Rabu, 04 Juni 2008

Peace and all good!

Another year has just finished in the life of the Seminary Menengah Christus Sacerdos, and it was also the second year of my teaching experience with the young Seminarians.

Reading the articles of Bro.Gerard who I met personally here during his stay with us and of Petrus Sitohang, I have more vivid idea of how the English language in the Seminary should be given a first place concern that it may become part of the real life situation of every seminarian.

The semester recently was quite tough for me since I had to teach the new comers, that was the 3 Probatorium classes. Majority of them couldn’t speak the language and even to grasp it. I had tried the most possible means I have in hand like internet, LCD, presenting my lessons in Powerpoint, games, songs and more written dialogues prepared by them so that they could express themselves using English. I think they were effective enough. It is consoling to hear them once in a while speaking English.

I believe somehow that my presence would help them, the seminarians as well as the teachers, to practice English everyday. It is also true that this is what is lacking, the opportunity to use it not only in a classroom situation but also in every day life situation. I am also glad that many of our teachers are given the chance to study the language and I’m happy that they started to have the courage to use it not only with me but also among themselves.

I have a lot of stories, even anecdotes to always remenber during these two years that somehow become the teasers in animating my community.

One day in one of my lessons, Tupa with his broken english asked me,”Sister, couldn’t you speak our language?” I answered, “I couldn’t.” He continued, “Don’t you know it?” With my white lies I responded,”I don’t know.” And he questioned,”Then why have you stayed in our country?” I replied,”Because, I have to teach English in the seminary.” He insisted, “And then, you have to know our language.” I said. “That doesn’t matter because with you there is only English language.” In between the lesson, this seminarian’s naughtiness continued and interrupted me by asking something in Indonesian language which distractedly I answered, and with his forefinger’s ponting up and a smile on his face, he exclaimed,” So Sister, you know our indonesian language!”. And I smiled.

Funny story? Perhaps, but more, it was a beautiful experience. The spontaneity of these young seminarians, inspite of the difficulties in the teaching and learning process of the English language, gives me that enthusiasm to share more what is in my dispositiona. In the Seminary, I am the only foreigner but I never felt I am a stranger. Every one has done the part to let me feel at home.

What we are hoping for the next school year is that we may offer more good education to our Seminarians, rich with spirituality and brotherhood so that these young boys whose future will be also ours, will give the best of their lives and so that our Church may be enriched with men of good faith.

To all the Staff and Seminarians: A fruitful Holiday! See you all again the next school year! (Sr. Imelda Espital Dela Cruz FIS)

Senin, 02 Juni 2008

Olimpiade Sains

Banyak pendapat  umum mengenai seminaris bahwa seminaris hanya mahir di bidang olahraga. Bahkan pernah ada komentar yang mempertanyakan partisipasi seminaris dalam bidang olimpiade sains. Pendapat ini dipatahkan dengan pembuktian bahwa seminaris juga mampu bersaing di bidang olah intelektual. Senin, 2 Juni 2008, seminari mengutus salah seorang putranya untuk mengikuti kompetisi OSN tingkat provinsi di Medan. Sebuah kebanggaan tentunya, melihat kenyataan bahwa saudara Jollifi Ginting, siswa syntaxis IPA 2007/2008,  mampu mengalahkan pesaing-pesaingnya di tingkat kota Pematangsiantar. Sebagai juara I OSN Kimia tingkat kota Pematangsiantar , saudara kita ini berhak mengikuti gelaran Kompetisi yang lebih tinggi di Medan. Nah semoga dalam kompetisi ini saudara kita mampu membawa pulang piala Thomas..., ups..., maksudnya, mengibarkan panji seminari di kancah pertempuran intelektual yang semakin sengit ini...yeah..., mari kita doakan...

(_paunk)

CROSS CULTURAL UNDERSTANDING

Basically, every place has their own values of culture. When we are in one place, we must obey its cultural values.


 


            East and west, the different sides of earth have many differences of cultural values.


 




  1. Equality and Egalitariannism


West value       : all people are created equal thus they have no rank or status in         their society. Notice that it’s only an idea, not a fact at at all.


East value         : they have hierarchy, rank or status in their society. It’s made for knowing their status or position in society. And they always look their status when they have a relationship to other people.


Our ethnic group , Batak Simalungun, is in the East value. It looks clearly when we have a traditional celebration ,especially a marriage celebration.


Simalungun hierarchy ,which is called ‘Tolu Sahundulan’,  consists of:


1)      Tondong


2)      Sanina


3)      Boru


We will discuss them, one by one:


1)      Tondong


Parents of a bride are called ‘Tondong’. ‘Tondong’ is the highest status in family relationship. In marriage celebration, only ‘Tondong’ gets ‘Jambar’(a piece of meal). It shows us that Tondong is the highest status in Simalungun ethnic group.


