i told myself i couldn’t have such hatred, but perhaps the only way to really get over someone is to hate that person. it’s okay. once i get over him i’ll forget him and i’ll lose the hatred too. no i’m not bitter. it’s just like being annoyed and angry and then being a bitch and scolding someone, my forte. after that you don’t remember it anymore, because it’s not even worth the 2mb in your brain.

from breaking hearts to two-timing to toying with feelings - what is he not capable of? he is not the least bothered about hurting others. why did i get so sad over this kind of man??? pffft. not worth my time or tears or heart. guys are adept at being jerksfuckers, and you can never believe what a man tells you, not one word. some things he repeated all the time, and thankfully i heard but i didn’t listen. but i’m not mad because he doesn’t want me. it’s the way he handled things after that.

this is what you wanted, isn’t it? for me to hate you. now your wish is granted, so go sleep in peace. you obviously don’t care about how others feel. and today you confirmed what i’ve always suspected. but no worries, i can play this game too. i must have been crazy to imagine being with you in the long run. look at how you handle things. close your eyes, pretend it’s not there, hide under mommy’s skirt eh? this kind of guy cannot handle any sort of responsibility, because all he’ll do is shirk it and then swept the mess under the carpet.

i know you don’t love me because someone who loves me would never want me in this state. in this fucked up state i’ve been for the past 2.5 weeks. and no, not one are you ok? or i’m sorry to hurt you like this but instead, he’s the one getting angry and then ignoring me altogether. he doesn’t give a flying fuck to any consequences, now or then. it doesn’t concern him anymore and thus it’s none of his business, selfish bastard. he can be hypocritical and delete my little harmless facebook comment that was made in good humour, ignore me for 2 weeks now, and yet pretends he still cares. hahahaha don’t make my toes laugh.

yes it’s a painful lesson and also a long, costly mistake. haha cynical me actually taking that leap of faith, and then ending up with another battlewound. how not to be jaded, you tell me? do you remember july where you supposedly were making the right choices for me? what gives you the right to know what’s best for me? you make the right choice for yourself. i made that mistake so many times, thinking it’s the best for you. how did you feel? whatever it is, it doesn’t matter anymore. as long as you’re happy this way, i’ll accept it.

—————-

all that was written last night. i didn’t want to post this at first, but why should i self-censor on my blog? now i’m feeling quite blasé. maybe everything was just a cruel joke. maybe his sis told him to ignore me or he never did love me right from the beginning. maybe he’s got another girl in his arms and is laughing at me right now. maybe his objective is to make me hate him. no matter the reason, bottom line is, he wants nothing to do with me anymore. so all i can do now is respect that :)

i know it’s gonna take time, but it’s stupid not moving on when he already has. i don’t think he’s ever loved me, if his actions are anything to go by. from april all the way to june, then july, then october. yes it’s my fault for being indecisive and mean, but he’s also to blame for being the spineless guy who doesn’t know what he wants. not like he treated me very well either. i believe that he never did love me to begin with, and i was just being an idiot. but mpr, it’s over, damage done, just do damage control now. not too late; never too late.

molly cheers me up :) princess and the queen! (from facebook)

i love the drum drum molly. she looks like a teardrop fifa with her reddened cheeks and pouted lips! so adorable~ and yea, i kinda feel you right now =’)

this is the classic molly the painter! hauntingly beautiful, no? i think she’s akin to a clown. clowns are meant to be funny, but the result? some find them scary, some love the harlequin. for me it’s a mixture of both, and that is definitely intriguing. it reminds me of plath and her bees. morbid fascination.

listening to penny tai and aiza segurra on my ipod also makes me feel at peace. and maybe i feel a little weak due to my giddiness, but i’ve never been frail. i’ve always been radiant, healthy, sunkissed. and i know this is not going to last. no more crying until i feel like i have epilepsy. no need for referrals to neurologists. inner strength, inner peace, god’s love, fantastic friends, more than sufficient. oh, and a little chocolate won’t do any harm :)

yes, when i think of him my heart hurts. i can’t seem to bring myself to hate him. all i’m left with is an overwhelming sense of sadness and disappointment. perhaps it was inevitable; something had to be done, and he decided to be the baddie. i understand that. but he had gone ahead and decided to give up completely. when did our love become not worth it anymore? i thought i meant more to you. so yes, if he can be so heartless, i’d rather believe he didn’t love me in the first place.

