Can I go back in time??

Grammar has reclaimed its glory in the school syllabus.... and that's great news. Even though I was lucky enough to get a somewhat basic education on the English language and grammatical rules, I have never quite understood some parts of it. Sometimes, it feels such a waste not being able to fully exercise the intricacies of the language when I'm writing.

I remember the ironic situation in secondary school when despite scoring top marks in school for my prelims in English, I signed up for a course on English at the RELC and was severely humbled by the teacher. I learned my lesson then and became more conscious of what I write... trying to improve my skills all the time. And these days, when I see the sort of abuse the language has been subjected to with the insurgence of sms language, it sets me in an irritable mood. Same thing happens when I come across bad usage, or rather, inability to use the Chinese language.

And the sad thing these days is that children hardly have any interest in reading. What happened to everyone's favourite hobby of reading? I thank my brother for bringing back my first storybook from the library when I was in primary one and that sparked my passion for books. I went through that phase of devouring Enid Blytons, Nancy Drews, Sweet Dreams and graduated to David Eddings, Raymond E Feist and Isaac Asimov by the time I was in Primary Six. That helped me to develop what I can do with my languages today, as I vaguely remember my primary school teacher's remarks in my report book... "need to improve her English." Today, I dread the thought of shifting homes as I look at my bookshelf.... five shelves, each are laid with three rows of books from inside to the brim of the shelf and two rows of books tall. And that's not counting the box of books the movers lost when I last shifted...

Still, there doesn't seem to be enough ammunition in my language prowess. Can I go back in time and learn it all over again...??