Musalla, Asrama Puteri

In those days, the huge room next the the Warden's Roon on the first floor (i.e. right above the Common/TV Room) was our musalla/bilik sembahyang.

The picture above was taken in either 1978 or 1979. It was after an usrah with the three ladies in the middle as our guests.

At that time creating murals on the school walls was a popular activity, so one of the weekends we, the girls, decided to have one in our musalla, hence the kalimah on the wall!

To fellow friends: If you look well, you can see me, Mahizan, K Eddie and Aida as the seniors among the juniors. I can still recall some of the names of the juniors too!

Note: Despite going back to school regularly for alumni's activities (for the past 4 years), I've NOT been inside the Asrama Puteri since I left the place in Dec 1979! Maybe during the next visit (Majlis Qurban), I'll do so :-)

The Old School Bus

This is the first bus the school had. When it arrived in 1974 (according to recollections from seniors), teachers and students alike were very excited.

As for me, I remember this bus as one of the main means to get to town for our weekly Saturday outings. It is also the vehicle that took me to various destinations (the further ones were KL, JB, Kuantan, Kuala Terengganu) during many school trips.

This pix was taken a couple of years ago. I have a few more shots of this old machine, but need to find them first... Source: semesta's e-group


During the Labour Day break last year, we were passing by the school, and saw something familiar in the open space next to the school compound (i.e. OUTSIDE the school compound). Hubby took the first pix:


On a close-up, we realised that it was actually the OLD BUS!
(Note the red and blue stripes)
I just wonder, if an essay is written with the title "An Autobiography of a Bus" or "Aku SeBuah Bas SBP", you'd know how the ending would be.

Note: Amran (73-79) has written about the day the bus first arrived here

The Earliest Picture of the School??

Courtesy of : Hilmy Abdullah@AHA

I found this photo in one of the folders in our e-group's photo folders. It (the photo folder) was created by our good friend Ahmad Hilmy Abdullah@AHA.

Remark from Hilmy:

Blok Bangunan sekolah

1974... Sewaktu kantin belum dibina. Di sebelah kanan adalah cucur atap Dewan besar. Sekarang, selain kantin, berbagai bangunan tambahan dan tumbuhan bagaikan taman telah memenuhi ruang . Seksanya... cuma dewan makan tempat mengisi perut ketika itu.

Even the canteen block is not in the picture!!

Tuan Hj Hamdan - Our 3rd Principal

I know I'm supposed to write about the first principal first, but today I was given the contact number of Tuan Haji, which prompted me to call him, and hence since it is still fresh in my mind, I've decided to write about him first.

Tuan Hj came to our school (as recorded by here) on 15 Dec 1977. He was there until 31 March 1979.

What fascinated me of this great principal was his fatherly approach in handling the students -both boys and girls. I remember how he lead the Thursday night prayers (as the imam) in the big hall (no mosque nor common surau yet then). He also made a point to come to the girls hostel every fortnight to lead the prayers, after which we would sit around him and listened attentively to his "nasihat", just like listening to your dad talking!

Tuan Hj was also good in languages and Music. He can play the piano well. In Those days, we had the piano parked at the foot of the staircase that leads to the stage, in the main hall.

The day he departed was a sad one. I remember Tuan Hj sang the beautiful song "Selamat Tinggal Bungaku". Right until now, if I hear that song, I get teary eyes, and am very much reminded of him. What I do not recall is that I actually ran up the stage to ask him to sing the song (and HE remembers it!).

The lyric of the song:

Selamat Tinggal Bungaku

Selamat tinggal bunga ku
Aku bermohon pergi dahulu
Terima kasih seruan ku
Jasa mu untuk diri ku

Ke timur atau ke utara
Tak tentu dimana nak tujukan
Setitik airmata
Dititiskan dibuang jangan

Sekiranya aku masih
Berada nun jauh di balik awan
Salam yang bahagia
Khabar yang gembira ku kirimkan

Inikah akhir bertemu
Bila nian kan berjumpa lagi
Ingatlah pesanan ku
Jaga baik diri mu sendiri

( Lagu : Johar Bahar / Ahmad Wan Yet - Lirik : Johar Bahar )

Here are some of the pix of me with him:

Here he was with us, watching our Malay debating team practicing in the main hall - we went into the final that year with the team thatconsisted of Roslan Ghani, Zaidi and Zulkifli and Ab Aziz Ahmad:

Fr left: me, Anee Lin, Che Jamilah, Tuan Hj Hamdan

While I am at it, I might as well say a bit abt the team. That year we had back-up teams consist me, Affendi (in the pix) and a few others (some are not the this pix). I was with Team B, while the other girls were in Team C (they were only in form 2 then!). Team B went all the way to win the Piala Ekspo Pendidikan Kelantan while Team A went on to win Piala Koperasi (Kelantan) as well as entered the PPM final in Angkasapuri at the end of the year.

The Pix of Pasukan Bahas BM for the school magazine.

The following pix was taken during the Prefect's Jamuan (can't remember if it was for Raya, or just end-of-term-thingy).

