RIP Mrs Seet: An ode to a teacher

Clement Tan, her former Secondary 1 student, writes:

15 years ago, we never quite understood why we needed to bring those thick public phone directories to school for, of all things, music appreciation classes. Not the kind laden with music theory, but the type that were meant to cultivate our aesthetic sense. We found out soon enough.

As it turned out, Mrs Seet made us lie on our backs in the 4th floor music room -- and made us sing with those thick public phone directories on our stomachs. "When the book goes up and down with your breathing," I remembered her saying, "it means you are singing with your diaphragm." An all-knowing, triumphant wink always followed as she turned back and continued playing the piano.

This was in 1995, at Fairfield Methodist Secondary School, when I was in Secondary 1 -- we were her last batch of students before she retired.

Mrs Seet was a force of nature. She's a legend in Fairfield's history and represented a dying breed of teachers who spent their entire professional lives in a single school. She was old school, and expoused "old-world" values but there was nothing out of fashion about her.

Somehow, I suspect that allowed her to get away with being curt and honest. Instead of being resentful and feeling all hurt, her words always festered within my being. She was the sagely grandmother I never had, so whenever she dispensed her life advice, the aura about her somehow made accepting her hard words that much easier. I almost felt like I had to take it in.

"Clement, you are blessed with the gift of the gap," she told me once after I was ostensibly arrogant during an English class. "The downfall of people like you, is their lack of humility...so use your gifts wisely."

It may not have been apparent that her words to me resonated, especially not in those adolescent years, but 15 years to the day she lectured me, her advice continue to inform my approach towards people and my journalism. She may not be the only one, but Mrs Seet was one of the first to have said that to me.

I was really upset she retired the following year. She gave me my first solo -- as a soprano, with my unbroken voice, at Easter service. And she was also the first to recognize my talents buried beneath that obnoxious, insecure exterior.

I don't know what happened to her. But I guess her passing must have been age-related. I do know however that she's in a better place now, taking her rightful place in the heavenly choir with those angels.

I know I must have said this many times, but thank you, Mrs Seet, for your love, your dedication and your faith. Rest in peace.