to be fair, i know why his reasons for not wanting me. sick of the want-don’t-want, the vacillations. what i don’t know, is his reason for ignoring me. maybe to make me give up. s, you still don’t understand me huh. remember there was once i ignored you for three days and you were dying already? what makes you think i am any different? but you can be so much meaner than i am. girls are so stupid. nice girls are always doormats. and then guys just treat them like, well, doormats. i find myself smiling as i type all these. which is weird =.= but it’s good. simply smiles. my tears might flow but i am still smiling. because i know, and i understand. when one party decides he/she wants out, the other one can really do nothing but wish him/her all the best :)

plato thinks that people want to get out of the cave, but a lot of people would rather not expose themselves to the world outside, like how people refuse to fall in love, in fear of having their heart trampled upon. and yet others are thankful for their experiences. it’s a kind of bittersweet feeling, when you are both grateful that god arranged for you to fall so deeply in love with someone, yet you know you can never go back to the time of being an ingenue with wide-eyed wonder, curious about the world and your untainted head filled with youthful idealism, thinking that everyone is good by nature. indeed, the harder you fall, the more difficult it is to climb out of the hole. but greater challenges, as everyone knows, make you a much hardier person. tougher, stronger, wiser. but it also makes you never want to fall into a hole again.

like the pun here. from wikipedia:

In Greek mythology, Sisyphus, was a king punished in Tartarus by being cursed to roll a huge boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll down again, and to repeat this throughout eternity.

Today, Sisyphean can be used as an adjective meaning that an activity is unending and/or repetitive. It could also be used to refer to tasks that are pointless and unrewarding.

i leave you with this:

again, from pearls before swine.

it’s been 2.5 weeks, and clearly only one party is suffering. he certainly doesn’t care. and no, no more self-pity, no more ‘what if’s, and no more doing stupid things to numb the pain. he doesn’t love me, he never did love me, and he never will. i will get over you, no doubt about it. not worth it doing this for a mere male. thank you for everything la, no more hard feelings. just hope you’re happy with this la.

i’m not going to pretend that it’s all okay.

it’s gonna take as long as it’s gonna take. sure it feels horrible, but there’s nothing i can do. after all we’ve been through, there’s really nothing left to say. i did try my best and there was a week when the 2-day curse didn’t exist. yet at the end of that week he chose to pull out of my life, and i have learned to accept it. i did my best and i have no regrets. this is his choice. yes i will respect it but it doesn’t mean that i am okay with it.

i for one should be familiar with the transience in life. the only constant is change. it’s just a little scary how ‘love’ can snuff out just like that. ah, c’est la vie. and you realise you never really knew the people you thought you did.

you learn to be stronger, then you find yourself being broken down, then you learn to be stronger again. but in actuality, you never learn. you keep getting sucked into this whirlpool, willingly. not the first time, never the last.

the trouble with love is.

but no matter what i do, i’ll simply smile. i am not you - i will not hide behind a smile, not anymore. that was so 2000. i will just smile when i mean it. i have no need to hide anything.

the thing about family is they never, ever stop loving you. they’re always there for you to fall back on. no matter how estranged you might be. no matter how many times you’ve screwed up.

guys are just jerks lah.

love is not about it being worth it or not. humans always think of whether something is worth my time/effort, what’s the opportunity cost, what’s in it for me, he doesn’t deserve you, you don’t deserve her… i say screw it. why must there be something “in it for me”? do mums say, if i buy my 3-year-old kid an ice-cream, maybe he won’t put me in a home for the aged 30 years later? does God say, if i bless this woman, will i get an extra $50 in tithes or she’ll do a good deed for someone else? LOVE DOESN’T WORK THAT WAY. it’s probably the only thing that can make humans this stupid, but it’s also the only thing that make humans human. it’s not about what you get back, at least not tangibly.

in canada, we went to a home to sing christmas carols. sure, i’ve had praises on my singing before, and yes i appreciate them,  but when it comes from an elderly woman in a wheelchair with tears in her eyes, struggling to get the words out, you can hardly take it lightly.

angela was so worked up after chatting with a guy staying at the home. she was on the verge of tears, probably due to her korean background. “these people actually have children; their children just don’t want them!” and “in korea they would never send their parents to a home!” this was very unstandable - visiting such places does make you realise a lot. but it wasn’t the first time for me, and perhaps my heart has been hardened, but i told her “if the children are busy, or don’t have the means to take care of their parents, then perhaps putting them under professional care will be the best, especially under pallative conditions.” but nobody would like to go to a home. no senior would like to live with other old people; in singapore the elderly mostly like to see the children and the youth, even in their neighbourhood. the government here has built these homes near schools so that schoolgoing children can do their mandatory community service there, but children often dislike seniors. myself, i can hardly claim to be detached from these people.

