High School Memories Never Fades

Hello everyone. How are you today? Hope everyone is doing fine today.

Before I start with my article I want to thank my new upvoter on the last article that I published @Eunoia thank you so much and I also to my new sponsor @Princessbusayo a million thanks to you.

My high school life is not the same with others that has JS proms and be with some of our classmates in elementary. I studied far away from my family and live in a dormitory. This was the very first time that I'm away with them.

The Sisters of Mary School

This school is a private institution that helps those unfortunate children to study without spending any money. They offer scholarship tByo those students who excels during their elementary but before the students got the scholarship they needed to take the exam and if they pass, they will be sent here after their graduation in elementary. Those who passed don't need to bring clothes or any school supplies because this school provides all the students needs from personal and school supplies.

April 17, 2006

This was the day my grandmother and sister accompanied me to the school where I had to study, we rode a bus and it was a 3 to 4 hours travel to reach the school. When we arrive there, we are assisted by one of the students and brought us to the clinic for a Hepa Test and luckily I got a negative result. And by then, after getting the result we were sent to our respective dormitories. I was looking on the paper that I was holding and saw that my dorm was located at the fifth floor. We were assisted by a nun and when I reached our dorm I was introduced to our mother-sister. She was the nun assigned for us for a year and she asked me if I will rest or study. I answered her that I will study and so she brought me to the shower room and let me took a bath and gave me my uniform.

Staying in dormitory with strangers makes me uncomfortable at first but as I got to know them, we made memories that we will never forget 'til now. Every dormitory have 45 to 46 student from different places like Cebu, Bohol, Negros, Leyte, Iloilo and somewhere in Mindanao. Each dorm have two helping sisters who are assign to guide us and they help the nuns to take care of us. This helping sisters are all graduating students.

ONE DORMITORY=ONE FAMILY

Create memories that we will treasure for the rest of our lives

Outings

Obey the rules, perform the duty well, study well and you will be rewarded

During our first year, our dormitory was one of the most clean dorm because we always made sure to clean and organize our things and because of that we are able to go out of the campus and have fun. We went to the Dalaguete and as far as I can remember it was a beach and we enjoyed there for the whole morning. We had lunch and the food we have at that time were pancit bihon and fried chicken. After having fun at the beach, we rode the bus again and head out to the city. While on the bus, we were given some chips to eat and sang a song. We are like little children, just enjoying the moment. Then we reach our another destination "The Lapu-Lapu Shrine". We were roaming around and after an hour we are called by our Mother Superior because we will be going home because it was late already.

Another outing that I remember was when I was included on the honor list. We went to the National bookstore and we were given ten pesos to buy what we want and I remember that I used my money to buy two roll of cartolina.

Academic performance

Being a scholar, we need to maintain our grades. We need to study hard and in order for us to became an honor student we must have an 85 grades in all subjects. I am a student who doesn't like to memorize some stuffs and the subject that I dislike is Araling Panlipunan especially those history part. When we have quizzes, I just relied on those words that I remember and as a result I failed or sometimes I just got the passing score but when quarterly exams came I made sure that I got high scores so my grades won't be a failing one. During my first year, I was not that very competitive but I was recognize by our Mother sister because I was behave and an obedient student this time and I got an award "BEST IN RELIGION". On my third year, this was a blessed year for me. I was included on top 10 and I am so happy because I was also included in the honor list. I also got the chance to compete in quiz bees that was held in The sisters of Mary School boystown that was located in Minglanilla.

Weekdays

Every morning, when the bell rings we should immediately get up and go to the dining to do our morning prayer and after that we will take a bath. During Wednesday and Sunday morning we usually take a bath for 2 to 3 minutes only because we needed to go to the gym for the mass and no one should be late or else we will be receiving a punishment. Our breakfast everyday will be bread with spread like mayonnaise, margarine or peanut butter, then we also have our drinks like coffee, Milo or fresh milk, sometimes we also had oatmeal and boiled egg plus banana. Week days are spent mostly on our studies and we don't have much free time on these days.

Weekends

On Saturday we are having class in the morning and in the afternoon, it's up to our mother-sister what are schedule was. It's either we will clean the garden or wash our school uniforms.

On Sundays after having mass, we went back to our dormitories and have our breakfast them clean our area. At 8 in the morning, we should all go down to have a jogging around the oval and then do some aerobics after. After all those we will have our free time.

On Sunday afternoon, we spent it doing a general cleaning. Cleaning the shower room, Comfort room, corridors, bedroom, dining and fixing our clothes in the closet.