Girl Prefects with Ustaz and Tuan Haji Hamdan
Standing fr left: Parishah, Delima, Rosmayati,Ustaz Alwi, Tuan Hj Hamdan, Rosilah, Mahiza, Che Nasirah, Sh Haslina
Front fr left: Roselina Hussein, Roselina Yusuf, me, Nik Rozana, Husnayati

Here's a photo taken during one of the last assemblies at the end of 1978. The Home Science Club did very well that year - we did catering services to the school especially during MSSK (Majlis Sukan Sekolah Kelantan) sub-committee meetings. If I remember correctly, with our "income", apart from having the "Jamuan Tahunan", we managed to buy gifts to our Advisor (Cikgu Adawiyah), as well as a brooch (worth RM3 - that's a lot in those days!) each for every member! (we practically finished up the stock in the small supermarket!) and Tuan Haji as the Pengetua was willing to pin them to EVERYONE of us!

Note: The assembly was held in the open space, just in front of the flag poles! Many students were given certificates for their achievements in various fields.

P/S: Tuan Haji came to our recent Raya Gathering. For the blog on that and his latest pix, please click here.

Also, if you can read what Tuan Hj wrote about the school here. You can read about his childhood here.

1 Alpha 1975

Standing fr left: Nik Ahmad Eid, Baha, Salahuddin, Mahisham, Saiful, Azizi, Mazlin, Zuhdi, Halim, Shukri, Cikgu Ku Abdullim
Sitting from left: Khudzir, Aihah, Noorzaini, Nury, me, Fauziah, Sharifah aloyah, Norita, Hood
Front row fro left: Rozi, Hilme, Hasamudin, Rusdi, Iqbal, Halmi, Roslan, Razak and Zainal

This is our first class pix, taken here with our first class teacher, En Ku Abdul Lim.
If I'm not mistaken, the pix was taken just before he left us to further his studies in USM.
Back then I was the biggest in the class, sitting in the middle. Of course I can still name all my classmates, but I thought I should just give the pleasure for my friends to guess who's who :-)

Sportsday 1978

Here's the picture of the Champion House!! (or was it the runner up??):

Me being a non-sports person, was in blazer sitting on the right side. The yellow visors that you can see some of us wearing were actually made of manila cards only!! We just cut the pieces and stapled them together. Kak Eddie is the one sitting in the middle. I think she was the Sportsgirl of the year... On the left most, you can see Cikgu Mat Nor (in white) with the late Cikgu Yusoff standing next to him.

Sadly, even in 1978 the school field was still very "bald"...

Here's another pix further from the track, so the grass were thicker!

I know, I was always on the "plump" side when I was a studetn - still am :-(

More Pix of the School

Note: These photos are from my collection. I know not who took them, but during our school days they were very popular pix on sale!


This pix must have been taken from the water tank tower next to the dining hall. Part of the dining hall's roof can be seen in the foreground. The red-roofed building is the Main Hall, with the new canteen next to it. Two of the school blocks can be seen behind them. Note how yellow the field was!

Another nice shot of the hostel blocks:

Note the bare road going towards the dining hall (extreme right)

The next photo was taken from the school ground facing the dining hall and hostel blocks. The alamanda in the foreground helps to add colour to the otherwise bare, orangish grass! You can see the white and red checkered water tank!

Speechday 1976

The 1976 Speechday was very special indeed - I think it was the first Speechday for the school (I could be wrong, though). Anyway, on that day, the school gave out awards to the first group of LCE/SRP and MCE/SPM best students. En Omar Hashim was the distinguished guest of the day.

I also received best in form award for Form 1 1975 (the year before).
(I'll post the pix later).

In conjunction with it, we also had various exhibitions held on that day. I remember being very busy preparing for the Homescience exhibition - I had to sew a picture of a cat and flowers (which was later given to En Omar Hashim as a souvenir from the students) and also crocheted a red shawl (as seen in the pix below). Fauziah, my classmate made the whiteand red daisy shawl. We had the exhibition in the Homescience sewing room.


It was also during this exhibition that I came across the "Pascal Triangle". I can't remember who the exhibitors were but they really had a hard time trying to explain the probability related to the triangle. They had nails to represent the triangle, and asked us to drop marbles many times from the top, and where the marbles drop at is related to the Pascal triangle, or something like that!!

Trip to a Batik Factory

Updated on 28/11/06:
In 1975, I had a chance to follow a group (I think it was organised by the Art Club) to visit a batik factory. 2 Mat Salleh teachers took the opportunity to follow us.

That was the first time I saw how batik sarung was made.

Here's one of the surviving pix:


And here's another one, with Mr Foster and Mr Potts (don't know which is which). Cikgu Bahar is at extreme right. Soon after the trip, Cikgu Bahar managed to get the Art Club to have its own batik-printing/drawing session.

One of the Mat Salleh teacher (I think it was the guy with the Afro hair style) once entered our 1 Alpha to relief another teacher who was absent, and he taught us some German phrases (like good morning, good day, I'm going to the cinema, etc..)! I thought that was cool....