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in penang we used to go down to the night bazaar and buy dramas, RM4 for one piece and buy 10 get 1 free lol. then we’d trade them and circulate them all around. so yes while my miserably meagre 1MBPS maxis (altho not as meagre as portable internet in canada wtf where we yelled at each other for downloading and slowing the speed sigh) internet cannot compare to my 10MBPS i have here in singapore, i was never short of dramas or movies to watch. i’d have hong kong dramas and gossip girl and the l word and little britain and bones and even spongebob squarepants and really any mainstream shows. so while i don’t suppose you can find y tu mama tambien at these night bazaars. (which reminds me, i love how they don’t sell porn. but then again my friend says you have to ask them =.=)  anyway gossip girl is boring. i couldn’t even bring myself to watch the last episode of season 1. blair and jenny parts are nice, the rest are super boring yawn. and how i met your mother has started i’m so happy =D sigh.

my life is so boring. argh december hurry up already! i just hope i won’t be too broke by then to enjoy you *sniff* fat hope la i’m going to be owing money at this rate T_T and next year… where will i be next year? i still want to go all over the place and i didn’t volunteer anywhere this year =( home & life sent me an email about their new website and it made me miss all the little rascals so much (and my god they are natural camwhores. i hope their english is half as good as their camwhoring skills). i miss thailand so much it has almost been a year since i came back from chiang rai. and when will i finally get to backpack in vietnam?? haiya i want to go everywhere.  who wants to come with meeeee??? (backpacking please i live from hand to mouth)

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these few days i cried a lot. when i finally thought i had decided what route i should take, it seems that someone had already decided for me, that it was not to be. don’t count your chickens before they hatch, but who says that ducks aren’t just as good, if not better than chickens? so i picked the ducks instead. i’m still lucky to be able to have ducklings even though my first choice were chicks. but after tonight i realise my first choice should have been ducklings right from the start. why would anyone think the ‘ugly’ duckling is ugly? i think it’s special.

when i was young(er - haha), i’d watch those 7pm dramas while having dinner, (my mom would always scold me because my rice would all be cold by the time 8pm rolls around.) and i thought how awful it was for a woman to give birth to a disabled (mentally or physically) kid. i know dear mrs kan would shake her head sadly and say a silent prayer for the mother and her kid, haha (mrs kan, i miss u!). as i grew older, and been to hospital and homes to do volunteer work, i think these people are really special. some time ago, i went to a friend’s family and saw a very special girl. she was very pretty, and you know she wasn’t like normal folks, but she was very endearing. it made you notice her, a little girl that you normally wouldn’t give a second glance to. it was as if she was attracting you to love her more. she would cry easily, and it really hurt to see her in pain. i wondered if i would be lucky enough to love someone in special need like her one day. always thought that having a special needs kid teaches you more about love than having a normal kid does. if i were to have a special needs kid one day, i’d thank god for choosing me to love and have such a special child. if i have the means to, i’d definitely adopt. not an exotic child for an international family unlike ms UN ambassador a.k.a. show-off, but a precious, special child.

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I never want to forget those raw emotions that made me so resolute on certain things, those intense feelings that motivated or even inspired me. But as I return to my old livejournals and read some entries, I find myself asking who that girl is. Was I ever that funny or angsty or sad or happy? I don’t seem to remember much of that girl. She’s like a fleeting shadow that I once fell in love with, but has since retired to the old quarters of my memory that I hardly polish. That intensity of love still manages to eke out a tinge of pain, but that’s all that evicts. That’s all that it provokes. A song from one of my favourite musicals reminded me of this familiar instant - The Confrontation from Miss Saigon. This American soldier loved this Vietnamese girl with all his heart, and even married her and gave her a child. But after he returned to the US, he cleanly forgot about her and started a new life with another woman. The audience would scream of an unfaithful, irresponsible man, but it is not uncommon. It is not unthinkable, and it is definitely not inexplicable. How many people out there are faultless? How many people have never made a mistake in their lives? How many people have just truly loved one person in their lives? Perhaps such people exist, but people who don’t dare to love, haven’t truly lived. Unfortunately, I think I am becoming such a person.