Disobedience

Obeying is a must in our school but sometimes we can't avoid it especially during my last year in school.

There was one close dormmate of mine who chose cooking as her course in TESDA. One day, there were making a carrot cake and they were given two slices of it as their share. Sleeping time came, no noise should be made and no one was allowed to eat too. As I was lying on my bed, my close friend whispered to me, "I have a carrot cake, we will eat this". Without any hesitation and without being afraid that our mother sister might caught us, we ate and finishes it all. Successful disobedience LOL.

Another time when we have our AutoCad subject. That subject was our last subject in the afternoon, we went to the computer lab to finished the 3D house we made from previous days. The computer lab has an internet connection and when our teacher leave and the student teacher was the only one assigned to us, we asked him to open the internet connection and as a kind student teacher he open it. That was the time that I made a friendster and I was able to chat my cousins and brother but we are also careful not to be caught my our principal.

Punishment

Punishment for being unorganized and for not performing the given task.

During our ROTC, we have our drill that time and every platoon should cooperate and do the what the platoon leader instruct to her members. We belong to the Bravo company but other members were not serious with that drill and as a result we are scolded by our ROTC teacher and what was worst, we clean and brushed the basketball court even if the sun was shining so bright.

One time, we are told by our mother-sister to clean and organized our dorm but what we did was just talking and making noise. When our mother-sister went to check on us, we were scolded because of disobeying and she let us put our slippers as our necklace and told us to go down barefooted and stay at the basketball court where all families can see us. We were ashamed and at the same time having fun as well.

Film showings

This was the most awaited times to relax our mind from studies. We usually have our film showing during Saturdays and Sundays nights and it last for 2 hours only. We can also watched after our periodical exams. The most favorite movie that I have watch is Eragon and we also watched Korean dramas like Jumong (this was my favorite drama too), Jewel in palace and Hello my Lady.

Sports

I am not fond of sports but all are required to play in our school. I have tried playing basketball with the nuns as our opponent but something happened. My ring finger was injured while I was trying to catch the ball.

I also tried playing volleyball but then again it seems that the ball doesn't like me, LOL. As I was trying to pass the ball, it was supposed to be pass to the opponent but the ball that I hit landed on the face of my team mate. That was embarrassing, I said sorry to her many times even if she said it was okay because it's part of the game.

Celebrations

August 15 is the foundation day of our school. We spend this day playing games, eating and having some fun with other students. This day, we are all celebrating our birthday. We receive some gifts from our mother-sister. The gifts are some chocolates, big Mr. Chips or Chippy, undergarments, T-shirt and candies.

Visiting day

Visiting day only happens once a year and it will be held on the first Sunday of September. It is the time when we are visited by our love ones.

• My first year visitor- my grandmother and my brother. My brother just got home from Manila and I'm so happy to see him again because when I went here at our school I haven't had the chance to see him because that time he was already in Bulacan.

• My second year visitor- my sister and my grandmother.

• My third year visitor- my grandmother and my step-mom. I was expecting my father to visit me but he hasn't come because he has fever that time but I'm still thankful that I have my visitor because other student haven't got any visitor.

• My fourth year and last year here in the school- my grandmother, my brother and his live-in partner visited me. They brought roasted chicken but when we are about to eat the chicken fall to the ground.Lol

To our mother-sisters:

It's nice to see you all smiling in this picture. I'm so glad that I became part of your lives. Thank you for guiding us through out our stay in the school. Thank you for teaching us some values that we can treasure for the rest of our lives. Thank you for being our mothers who supported us in our everyday lives, comfort us when things go down, encourage us to be better, scolded us when we made mistakes and most of all thank you for always putting a smile on our faces.

I will never forget all of you and those memories that we made will be treasured and cherished forever.

Time flies so fast, it is as if I was graduated yesterday. All the memories that we've made are still fresh on our mind. I wanted to visit there and bring my children to let them see how beautiful and wonderful that school is, how you spread positivity to all and how you showed gratefulness in things you do.

You are forever our mother, teacher and bestfriend in our hearts.

I love you and I miss you.

I am Fr. Al's miracle

To our beloved Fr. Al,

Thank you so much for the opportunity you have shared to the less fortunate children and I'm happy that I'm one of those privileged ones. I'm forever grateful to you.

"The glory of God is manfully alive". This was the motto of the school. This means that we have to do our best in everything we do and develop our talents that the Lord has made to us.

Thanks for reading

-LHES