It was Monday morning and I woke up promptly to the sound of my alarm. It was 6:30am and after that night’s drive with Yi Xing, my fridge was filled with food and drinks and we had bought the necessary items from the supermarket and convenient stores. I was familiarized with the places, nearby, there was a supermarket, library and even a shopping mall of walking distance. Yi Xing told me that he would come over to my apartment and cook breakfast for the two of us. 

Before going to shower, I peeked out from my bedroom and saw that Yi Xing was indeed in the kitchen cooking. I quickly went to shower and change. I kept thinking about my first day at the teaching course, how I was going to learn well from the teachers and how the university would look like. According to Yi Xing, I would be having my teaching courses at the National University of Singapore (NUS). The movers had already moved my books and my other items into my apartment, it was good to have my precious books back so I could read them. However, I should really visit the library nearby to read more books to improve my English. I really don’t want anyone to judge my horrible English and especially when I spoke in English, it must be so weird with my Korean accent. I have been learning the English language since young, but I don’t think I’m as good as the others, who were probably from English-speaking families. 

When I finished showering and changing, I went to the kitchen and noticed that Yi Xing was waiting for me. He was sitting on the sofa, reading the newspaper. Once he saw me, he greeted me and I replied, “Good morning Yi Xing, let’s eat.” He nods and puts down the newspaper. We made our way to the dining table and had a fairly silent breakfast. I was busy eating my scrambled eggs, bacon and toast. Yi Xing asked me, “Joon Myun, are you uncomfortable with me coming over to your house to cook for you?” I was slightly shocked that he asked about it but I replied, “No, it’s not uncomfortable. I can’t really cook myself and plus, I’ll have to wake up earlier to cook myself. You’re my assistant, it’s fine if you do these things for me. You just need to tell me beforehand if you want to come over to my apartment.” 

I really didn’t expect Yi Xing to ask me something like that, it seems like he was more sensitive but at the same time, he tends to over-think things and ends up over-reacting. He just nodded and continued to eat his breakfast. I washed my plate and cup, cleaned myself up and it was already 7:15am. Yi Xing reminded me that we had to get going by 7:30am, so I decided to look at my emails and read the newspaper. I saw that both Kyungsoo and Baekhyun have replied to my email, so I opened both their emails. 

From: Kyungsoo
Hi, Baekhyun and I miss you too! :( We are pretty busy now, preparing for debut. Maybe we won’t even have time to video chat. I’m sorry we couldn’t reply yesterday and video chat you. We’ll try to fix a specific time and get back to you. 

From: Baekkie
KKABESONG Joon Myun, Kyungie and I will get back to you as soon as possible, we’re SUPER busy right now with our debut. Chanyeollie, Chennie, Kai, Sehunnie and our leader, Minseokkie, says hi too! ^^ Video chat us sometime next month, we should be less busier. 

Soon, we got into Yi Xing’s car and Yi Xing offered to drive me to and from NUS. I said, “Next time, I should just use my own car to drive to and from there, you don’t need to do that next time. I just need to know the directions, I pick up things quite fast and memorize well, I should be able to drive by myself next week or maybe even sooner than that. I know you’re my assistant but I’m sure you’ve got a life too.” Yi Xing nodded and said, “I understand, thanks for giving me less work load. I thought that a rich boy like you would boss me around and get me to do everything. You’re nicer than I expected, Joon Myun.” 

It was 10 minutes before we arrived at NUS, it was a big campus and I started to think about my mother. Before she was married, she was a highly-respected and well-known professor in Seoul’s top university. She always emphasized on a good education, now that I was going for the teaching course, I should do her proud. Even though my parents weren’t around, I had my freedom but I wanted to use my freedom and choose to study hard for the teaching course.

My mother always said to me, “Education is highly valued and prized, having an abundance in education will gain you acceptance into society but spreading education, like me, is respected and admired. Teaching is the second best thing in the world, next to your father’s business.” I really hope that the teaching course will be better than business, better to understand, learn and perhaps, learn to love. Teaching was my mother’s passion, so hopefully, some of her passion brushed on me. Otherwise, I’d really think I was adopted by them! 

I was left to one of the seniors in the school, who introduced me to the school campus and gave me a tour. After the 15 minute tour, he showed me to my classroom and there were about 10 to 15 people that were in the teaching course. I bowed to the teacher and greeted him, “Hello sir, my name is Kim Joon Myun.” He replied, “Hello Joon Myun, I shall introduce you to the class and show to your seat now, so we can get on with class. As you probably heard just now, this is Joon Myun and he’s from South Korea. Please get along with him and learn from each other.” The class clapped as a form of welcoming me and he turned to me and said, “I’m Mr Chan, you’ll be sitting next to that girl with the ponytail and spectacles.”  

I nodded and made my way to my assigned seat. She waved at me and smiled at me, she said, “Hi Joon Myun!! I’m Ting Yi, Wu Ting Yi! Nice to meet you, it’s pretty cool that you’re from South Korea. You speak English, right?” 

“Well, she seems excited to meet me… Wu Ting Yi, it’s quite a nice name. But seriously, how could she think that I didn’t speak English? I’ve been learning the language since 7 years old, but I guess she wouldn’t have known anyways. She seems to be a very cheerful person…” I thought.

Name: Wu Ting Yi

Age: 22 

Height: 173cm

Hobbies: Acting, listening to music (K-pop), telling jokes, reading, talking, playing soccer and watching Korean dramas.

Family: Mr and Mrs Wu; older brother, Wu Yi Fan.

