t want to join other circles because they all look the same. I decided to only hang out with one or two friends during break or lunch, and sometimes I just eat alone at an empty table. I know it’s sad, but what can I do?

And what’s more sad about being in a new school is being in a class. I seat in the middle of the class, and behind me is a fellow classmate who is quite rude and mean towards. I tried tolerating him for atleast a week, but I just can’t. One classmate of mine is also a newcomer, but the bad thing is that she thinks I’m a “freak’ and bashed the previous school I’ve attended. And one classmate judges a book by its cover when it comes to me, and I felt really unpleasant towards such judgments. And aside from those, I had frequent fights with one classmate whom I can’t stand for months now. He’s quite paranoid, and seems to be quite sensitive whenever I made a remark about him. And some students find me rude and irritating because of my behaviour.

And because of that, I wanted to tell them that I’m sorry for all the mistakes that I’ve done, and I felt terrible for failing to make you guys like me. And In those months of horrible experience, I’ve suffered from depression, loneliness and anxiety as a result. I even had suicidal thoughts when I suffered those months of shame and embarrassments, especially on Thursdays.

However, it’s not really all that bad. This school does have some wonderful things I’ve experienced. The best things about this school are the teachers. They are fun, lovable, and have a great sense of humour. Pn. Kamala, my History teacher is really lovely and fun to interact with. My Science teacher Mr. Austin is hilarious in a mean kind of way, and he kind of resembles most British comedians like Chris Morris and Dylan Moran. And I finally have interests in Economics and Commerce thanks to teachers like Pn. Rosmawati and Pn. Norliza. It’s a wonderful experience having these teachers around.

And another good thing about this school besides music is the newfound individuality I’ve discovered during my first term. Sure, they don’t listen to the same music I do, and maybe they are more interested in American TV shows than most British shows I watch on BBC Entertainment, but atleast I felt free for some reason. I realized that it’s okay to be different than others, as long as I don’t make myself arrogant about it. And thank god, I’m one of the few lucky students who have managed to survive a term of Form 5 in a new school. Most students who took Form 5 SPM in a new school would drop out after 2-4 months after their first day. And I felt lucky because I’m not one of those students because I’m patient enough to survive in my first term being a Sri KL student.

And as the second term has already started, I’ll try my best to keep on until SPM is over, and I’ll make sure that this time, there will be lesser mistakes and embarrassments than those I’ve made during my first term. And if this time it really worked, I’ll probably remember my last and only year in Sri KL as the best year I’ve ever had..