Prefects 1975

In the 70s, there were 3 terms a year as compared to the present 2 semesters.

By the 2nd term of 1975, together with Hishamudin, Rashidee, Saruji, Rosilah, Rozana and Zainal Azim, I was elected to be one of the junior prefects. Only Zainal and I were from form 1, the other 5 were in form 2.

Looking at the pix, I think I still remeber abt 70-80% of them by names, but will list down later. SEMASA (correction: SEMESTA) Presiden is also there, sitting 3rd from left, and Arif is 4th from right.



Sitting next to Principal Mahadzir is Ezanee Adam (with glasses) who was the headboy then. We didn't have any head girl that year :-(
I don't dare to say that Ezanee Adam was the first headboy, since I heard that when the pioneers were in form 1 in SMIP in 1973, there was already a headboy then...

2 Alpha Girls 1976

Standing fr left: Norita, Nuraini, Norzaini, Fauziah, (the late) Sharifah Aloyah
Sitting: me, Aihah

We took this picture during one of our outings! We went to the reknown Wong Photo Studio. We changed to ordinary dresses specially for the photo-shoot after which we changed back to our school uniform.
Then we went to Odeon to watch the movie "Hapuslah Air Matamu" (I think) - yes, in FULL school uniforms. "Sayang Anakku Sayang" was showing at the same time but at the other cinema (was it Rex?). We wanted to watch it instead but it was sold out. Ous classmate, Mat Yih helped us to get the tickets, as people were scrambling to buy tickets - nobody queued in those days!

Earlier we also had some pix taken in school by our then class teacher, Mr Lye Kim Yong (Who had recently retired).

We also have the class pix taken, but I've yet to scan it (pls come back later for updates).

Pantai Sabak 1976

Somehow, I was very close to many girls who were 2-yrs my senior. In 1976 (when I was in form 2 and they in form 4) we went to Pantai Sabak. I can't recall how we went there (since one of them had a bike), but we sure had a great time.

I can only remember some of the names
Standing fr left: Siti Aesahah, ??, Muhibbah, Nik Fauziah, (the late) Shamsiah, Senaning, Rosmawati (her sister is K Hajar Ramli), Zawiah
Front fr left: ??, ??, me

Notice the school bag in the bike's basket - in those days, almost everybody had one. It came in 2 main colours i.e. red and blue. We carry the bags to school and also used it for our outings (read - balik kampung)!
The house behind us is now gone, together with the beautiful beach that has since been lost to erosion. Just imagine, back then the house was so far inland (more than 100 meters) from the beach!

PPM 1979

PPM 1979 was held in SDAR, Seremban.

Some pix:

In SDAR - we were facinated by the rich flora in their compound (unlike our school then)

During a trip to PD on one of the free afternoons.


In the living room of one of the hostel blocks in TKC.
Fr left: me, Salwani, Roselina Yusof (senior), Roslina Hashim (junior), Fauziah (sitting), Shamsinar (junior) and Yasmin (Microsoft)


At TKC, watching a basketball match. Me with the red visor.

The three ladies in front of me were then young single teachers who accompanied us, but were always too camera-shy :-(

The Early Days of the School

The view from Block A of Boy's Hostel. Part of the dining hall is on the left side, the new canteen in the middle and part of the school blocks in the background. Compare with the picture taken in Jan 2007 here.

As you enter from the main gate, you would be able to see part of the principal's house (left). The 3 4-storey blocks are (from left to right) Girls' block (C), Boy's Block B and Boy's Block A.

The school hall in the middle with the school blocks in the background.

In those days, these were some of the best pix of our school!

This is the original group of girls for my batch. There were later additions (e.g. 2nd intake) as well as those who came in in 1978 i.e. after our LCE exam (equivalent to PMR now):

Taken in early 1975
First row from left: ??, Khalidah, Nik Ruzni, Azida, Norita, Latifah (fr Sarawak), Munirah, Nuraini, (the late) Gan Choo Heok
Standing from left: Che Norizan, Noriza, Mahizan, Siti Haslina, Che Nasirah, me, Fauziah Mat Zain, Rozaida, Fauziah Mohd, Saroja

Sportsday 1976

The 1976 Sportsday was one of the grandest that we had, or rather the first grand one, since i joined the school. Principal Mahadzir insisted that we prepared well for the day.

Weeks prior to the big day, we had to literally water the grass every morning - those who had PE (Physical Education), would use the time to carry water in pails to the field from the pipes near the main hall. I remember there was only one long hose for the task, so the others had to bring pails for PE.

AS for the march, we spent 2 weeks practicing it under the hot sun during the afternoon prep i.e. from 3pm - 4pm!! And the results, you can see here how "uniform" we were in our steps:

Rahman(Yellow) house doing the march. Note the barren track - not much grass.

The girl with the long plaits of hair is me :)


Still not much grass to cover the field - just imagine how it would be without our effort to water them daily!!