Forever missed: Hong in a group photo with her class in 2010. Low is standing in the third row on the far right.
PETALING JAYA: A lazy student met a great teacher who changed his life, but Leon Low never got to say thank you.
The 22-year-old Low said it was the hardest moment of his life when he heard that the teacher Hong Mei Jing, 38, had died in the Batang Kali tragedy.
Suddenly, it was too late to say thank you.
Hong was among six teachers of SJK(C) Mun Choong in Kuala Lumpur who perished in the landslide.
Low, who now works in the food and beverage sector, was a student at SJK(C) Jinjang Tengah 1 when Hong was teaching there.
“I was in Year Four and Hong was my teacher. I didn’t like her because she always criticised me but now I realise she did it for my own good,” he said.
“At that time, my school results were very poor and the teacher let me into her home for tuition and her mother treated me very well,” he recalled.
“When I read the news, I was stunned. I couldn’t believe it was true,” he said.
“We met in an optical shop once, but even then, I did not say ‘thank you, teacher’.
“I never saw her after that but now, it’s too late,” he added.
Low is planning to go to Japan in April this year to further his studies.
But he will always carry with him the memories of the teacher who helped shape him into what he is now.
“If not because of her, I’d have achieved nothing,” he said.