Have I truly become someone who’s willing to live a simple life, content to stand by the sidelines and blend in with the crowd? Really, what is the merit of being different? An ordinary life, with a husband and lovely children, with a good job, with a good education - what’s not to like? Yet why do I hanker for something else? Why do I yearn for something more, something out of the ordinary? These are not words of a cheating wife, or the thoughts of an old man willing to shell out diamonds for that young foxy lady hanging off his arm. I used to wonder how people can be happy with their 8-5 jobs and their mundane lifestyles. Now it seems that there is nothing wrong with being content with their lot. Soon, I am going to bid teenhood goodbye, and take on life as an adult. Have I been adulterated (pun not intended) by life and its way of life (pun not intended either)? I used to like Michael Learns To Rock and wonder what’s it like to live those experiences of love that they croon in their songs. But now that I’m older and had tastes of what love’s like, those love songs lose their meaning. Love definitely isn’t unique, so why is everyone pursuing it? Why does everyone pursue things that are a dime a dozen? A high-paying job, a loving wife, obedient children who grow up to become doctors, lawyers and engineers…

One dream dies, and one dream starts. Have I lost myself in the process? Perhaps life sets out to put you right, and those that do not conform just lie as outcasts and sing their own happy song. To each his own? I no longer want to be in the thick of things - I know I bruise easily, and will be chucked out like a bad apple in an instant. I would rather watch from the sidelines, watching each move intently like spectators at a football match, cheering whenever a goal is scored, and dissing when a foul committed, even shouting “referee kayu” with fellow supporters. Or like the audience at a musical, wide-eyed and thoroughly taken by the protagonist. Is it wrong to be angry with the other team for winning? Is it wrong to feel too much for the main female lead, and neglect all the others? To be opinionated is one thing, and to be biased is another. Appeal to Emotion, a logical fallacy, as Philosophy calls it.

Okay I have to stop abruptly because there are too many distractions in multiple digressions. I’d make a brilliant lecturer ;)

Perhaps I was really born to disappoint.

I’m tired. I have things to do rather than sit around and wait for the call that never comes, only to listen to more lies. Lies that are meant to coax and humour. Lies that have the total opposite effect. But still. Like a drug, it hooks you. Infatuation is a dangerous word, and obsession a deadly one. It’s like keeping from reaching from another cigarette from the packet. The temptation is huge, you know you’re just killing yourself one cigarette at a time. But you still do it because you’re addicted. To the supposedly wondrous high feeling that just makes you feel cheap after. Like a used fifty-dollar whore. Like a hungover drunkard with shady images of the night before.

Enough is enough. Damn, times like this, even Kungfu Panda can speak to you. Just because you’re too shitted up caught in your own world that you fail to wake and let the fresh air bring you to your senses. To let the cold turkey wake you from your misery. You know you’re in a bottomless abyss, and yet you’d rather keep on falling. Only to hit the cold, hard ground, headfirst.

By then, you’ve already suffered a serious concussion, with cuts on your face and a broken neck. Still you would willingly do it all over again, in hopes that all this giving will finally lead somewhere. It’s not the first time, and every time you tell yourself it’s the last. It’s the last cigarette I’ll ever touch. It’s the last drink of alcohol for me. It’s the last lie I’ll believe. And it never is.

You’d give up your job, opportunities, advancement chances in a heartbeat just to be with your sweetheart. Not to mention money, time, effort spent on making him or her happy. Love makes one lose sight of their senses willingly. Others may call that stupid, but when you’re in the thick of it, nothing is. Nothing is when you’re blinded by this overwhelming sensation of love just swelling and bursting out from your chest. People addicted to say, coke, give up their entire family fortune for gram after gram of this heavenly substance. Resort to stealing and abandoning any shred of moral fibre they once possessed. Obsession is a fatal word indeed. Is is stupid, or is it love?  Yet would you be with someone just because they can help you climb the corporate ladder? Tonnes of people are willing to do anything to make their mark, even if it means sacrificing their true happiness. Call it a priority of importance.