2)      Sanina


The brothers of bridegroom are called ‘Sanina’. ‘Sanina’ is lower than ‘Tondong’ but higher than ‘Boru’. It looks clearly in marriage celebration, ‘Sanina’ always be the second in giving foreword (Siparhata).


3)      Boru


The sisters of bridegroom are called ‘Boru’. ‘Boru’ is the lowest status in Simalungun ethnic group. They get no jambar and always be the last who give foreword.


 




  1. Directness, Openness and Honesty


West value       : honesty is the best policy. People should express themselves openly. It is not considered good to “ bear around the bush”.


East value         : indirectness and “saving tace”. People should consider one another’s feelings when deciding what to say. Honesty is not always the best policy.


Batak Simalungun, is in the East value. Our people always notice the other feelings. They can’t say something directly, moreover when they disagree with someone. They always consider the other feelings.


It looks clearly in traditional dance of Batak Simalungun, 'Tari Somba'.


This traditional dance is usually danced in opening a formal celebration. It’s aim is giving honour to the guests.


And if we pay attention to the detail, we will see that the dancers always look at the ground. They never look at the guests directly. It shows us that they always consider one and others feelings




  1. Informally


West value ®    First name usage( Just called "Bob”). It’s not so important for other                            people to know our title or last name.


East value  ®      usage of titles are common. People are retrained and polite with each other.


 


                          


Our people always need to know our titles. For them it is so important to know that because they will know how far their relationship is, by their title. If they have a same title, conversation will be relaxed and deeper than they have different titles. They usually want to know our hometown or the hometown of our father. And it can be more than knowing our identity but also our family’s identity.


 


In Batak Simalungun it looks clearly in their traditional song, Pos ni Uhur.


In one lyrics


      “… Putus ma boru Girsang


                        sambung boru Saragih, Otene boto…”


 


It shows that they usually use the titles, it doesn’t matter what their first name is.


It can be better if we know our ordinary culture, then also try to progress our culture, because culture is a dynamic thing. All of culture have positive and negative things,


 


And we must recovered our culture because it’s not bad at all. And it will be better if we can mix them, so that it can be the best for our future.


 


                                                                                         


                             


                                                                    Risky Yakob Purba


                                                                  Poesis IPA 2007-2008


 


 


 


 


 


 


 

DISCIPLINE




 


We are what we always do repeteadly, therefore, specialty is not a behaviour, but a habit. (Aristotle)


 


   What is the discipline? Discipline is taken from latin language, disciplina, which means orders. So discipline is doing things in orders. It is difficult to do everything in order for some people because they’re not usual to do that. But before we’re talking further how to do everything in order, let’s see why do we have to be discipline.


            Stephen R. Covey in his book “The seven habits of highly effective people” put discipline in one of the seven habits he mentioned. The seven habits, help men to be success. Of course everyone want to be success, and there are a lot of books and speeches which tell us the way to be success. But I just want to emphasize two points this time, they are: 


 


1)      Making a private management principles


2)      Doing the principles as a habit


 


Making a private management principles means managing yourself by principles you’ve decide. But what principles do you want to apply to be discipline? I think, all of the principles are just about arranging time.


The most usual  problem which people face in discipline is the lack of time. People -usually said: “I don’t have enough time”, but everyone has been given a same time, a same day, a same week, no one in this earth who has been given 25 hours a day, but why do many people have enough time to do their activity but the others don’t.


Maybe we can say that everyone have different activities, but let’s make a closer example. We are seminarians, who have the same activities everyday. Especially in a same class, we have same homeworks and jobs to do. But it’s usual for some of us to do our activity on time while the others don’t. In this case the problem must be in arranging time. Not all of the students can arrange their time well, although most of our time had been arranged. We  have not much spare time in a day, it’s only about 3 hours a day, but why do we can’t use it efficiently? 


I think, the most usual problem is that most of us do not do our activities on time, we're not discipline. There are some of us, seminarians,  who sleep when we should study, read novels when we should sleep and do others indisciplined actions. These indisciplined actions will result bad effects on us. These bad effects such as: we will get bad school grades, our health will be decreased, many people will hate us because we do not follow the rules.


I have two suggestion for us to build a discipline attitude:


 




  1. Do you activities on time and as you’ve been ordered


Maybe this suggestion seems too simple but this is the most important action to be discipline. Shortly, it means you have to speech when it’s time to speech, and you have to sleep when it’s time to sleep, and you have to hear when it’s time to hear. Imagine if the doctors plow the fields, the policeman injecting the patients, it won’t be funny, will it? So do you activities on time and as you’ve been ordered.




  1. Make a priority.


            We have to do the most important thing first, the secondary next, and so on. Of course we have our own priority. But especially as a student, our most priority is to study well.


I have not much advise for us . But I’m sure if we do these two suggestions well, we will get good effects.


Habit is a strong factor in our life, for our consistency and what we do, habit always express our character .


 


Thank you,


 


 


                                                                             Richardo Marpaung


                                                                             Syntaxis IPA 2007


                                                                             

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