Quarantine @ Tiger Lane

So Quarantine for orientation week happened in full force.

No official pictures, other than unofficial snippets form HM, teachers and some from angah.

No outings and visits from parents. But school had planned for coordinated outing to Taman Cempaka, monitored by prefects to familiarise the F1 there.

No call cards given to ensure that no calls could be made to parents. 

It was the strictest as it could.

Come Friday, there was no official news from school. We had snippets from Angah when he was asleep on the first day, and some snippets from Cikgu Shahnun, whom I truly think was done on purpose for new parents. Ustaz Safwan has also been so kind to provide a couple of updates of his training. He's been coming daily without miss, and seemed to be gaining trust from Ustaz. Few parents was hanging outside the school gate on Wednesday and Thursday the first week and that gave us comfort as well. He tried on saxophone, Anep shared to Qaid. Looking back, we were really lucky to a certain extent as well. Despite the strict quarantine, we could still get hold of his well being one way or another. 

Allah works in mysterious way as always. Hubs was supposed to fetch his mom to KL for some checkup the week after. Instead of him picking MIL up midweek, we might as well just do everything that we could in Ipoh while fetching her and do it in the weekend instead. Alhamdulillah it was the best decision ever. Angah had a misfortune in the morning, Aita finally, after being asked, wasn't coping too well. The exact examples that he had shared was, the fact that you need to clear too early for Qiamullail when the activity itself started very late. And in his own words, the only way to make friends is by making people laugh. Both of us cried berjemaah in the car. Our first time, after 2 kids prior. I assured him with all the comfort needed, and he turned out relieved after. We stayed to watch his training run and he seemed to be well after, emotionally recharged. Both kids were emotionally recharged instead. Angah took comfort in the advice we gave him and it put him at ease a bit more. Productive weekend in Ipoh, just 4 days after the initial.

Everything seemed to be fine, until the week after where cross country was held. He secured 16th, not too shabby considering there's MSSM participants and all. Black secured 1st for the categories that my sons were in and 1st overall. Alhamdulillah. The slight training paid off and we know Aita shud be on track to better days. 

A day after people started sharing football friendly pictures. There was no sign of Aita. We turned worried. Asked angah and he assured that Aita didn't come to practice. Ok, at least there's an explanation why. We tried to think of the various reason, was he in any pain after the run. But he seemed to be fine after. Then, after 1 week, I had no choice but to bother Faris, the prefect dorm's again. I had earlier on bothered him to make sure that Aita send his laundry and to check whether he has anything to wear for weekend's inspection. I had no choice but to bother him again. He said Aita had athma attack for few days, the reason why he didn't join Sunday's football. We know he had good excuse, but it's a dog eat dog world there. Especially if you are still at the proving yourself phase. He didn't just miss one training day, he missed a friendly match's day, and a chance to prove his worth. Well, it could have been worse. We hope this is just a one time off thing. And hope he's still in a good track record. 

By Monday, the call card has been distributed to the kids. It's a mark that quarantine period is ending. Alas, no news from Qaisar still. Parents been updating that they've been receiving calls the evening itself and even in the wee morning on Tuesday. We didn't quite mind. No news is good news. Tuesday night was supposed to be Malam Bakat. We had planned to come earlier on but Cikgu Azli's META was so strict, even if you come for the night, no kids were allowed to leave that night itself and have to wait to the next day, just like the others. Hubs were so mad, since usually, there's always some flexibility. We cancelled our plan to come for the night. Right around before 3pm on Tuesday, 27th Jan, we received call from Aita. His first question was, "Papa datang ke malam ni". After hearing this, I straight away uttered a wild suggestion, "Nak pergi tak malam ni". On which of course, it was not a hard decision to make. 

I went back early since the plan was to leave the fastest we could. I stopped by Home Baker @ Clover for some cinnamon rolls. Big box for Aita and friends and small box for Angah. We ended up leaving right before 7 pm. 

No one knew we were coming, not even angah. Right after we entered the hall (quite late, session has started but it was just some kickoff formalities), settled ourselves at the very front, and we informed Angah only then. 

Aita's session started quite late. Angah was already with us then, and updated us that Black's would be boring. I was more anxious on knowing whether Aita would have any role, he said he would just be NPC (non-player character) and whether he would hide behind people and try to avoid from being out there. We were glad to see that he wasn't just a pasu bunga or a prop. He had some dialogs but yes very minimal. He wasn't the one to clear the props at least. He had few scenes assigned. So all was good. I can still recall his face on the stage when he saw us. A very controlled look but I know he was glad that we made it. 

When the announcement was up, we were so glad it wasn't last. Right before announcement for the 3rd, we knew we couldn't hope for anything better cos but it was already good enough that we were ahead of Yellow. So glad that we could settle with 3rd. 

During the last call for all F1 to be on the stage, we were happy to see that we went to front instead of the back. He seemed ok to us. Unlike the first week. And hopefully this will last.