Personality: Slightly tomboyish, cheerful, bright and positive. Loves to smile and is a fun-loving, carefree girl.

Motto: I live to smile and be happy, I live for myself and my happiness, and so should all of you in the world! 

Self-introduction: Hi, I’m Wu Ting Yi! I’ve lived in Singapore for about… 5 years or so? Okay, probably more than that but I used to live in China until my father got a job transfer to Singapore. Now I’m currently doing the teaching course. I. Am. A. Drama. Queen. My nickname in school was ‘Sunny Diva’, shine bright like a diamond? Oh no, it’s shine bright like the Sun and give warmth and light to the world with my talents! The only people that are more talented than me are EXO. I mean HAVE YOU SEEN THEIR TEASERS?! THEY ARE PERFECT AND FLAWLESS. NO MORE WORDS TO DESCRIBE THEM. I just fell in love with them and … I’m getting off topic again. Damn it, okay focus Ting Yi! My English name is Katherine but people just call me Ting Yi. I’m planning to become a drama teacher and English/Literature teacher too! I was kind enough to spread my knowledge and talents to the lovely students that I’ll be teaching, instead of becoming an actress! My dream is to teach, act and MEET EXO. My special talent is imitating my older brother, Yi Fan. People say I’m really funny too! 

Class was dismissed for lunch and I had not much of a problem understanding teaching, it was a lot of techniques and communication with the students, besides the knowledge. It was really different from business and I think business has more numbers and less heart and less people communication. I’m really starting to like teaching, it was very different from business and it required more people communication and more ‘heart’ into teaching. More feelings, I suppose. Teaching seemed to be more interesting than business as well. I learnt a lot of new things that I never learnt much from the economics and stoke market and such, it was just different. And Ting Yi, the girl sitting next to me, she is such a chatterbox! She reminds me a bit of Baekhyun and she mentioned that she loves EXO, she might freak out when she knows that I know them. She took me to the canteen for lunch and offered to sit with me, she was very friendly to me and I let her talk about herself. I listened to her as she was immersed in her story-telling, her stories were surprisingly interesting and captivating to me.  Her dramatic reactions and gestures were also amusing at times. I would occasionally laugh at her jokes but I was more focused on eating my lunch and getting to class on time. 

It was 5pm and the teaching course was finally over! Ting Yi started to talk to me after class again and she said, “Joon Myun, what subject are you teaching? As you know I wanna teach drama, literature and maybe English too! Although I sometimes wish Singlish was a subject too!” 

I replied, “What’s Singlish?” I really had no idea what ‘Singlish’ was and she looked shocked by my response. She exclaimed, “Kim Joon Myun! HOW CAN YOU NOT KNOW WHAT IT IS. Bodo ah is it? I really need to give you a lesson or two about it, I’ll explain to you later though, I’ve gotta catch my bus!” 

“Wait, where do you live? Maybe I could drive you home!” I shouted to her. She paused and turned around, she smiled at me and shook her head. She said, “You’re new to Singapore, I’m sure you don’t know where Tampines is!” 

She lives near me? Oh wow, what a coincidence…

I replied, “I actually live in Tampines, plus my assistant is coming to pick up, he is pretty good with directions.” dropped and she said loudly, “You have an assistant?! Walou eh, you rich ah is it? Wah wah wah, but never mind la. I’ll just take the bus!” She smiled at me once again and waved goodbye at me, before skipping off to the bus stop. Her cheerfulness was starting to irk me slightly and what is with the weird accent and words? I’m guessing it’s just like Baekhyun when he speaks in his accent when he gets over-excited or something. 

Yi Xing soon came to pick me up in his car and when I got into the car, he asked, “How was your first day at NUS?” I replied, “Just fine…” 

Yi Xing laughed and said, “Just fine? Are you sure it was just  fine, Joon Myun?” I replied, “okay, it was pretty fun. I met this girl called Ting Yi and she –

“Ohh… a girl huh?” Yi Xing smirked.

“YAH! Zhang Yi Xing, it’s not what you think! She’s just… very weird, how can someone be so cheerful and talkative? I’ve never met anyone like her in my life! But she’s got a weird accent and she says weird things some times and I still don’t understand what Singlish means.” Yi Xing said, “Oh you’ll learn soon enough. It takes time and once you adapt to your surroundings in Singapore, Singlish will be a breeze! You’ll see la. Oh goodness, see? Singlish will become so natural to you after a few years, especially when the people near you always speak in Singlish. Singlish is part of the Singapore culture and it’s technically a language, I suppose.” I nodded and tried to understand what Yi Xing was saying about Singlish, I guess I’ll be needing those Singlish lessons from Ting Yi soon…

A.N: Hi there everyone, I wanted this chapter to be a bit longer but I think you guys all want to read this chapter so I hope it’s not terrible. :( And I know what you’re thinking right now, for Singaporeans, you’re probably lmao-ing about the Singlish and other non-Singaporeans, I’m pretty sure you’re confused just like Joon Myun about Singlish. XD I’m so sorry, I just HAD TO add in Singlish, although I don’t speak as much Singlish as much as my friends, I thought of adding Singlish to be slightly different from the other fan-fics there. I’m really sorry if it’s not your style, please comment down below what you think about the Singlish. Yay or nay? And LOL Yi Xing speaking Singlish! XD Haha, can you imagine?? And I don’t really know how to do introduction for characters, I hope it was fine. AND YES, SHE’S AN EXOSTAN/EXOTIC. :D You’ll find out eventually why I did that… I hope you have enjoyed reading and thanks for everything! ^^