History teaches us about great dead men, their triumphs, glories and their mistakes. Some people might think, what a hero; to have loved and lost and lived, to have caroused and celebrated and cried. But where does it go in the end? What happened to the words you uttered, what happened to the love you gave, what happened to the dreams you had? In the end you become emptier yet chock-full of secrets that you cannot tell, you become wiser yet wisen, more experienced yet more miserable than you have ever been. One would think that one would learn from his mistakes. Yet why does history keep repeating itself? Some irreparable genetic attribute and characteristic of humans, perhaps. Which is why we choose to love, knowing fully well we will get hurt, and yet choose it all over again after we barely heal.

What happens to those who do learn? They close themselves up and dare not love, dare not subject themselves to vulnerabilities, dare not take another plunge into the dark hole of blackness. In the end, they shrivel up and harden, trying to be as inconspicuous as they can. Wise, cowardly, or just plain sad? It’s not for any of us to judge. They simply have a need to protect their hearts from being mercilessly ripped to pieces.

wow… i just came home from my lesson and omg i took a super old-school sbs (now smrt) bus! i haven’t been on one of those in years. i remember taking them and having to regain my balance while i fed my ‘mrt card’ through the red machine and pressing the 45c button, then just running to my seat, aka whereever you land when you finally manage to stop running (because the bus is taking off!). of course, my mum or whoever’s taking me out would then come along and scold me for sitting too far away from them (very wtf right i chose the seat first leh!) irregardless, i tell ya, it’s better than the knight bus. the bus tonight resembled one of those old creepy, rundown hospitals in japanese horror movies, where the exit sign is the exact shade of garish red, flashing like the emergency sign at a byoin, only with incessant beeping noises.

i just typed all of the above in like 10 seconds. *catches breath before it runs away again*

hahah penang buses are run down and old and the exterior may resemble that of the old-school smrt bus but they are really different. penang buses have two categories. the old white & blue buses and the new, rapidpenang buses. i’ve had my share of weird encounters on penang buses, and that after hearing those you might not want to send your kid to school on a penang bus hahah. smrt bus drivers are reckless yes, but when they stop to let you alight they make sure they slow down (so sweet right!). who can forget those smooth brown chairs that are so much more comfortable (and hygenic, really!) than the current furry seats on buses now, where all the bacteria thrive! >:D *cue fat man & perverts jokes*

who can forget collecting those pink/yellow sbs/smrt bus tickets?? some people had a huge collection, with the wordings fading off slower than that of a movie ticket. i remember huge creative artworks made from these little scraps of paper, and of course, the horrible littering in buses. tickets could be found in every nook and cranny of seats, all folded up into tiny squares or rolled up like little ciggie butts.

when it was coming to my stop, i glanced at the bars anxiously looking for the bells, only to remember that the bells were on the sills. handles were still round - i remember sliding my hand through and taking them for bangles as a kid, and there were individual seats as well.

it just isn’t the same, having futuristic-looking ezlink devices installed near the doors of the old sbs bus, looking awkwardly out of place, as if it were a little girl dolled up in diamonds and adorned in the best silk wandering among the slums and squatters of india (or any other country, really).

anyone who knows me should know that my favourite form of transportation is the bus. it used to be airplanes, then i got sick of it just like any frequent flyer. up till a few years ago, whenever i was sad or just needed a place to think, i would take the 67 bus at night to the end, then alight, cross the road and take the same bus in the opposite direction. bus rides are ideal for thinking, for long conversations, for just watching people. perhaps my love for buses stem from my childhood, a reminder of simpler times before where everything was so much easier, a reminder of 1990s singapore where it wasn’t all that much of a stepford wife.

i wonder how i have willingly given up my simplistic life for one that’s materialistic, for one that finds the simple notion of faithful love sickening, for one that i would never would be proud to have ten years ago.

have we grown up, or have we deteriorated?

i love it when i’m outside with a friend, getting up to our usual antics, and end up making a stranger smile at our silliness. a smile is such a great thing to induce, which is precisely why i love poking fun at others. some are able to tahan it, but some have no sense of humour whatsoever, which results in a rather awkward moment hehe. oh well.

i do suppose happy people do attract people. i’m always happy to be around a happy person, but while withdrawn folks may scare people away, i think i unknowingly try to do my best to make them smile. it’s like those soldiers you see outside palaces. they have a stern/serious face, and people keep trying to make them have some sort of expression. when i was in kl we went to the sultan’s palace and you know, there was this soldier in red on a horse. I SAW THAT SOLDIER SMILE!! hahaha some guy wanted to put his kid on the horse heheheh so cute la. in canada, we never let people sit alone at dinner. anyone sitting alone at dinner had to join our table. kind of reminds me of lilo and stitch. ohana means family. family means no one gets left behind. or forgotten.

