As heard in poetry-recital! Talks about how what is to be commemorated is either overly or never so. :D
Cultural reference explanation in the comments!
#commemoration (n.)
glacial lintel
every monday at 7.30
The flag raising ceremony, in which we pay respects to the flag, and sing 2–5 regional/provincial/city or municipal/school hymns, depending on where in the country you're from. This is also the time to make announcements for the week. It takes about an hour or so. Most of us dislike it, especially if you're standing under the morning sun and on top of wet dirt
sometimes on cement, mostly in mud—depending on the kind of poor you are
Double entendre. Some of us are in private schools, most of us are in public. Also, in my own school, the way to the Special Science Classes is cemented, while the paths to the different Senior High and Vocational Junior High (this was me pre-graduation!) are left untouched, hence why we get to our rooms with muddy shoes
floor wax as red...
Most public classrooms are bare polished concrete, touched up once a week/month by us, the students, with red StarWax. It's a tiring thing
beige/green/blue uniforms depending on the day
Teachers actually do have uniform rotation. The newest one is more forgiving (I think) as it makes you repeat the blue uniform for Tuesday and Thursday, unlike the previous set which has one per weekday
four quarters
Our school year is divided into four. It'll be divided into three the next school year
TLE
Technical Livelihood Education, basically Home Ec for high school. In vocational high schools like mine, it's TVE, Technical Vocational Education
even if a vocational career is never commemorated
Here, if you go for the arts, you get looked down upon. If you're a fisherman or a seamstress or anything that doesn't give you five digits, you've flopped in life. Asia, amirite
josé protacio rizal mercado y alonso realonda
That's... that's his full name. Yeah. National hero, killed by firing squad for his work against Spain
noli and fili
Noli me Tangere (Touch Me Not) and El Filibusterismo (The Reign of Greed) for short. Rizal's two works, required reading