You-Want's Life

Ivan. What a simple name. I-V-A-N, just that simple. But behind this ubiquitous name, there live thousands of stories. The headboy in school is called Ivan and he has the best grades; the gardener of Nong Chik Garden is an Ivan, he lost a leg in an accident last month; even the rising engineer of Soft Lab Malaysia is also named Ivan. See? That is just how common the name is.   Yet, even though it seems common to most, I have to confess that each time I hear it, a tsunami of emotions strikes me. It triggers a feeling of grief from the back of my mind, shoving up an old patch of memory, reminding me of the death of a lovely boy.   He was Ivan Ronan, young and adorable with that heart-melting little smile and bright blue eyes. He used to be one of the students in the kindergarten I worked in. Born into a loving family, life was simple but perfect for him. He had warm milk to drink every day, plastic toys his father bought for him and enthralling bedtime stories whi...

A pen-pal programme was commenced by the Literary, Drama & Debating Society of English College Johor Bahru, in collaboration with the Interact Club of SMK Sultan Ismail,  as a token of friendship and a pursue in the rise of the quality in English writing.  The programme involved  12 volunteered students from each school, in which the paired couple exchanged pseudonymously handwritten letters twice as the one-month plan went.   The word 'EPISTLE * ' was selected as an embodiment of the programme, in which we penned letters and laid our thoughts in handwritten forms instead of other tedious methods such as speaking and typing using electronic devices. * According to   http://www.thefreedictionary.com/epistle  , the word EPISTLE holds several meanings: 1. A letter, especially a formal one. 2. A literary composition in the form of a letter . 3. Epistle Bible      a. One of the letters included as a book in the New Testament.   ...