there’s this online friend that i have on my msn, and her dog just passed away. maltese, 12 years. at first she made me really sad and i didn’t know what to say, but then she showed me her dog on her display pic, and i tried to cheer her up. loss is something i had to deal with at an early age, and i know that death is part and parcel of life, and that God put me through so much to make me the person i am today. but i didn’t want to be numb. in the past, i told myself to be strong, to be emotionless, to be the iron man that others aren’t. then i realised i didn’t want to be that person, to desensitise myself, to lose fundamental feelings that maketh a man. i wanted to feel, to be able to empathise, to be able to put myself in someone else’s shoes to be passionate about a cause, but yet not get too emotionally involved or affected. as i grow older, i think i’ve finally managed to somewhat succeed. it’s hard, especially when you’re a female, but it’s plausible. crying is not a sign of weakness, but a sign of realisation, of a connection within you that has changed its wiring, of a beginning that you’re starting to accept new things and surroundings. a sign that you’re growing even more, even stronger, even hardier.

what do i say to someone who’s just lost her loved dog of 12 years? i’m not a pet owner; i can hardly empathise. but all grief is both similar and different. they have their roots in loss, in longing, in pain. this is a powerful emotion that can bring the strongest man to his knees. but every connection between lives is different, and it’s impossible to stereotype grief and read it like a textbook. everyone has their own way of coping with grief, and for her, she’s been keeping to herself and refusing to talk to anyone about it. i don’t know why she told me about it, especially since i’m just an online friend who’s not really close to her, but i’m touched. i thought she would be defensive and not really take me seriously, but she did, and indeed, i can’t affect you without you affecting me. happiness is a perfume you can’t spread without getting a little on yourself. if not more. when will people learn that grief is okay? it’s natural, it’s a perfectly healthy process after a loved one’s demise. take things at one time; there’s no need to rush. “don’t cry because she’s no longer with you, but smile because you had her love & company for 12 years.” it’s like the end of a romantic relationship, but with death, it’s never the end of a relationship. it’s a beginning of another phase of your relationship. one that can withstand long distance without contact, one that can last all eternity. what you have now, is so much better than what you lost. you’ve had fond memories, her legacy, her offspring that remind you of her. and you know that she’s still with you. when a loved one dies, she stays with you in your heart forever. she’s never really gone from you.

(and then there’s all that usual stuff about her being in a better place, back to her maker, only a matter of time before you see her again. false promises, i call them. i believe in god yes, but not everyone does. to push my beliefs onto someone else by force? not going to do much for her grief. i don’t do false promises that i am unable to guarantee. i am not one to honour this promise. i speak of logic and perspectives.)

when my grandma died last year, i didn’t feel as sad as i thought i would. i felt that my mum and aunts were selfish to keep her alive for so long. she’d been groaning in pain for so long, and still they kept her alive because they wanted her to be with them, just a little while longer. selfish is what it is. they made her go through painful chemo sessions and even considered operations that they knew she couldn’t take because of her weight. by the end of it all, she had lost all her long, shiny, black hair and was nothing more than skin and bones. she didn’t even remember me, or her daughters. what is the purpose of keeping her alive? does it make you happy to see your own mother in such a state of pain every single day? why do the authorities not see the humanity in euthanasia?

speaking of euthanasia, the aforementioned friend had her dog put down by euthanasia. i think it was for the best, since her dog had kidney problems, and was in great suffering. my friend had to cut short her overseas trip and rush home to see her dying canine. i’m not a pet owner, as i mentioned earlier, and i support darwin’s theory of evolution, and so to see how animals have better treatment in terms of choices than us humans is just mind-boggling. but this is not an entry about euthanasia, and i shall not go into it at length.

i don’t mind making a fool out of myself as long as people are happy. i do say the darnest things sometimes, which also includes putting myself on a pedestal to have people laugh at my narcissism. even something simple like holding the door open for others makes me warm inside. i’m really not all that complicated. a simple smile, a simple gesture of appreciation is enough to make me happy. that is precisely why i want to do something humanitarian as a career. i am in pursuit of my own simple happiness, and it stems not from eros but from phileos and agape.

there’s been nothing much of interest for me to blog about since i’ve been stuck at home all day doing nothing but watching tv shows and playing pokemon sapphire study, so i’m just going to move old posts from all over the place here. random musings, yes.

