Basket.

That's right, it's Death Note in the style of The Simpsons. One of the best-done things I've seen in a while, and for some reason I couldn't stop laughing on initially seeing it.

Speaking of well-done things, or the reverse of such rather, I have thirty-four essays currently sitting on my desk in school which I suspect I shall soon have to do something about.

I'm supposed to have forty-one. As Shuang Ning suggests, signs of being overworked and underpaid loom. Now I am in the shoes of all the teachers who ever yelled at me and my classmates for not handing up work, on time or ever.

More than ever though, I'm becoming my past teachers, and not the nice ones. I always thought that, as a teacher, I would be really nice because I never liked being under strict teachers myself and could understand how the students felt. It has not turned out that way, and my realisation is, having people talking and laughing at each other during your lesson is really, really irritating. So is people not paying attention and/or giving the answer "I don't know". I didn't think I would ever hate that phrase more, such that I now banish everyone who answers me with it to remaining in a standing position until I get a satisfactory answer and/or the lesson ends, whichever comes first.

Unexpectedly I've also turned out to be quite a stickler for the rules, although, again, I thought I wouldn't. It irritates me when students give me a half-assed greeting in class with some of them still seated at the back thinking I can't see them. I usually make them do it all over again, and the same for the "thank you" at the end of every lesson. In my school days I never liked teachers being picky about this but now I supposed I can understand things from their point of view.

So, it's been quite a journey of self-discovery. That said, I'm probably now the kind of teacher none of you ever liked and actually intensely hated during your school days.

Fittingly, today I got my first groan of agony, when a class found out that I, the Social Studies teacher who loved passing sardonic remarks and making people stand for the slightest infractions, was also going to teach them History. I call that a job well done.

Quite honestly, however, I can now believe my teachers when they used to say that they didn't like punishing people. I don't either. It makes me feel bad and wonder whether I've gone overboard, and a few standing in a whole class is quite an eyesore. I would seriously rather the whole class of them sit tight and listen for the entire lesson, than have to keep catching people for talking, not paying attention and miscellaneous other little offences. It's tiring, irritating and an utter waste of time.

In addition, I also got my first "oh-you-are-soooo-young!" comment today, which I had been expecting for quite a while. It came from a cleaner who expressed the above sentiments to me in Chinese, although a few days before my Geography class gasped when I walked in and I overheard some of the above. I am perfectly aware that I can pass off as a student; I was one not too long ago, was I not?

That aside, it is an interesting experience teaching Social Studies, especially since I was part of the first batch to have to study it. If you can believe it, the syllabus has changed to become even more propaganda-ey than before. I mean, look, the first chapter is called Singapore: A Nation in the World and I am forced to inculcate in our bright young ones the, erm, fact that Singapore is a nation. No, I don't think very much of that, either. But a job is a job.

All in all, it's been a good experience so far, especially where my future career is concerned. It's given me a feel of things, made me get used to having to stand in front of 40 little devils that are our future and turn them into something useful (first time I entered a classroom as a teacher I was really nervous and no joke, my hands were shaking, but that's over with now) and allowed me to appreciate to some degree the various frustrations and joys of the job.

It's also made me wonder more than ever before why school begins at such ungodly hours.

Well, wish me luck in wading through more delightfully ungrammatical expositions on the pleasures and problems of being teenagers and tales of exciting experiences. Future of Singapore, I salute thee.