The Time Machine Dominic Chua
In Search of the ID10T Form
All this while , we ( the teachers ) were completely oblivious of the commotion going on in the General Office , with Mrs Pauline Lim scolding a seemingly endless stream of boys ! We really got it from her at the end of that day .
Back row , extreme right : Mrs Nora de Silva
Those of us teachers who were in the school from 1992 – 1993 never forgot this joke — we thought it was brilliant . And you know what it ’ s like — we were sitting in the staff room , and the 1st of April was just around the corner . I told everyone about what Mrs Shanti Sundram did for April Fools ’, and then Mrs Nora de Silva , always creative and quick-witted , hit on the idea of the ‘ ID10T form ’. And in those days , before the advent of mass computing , there really were a lot of forms in the office . If you changed address , you filled in a form , you changed citizenship , you filled in a form . There were forms named Form G , Form S , Form and so on , which the office would have , sitting in all these pigeonholes in the General Office . It was in the vocabulary of the students — these forms with alpha-numeric names .
The first time we played this joke was on the Sec 1 GEP boys in 1991 — we sent the students to the office to get the ID10T form . And the next year when we did it again , we played with all the Sec 1s , including the Express boys . But the first year was doubly hilarious , because when we played this joke , we forgot to inform the Office ! And you remember Mrs Pauline Lim , the admin officer and unofficial queen of the front office ? The whole office went into a frenzy looking for ID10T forms !!
The teachers had sent the monitors to the office to pick up the forms , and the monitors were duly scolded and returned to their classes empty-handed . Then we sent the assistant monitors . All this while , we ( the teachers ) were completely oblivious of the commotion going on in the General Office , with Mrs Pauline Lim scolding a seemingly endless stream of boys ! We really got it from her at the end of that day .
Rafflesian Times
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