26 sept 2007, originally posted in my notes in facebook

A long time ago (we used to be friends… haha ok no), I used to wonder how it was like. I used to sit by the viewing gallery in Changi Airport (which still looks like ice-cream after all these years) and watch planes take off and soar into the sky, imagining the initial adrenaline rush, the cloud-watching and the feeling like affluent, upper-middle class people sitting watching movies while pretty air stewardesses served you drinks and smiles.

I remember when I was young, one of my ambitions was to work at an airport. No, not be an air stewardess because that didn’t pay well (I know, I was practical as a child ok… hello I’m Singaporean?) but because it was one of the places, like TV studios) that made me feel classy. I used to walk along the corridors at the local TV station, behind glamourous TV actresses who walked in heels along the glossy marble floor making those click-clack sounds that I now find so annoying. How things change. Anyway. I guess being at the airport gave me a similar feeling. I had my fill of haughty actresses and glaring cameras, and looked towards the airports instead. My friends and I used to go to the airport just for kicks. Some place to hang out. We’d have fun with the trolleys and have ice-cream at Swensen’s, or go to the library and attempt to get some studying done. Pretend to be tourists and speak in fake accents. Take the new MRT line to the airport and spend the night there, watching foreign workers lay down their mats and get awakened by the alarm at 6am. Sleep for a couple o’ hours and finding out our thick textbooks make pretty good pillows (or maybe finding out we really could sleep anywhere).

Part of the surge of going overseas was the plane ride. Short flights to destinations an hour away were always part of the draw and the lure of a holiday (which I didn’t have many of). On my first long trip (24 hours) to Canada, I was the only excited person, smiling to herself and actually listened attentively to the instructions regarding the life jackets and oxygen masks. Fast forward just a little, and the excitement of a plane flight has gone. Perhaps too much of a good thing is really plus plus equals minus. You learn to sleep through most part of the ride and let the pretty ‘jie jie’ wake you up for meals. You pick the window seats not for the views but for undisturbed reading. You go on seatguru.com to pick the seats with the most leg room. And all you think about is getting yourself occupied for the entire plane trip. There was no more gum chewing during take off (of course, not in my case), no more imagining/day dreaming, no more looking forward to actually getting some free time thinking and planning.

Well yeah, considering how Canada killed all my enthusiasm, the last point can actually be disregarded. Still, I miss it. The late nights at the airports feeling like an adult, the strolling in Narita Airport in Tokyo with a newfound friend looking for food, the smirking at a customs officer (oh this.. I was carrying a heavy box full of notes on my last trip from Detroit Airport and the customs guy didn’t let me wheel my stuff on a trolley:
Me: No, I can’t carry these on my own (points at luggage)
Customs guy: Actually, you’re only allowed 7KG for hand-carry. I also dunno why they allowed you to bring that on board. (Okay you can see that the guy’s Singaporean. & my box weighed about, what, >25KG?)
Me: Um I don’t know. Maybe because they’re so much nicer than you are? (promptly pushes trolley through and strolls off before the guy figures out what I said (I can speak like a machine gun when I want to). He’s Singaporean la, takes some time to process things. Ok yeah I get the irony.)), finding out you can charge your laptop at some airports, duty-free shopping, hanging out at airport lounges with bratty kids who never shut up (ok so you get the bad with the good)…

Now, as my peers all send out emails and notes telling people when they’ll fly off to some far-flung country, that strong sense of longing returns. Perhaps I’m not so immune to peer pressure after all. Perhaps it’s the jaded been-there-done-that-but-still-miss-it-secretly attitude. I still go to the airport, like every month now, but the feeling has changed. I know that in the next few years or so, it’ll still continue to change. It’s the classic case of “going away, finding out home is still the best, and still don’t wanna come home”. The draw of being away from home is still there. Returning to Singapore still hasn’t made me want to be here permanently. I’ve always known that I was going to be a “quitter”, in SM Goh’s words, but a part of me still thinks I will change my mind in the end. Perhaps Singapore will always be Where I come from, but never Where my heart is.

I am still intrigued by the flight (flighty? hah) business, reading Richard Branson’s biography and the latest AirAsia story, learning about Southwest’s business model, loving Changi’s new Budget Terminal… I guess the charm of the airports will always be there. Mention airport to me and I’d think of dim streetlights, red car lamps, cold rushes of air, the anticipation of somewhere foreign, hugs before going in, and tears after the departure gates.